On the day in 1940 that Italy enters the war, two things happen to the 12-year-old Renato: he gets his first bike, and he gets his first look at Malèna. She is a beautiful, silent outsider who's moved to this Sicilian town to be with her husband, Nico. He promptly goes off to war, leaving her to the lustful eyes of the men and the sharp tongues of the women. During the next few years, as Renato grows toward manhood, he watches Malèna suffer and prove her mettle. He sees her loneliness, then grief when Nico is reported dead, the effects of slander on her relationship with her father, her poverty and search for work, and final humiliations. Will Renato learn courage from Malèna and stand up for her?
In the first year of the German occupation of France, Shosanna Dreyfus (Melanie Laurent) witnesses the execution of her family at the hand of Nazi Colonel Hans Landa (Christoph Waltz). Shosanna narrowly escapes and flees to Paris where she forges a new identity as the owner and operator of a cinema.
Elsewhere in Europe, Lieutenant Aldo Raine (Brad Pitt) organizes a group of Jewish American soldiers to perform swift, shocking acts of retribution. Later known to their enemy as "the basterds," Raine's squad joins German actress and undercover agent Bridget von Hammersmark (Diane Kruger) on a mission to take down the leaders of the Third Reich. Fates converge under a cinema marquis, where Shosanna is poised to carry out a revenge plan of her own....
Employing pulp and propaganda in equal measure, Quentin Tarantino's INGLOURIOUS BASTERDS weaves together infamous, oppressed, real and larger-than-life stories of WWII.
Starring: Brad Pitt, Melanie Laurent, Christoph Waltz, Eli Roth, Til Schweiger, Daniel Bruhl, Diane Kruger, Michael Fassbender, Mike Myers, B.J. Novak
Directed by: Quentin Tarantino
The year is 1941 and the Jews of Eastern Europe are being massacred by the thousands. Managing to escape certain death, three brothers take refuge in the dense surrounding woods they have known since childhood. There they begin their desperate battle against the Nazis. Daniel Craig, Liev Schreiber and Jamie Bell star as brothers who turn a primitive struggle to survive into something far more consequential – a way to avenge the deaths of their loved ones by saving thousands of others.
At first it is all they can do to stay alive. But gradually, as whispers of their daring spreads, they begin to attract others – men and women, young and old – willing to risk everything for the sake of even a moment’s freedom. Tuvia (CRAIG) is a reluctant leader and his decisions are challenged by his brother, Zus (SCHREIBER) who worries that Tuvia’s idealistic plans will doom them all. Asael (BELL) is the youngest – caught between his brothers’ fierce rivalry. As a brutal winter descends, they work to create a community, and to keep faith alive when all humanity appeared to be lost.
Cast: Daniel Craig, Liev Schreiber, Jamie Bell, Alexa Davalos
Directed by Edward Zwick
Script: Clayton Frohman, Edward Zwick
Joe Wright, the BAFTA Award-winning director of "Pride & Prejudice," has reunited with his filmmaking team and his Academy Award-nominated actress, Keira Knightley, for another classic British romance, starring James McAvoy (BAFTA Award nominee for "The Last King of Scotland") opposite Ms. Knightley. Christopher Hampton (Academy Award winner for "Dangerous Liaisons") has written the screenplay adaptation of Ian McEwan's best-selling 2002 novel Atonement. Shot on location in the U.K., the film's story spans several decades. In 1935, 13-year-old fledgling writer Briony Tallis (Saoirse Ronan) and her family live a life of wealth and privilege in their enormous mansion. On the warmest day of the year, the country estate takes on an unsettling hothouse atmosphere, stoking Briony's vivid imagination. Robbie Turner (Mr. McAvoy), the educated son of the family's housekeeper, carries a torch for Briony's headstrong older sister Cecilia (Ms. Knightley). Cecilia, he hopes, has comparable feelings; all it will take is one spark for this relationship to combust. When it does, Briony - who has a crush on Robbie - is compelled to interfere, going so far as accusing Robbie of a crime he did not commit. Cecilia and Robbie declare their love for each other, but he is arrested - and with Briony bearing false witness, the course of three lives is changed forever. Briony continues to seek forgiveness for her childhood misdeed. Through a terrible and courageous act of imagination, she finds the path to her uncertain atonement, and to an understanding of the power of enduring love.
Cast: Keira Knightley, James McAvoy, Romola Garai, Saoirse Ronan, Brenda Blethyn, Vanessa Redgrave, Juno Temple
Directed by Joe Wright
The true story of Wladyslaw Szpilman who, in the 1930s, was known as the most accomplished piano player in all of Poland, if not Europe. Roman Polanski, in his turn, escaped from the Krakow ghetto before its liquidation and wandered about gaining refuge with a number of Catholic families. His mother died in Nazi concentration camp when Roman was eight.
At the outbreak of the Second World War, however, Szpilman becomes subject to the anti-Jewish laws imposed by the conquering Germans. By the start of the 1940s, Szpilman has seen his world go from piano concert halls to the Jewish Ghetto of Warshaw and then must suffer the tragedy of his family deported to a death camp, while Szpilman is conscripted into a forced German Labor Compound. At last deciding to escape, Szpilman goes into hiding as a Jewish refugee where he is witness to the Warshaw Ghetto Uprising and the Warshaw City Revolt in 1945. When he escapes the ghetto, at first he is hidden in an appartment by Polish friends in the Resistance, after lives in the ruins of Warsaw.
Real hero of the movie Wladyslaw Szpilman died at 88 in 2000.
Set in the Philippines in 1945, "The Great Raid" tells the true story of the 6th Ranger Battalion, under the command of Lieutenant Colonel Henry Mucci (Benjamin Bratt) who undertakes a daring rescue mission against all odds. Traveling thirty miles behind enemy lines, the 6th Ranger Battalion aims to liberate over 500 American prisoners-of-war from the notorious Cabanatuan Japanese POW camp in the most audacious rescue ever.
Directed by John Dahl, the film also stars James Franco ("Spider Man"), Joseph Fiennes ("Shakespeare in Love") and Connie Nielsen ("Gladiator").
Starring: Benjamin Bratt, James Franco, Connie Nielsen, Joseph Fiennes, Mark Consuelos
English language with latvian and russian subtitles.
The film is based on James Bradley's book "Flags of Our Fathers: Heroes of Iwo Jima".
The Battle of Iwo Jima, which took place in winter 1945, was a turning point in the Pacific theater. About 6,000 Americans died and 17,000 were wounded during the Battle of Iwo Jima.
The battle produced one of the most enduring images of WWII: a photograph of U.S. servicemen raising an U.S. flag on the flank of Mount Suribachi, the island's commanding high point.
Cast: Ryan Phillippe, Jesse Bradford, Adam Beach, Paul Walker, Jamie Bell, Barry Pepper, John Benjamin Hickey
Directed by Clint Eastwood
Sixty-one years ago, US and Japanese armies met on Iwo Jima. Decades later, several hundred letters are unearthed from that stark island's soil. The letters give faces and voices to the men who fought there, as well as the extraordinary general who led them.
"Letters From Iwo Jima" revolves around the real-life Japanese General Tadamichi Kuribayashi, played by Ken Watanabe, who battled American troops for 40 days on the small island of Iwo Jima. It is the companion piece to Eastwood's other Iwo Jima film, Flags of Our Fathers.
Cast: Ken Watanabe, Kazunari Ninomiya, Tsuyoshi Ihara, Ryo Kase, Shido Nakamura, Yuki Matsuzaki, Hiroshi Watanabe, Takumi Bando, Nobumasa Sakagami, Takashi Yamaguchi, Nae Yuuki
Directed by Clint Eastwood
Based on the children's fantasy novel by British author Dick King-Smith. "The Water Horse" tells the story of a lonely boy in Scotland who finds a mysterious egg from which hatches a "water horse" -- a mythical sea monster of Scottish legend. The Academy Award®-winning producer and special-effects team behind "The Lord of the Rings" join with Revolution Studios, Walden Media ("The Chronicles of Narnia") and Beacon Pictures to bring to the screen the magical motion picture "The Water Horse." Rooted in one of the most enduring and intriguing legends of our time, the story begins with an enchanted egg... and what hatches will set in motion an adventure that will take a young boy on the unforgettable journey of a lifetime.
Cast: Emily Watson, Alex Etel, Ben Chaplin, David Morrissey, Brian Cox
Directed by Jay Russel
1942, Stalingrad. The Soviet forces are preparing to launch a counteroffensive against the German troops that have occupied the left bank of the Volga. The counteroffensive fails. Only a group of scouts under captain Gromov’s command manage to cross the river and occupy one of the buildings. They have their orders – to hold the position at any cost. In the building along with several survivors, Soviet soldiers, they find its last inhabitant –Katya, a 19-year-old girl.
A German officer Kahn gets an order to recapture the building occupied by the enemy.
One of the bloodiest battles in the history of humankind serves as a background for the stories of love and a dramatic personal confrontation
Based on the true story of the greatest treasure hunt in history, The Monuments Men focuses on an unlikely World War II platoon, tasked by FDR with the seemingly impossible mission of going into Germany to rescue artistic masterpieces from Nazi thieves and returning them to their rightful owners. The find themselves in a race against time to avoid the destruction of 1000 years of culture, risking their lives to protect and defend mankind’s greatest achievements.
3 Academy Award nominations! Best cinematography, Best sound editing, Best mixing.
Academy Award® winner Angelina Jolie directs and produces Unbroken, an epic drama that follows the incredible life of Olympian and war hero Louis "Louie" Zamperini (Jack O’Connell) who, along with two other crewmen, survived in a raft for 47 days after a near-fatal plane crash in WWII—only to be caught by the Japanese Navy and sent to a prisoner-of-war camp.
Adapted from Laura Hillenbrand’s ("Seabiscuit: An American Legend") enormously popular book, Unbroken brings to the big screen Zamperini’s unbelievable and inspiring true story about the resilient power of the human spirit.
Starring alongside O’Connell are Domhnall Gleeson and Finn Wittrock as Phil and Mac—the airmen with whom Zamperini endured perilous weeks adrift in the open Pacific—Garrett Hedlund and John Magaro as fellow POWs who find an unexpected camaraderie during their internment, Alex Russell as Zamperini’s brother, Pete, and in his English-language feature debut, Japanese actor Miyavi as the brutal camp guard known only to the men as "The Bird."