Farewell September

The story is about how the lives of two unwed mothers are inter-twined together.

Liked the nice plot but thought there was a little bit too much narration.

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FYP

The story is about how a woman who thought she was dying in three months time followed her passion to learn the piano. FYP stands for "follow your passion".

Liked the good chemistry between the protagonist and her piano teacher!

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Sweet Day

The story is about how a band struggled to stay together after many years.

Liked the little details that showed the bond among the band members and how they managed to keep their passion alive!

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God Knows

The story is about how a man fell in love with a deaf girl who plays in a band.

Was really surprised by the twist in the middle of the film! The director tried to explain what really happened towards the end but didn't think it was too convincing.

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Florence Foster Jenkins

The story is about how a rich amateur singer called Florence Foster Jenkins loved operas and sang to a large audience despite negative reviews.

Liked the positive can-do attitude of the protagonist played by Meryl Streep! Thought the singing lessons would start from basic, so was surprised that she knew quite a bit of the song already!

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La Ronde

The film consists of several inter-connected short stories about affairs by different couples.

Liked how everyone was linked together in one big circle! Thought the maid and the girl who loved to eat looked quite pretty!

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Our Time, Our Story

This is a documentary about Taiwan New Wave cinema that is packaged together with the "A Brighter Summer Day" criterion DVD.

Liked the interviews and the old film clips that showed how people lived more than twenty years ago! Learnt quite a bit about Taiwan film history from this documentary!

The Adventures of Prince Achmed

The story is about how Prince Achmed fought against a wizard to save a beautiful princess with the help of a witch.

Liked the interesting shadowy effects in the animation and the exciting fight scene towards the end!

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Cybercrimes with Ben Hammersley

This is a British documentary on different types of cybercrimes around the world.

Liked how the presenter slowly introduced the audience to the subject on location and the interviews with the relevant people!

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Somm

This is a documentary on how a group of young men prepared for the master sommelier exam, one of the most difficult test in the world.

Read about the exam in the newspaper some time back so was interested to learn more about it. Liked the glimpse into the history of wine making around the world!

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Blind Date

The story is about two neighbors falling in love with each other despite not having seen each other. Their wall is not sound proof and they could talk to each other.

Liked this charming little film! Can't really tell how great the piano performance was though except through the audience's reaction.

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After Porn Ends

This is a documentary on a group of people formerly from the porn industry.

Liked to hear how different people coped with the stigma of being in the industry and it affected their relationship with friends and family! Quite amazed to hear that one of them even ran for the governor of california elections!

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Tesla: Master of Lightning

This is a documentary about Tesla the scientist who enabled electricity to be distributed to the masses in the early 20th century and who was a pioneer in radio communications.

I have seen the lightning demonstrations at Science Center but didn't realize that they originated from Tesla. I was impressed by Tesla's contributions but I thought some of his ideas could be far too ahead of his time to be implementable.

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Why Planes Vanish

This is a documentary about the science behind the mystery of the disappearance of flight MH370.

Liked how the scientific principles of airplane tracking are explained in simple terms for the layman to understand! Didn't realize that there were so many gaps with present technology!

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Airplane!

The story is about how a series of incidents almost led to an air disaster.

Liked the visual gags and the play on words comedy! Might be a little bit politically incorrect at times but the auto pilot looks quite cute!

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Fantastic Mr Fox

This is an animation film adapted from Roald Dahl's short story of the same title. It describes how a fox family managed to outwit a group of business owners.

Liked the nice stop motion animation and how the wild animals worked together as a team!

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Particle Fever

This is a documentary on the large hadron collider (LHR) at CERN and how it helped to discover the Higgs Boson in 2012.

Liked the interesting computer animation of how the LHR worked! Thought the acne spot on one of the postdoc's face was a bit distracting though.

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Secrets of Her Majesty's Secret Service

This is a documentary about the British Secret Service MI6.

Liked the account of the cracking of Enigma during Second World War and the interviews with the former agents!

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Back in Time

This is a documentary on the "Back to the Future" series.

Learnt about many interesting "Back to the Future" related events such as theme parks and car shows!

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Atari: Game Over

This is a documentary about the rise and fall of the video game company Atari.

Liked how the director presented the view points from different groups of people: fans, programmers and historians! Quite amazed by how the protagonist could develop a game in just five weeks!

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Goodbye CP

This is a documentary about cerebral palsy in Japan during the early seventies.

Liked how the director dived deep into the personal lives of a few individuals to show us how it was like to be inflicted with cerebral palsy! Felt sad for one of them who had to cancel his poem reading session as the authorities called it a freak show.

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Wrestling

This is a documentary about wrestling in Canada during the early sixties.

Liked the exciting sporting action and narration! The reactions from the audience were interesting too!


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My Neighbors and Their Japanese Ghosts

This is a documentary about old people in China discussing about the Japanese during the Second World War.

Liked the interesting personal accounts told by the interviewees! They contrasted with the modern peaceful setting in Beijing.

The Green Wave

This is a documentary about the events that happened in Iran around the period of the 2009 Iran elections. Animation is used to recreate personal witness accounts from social media such as blogs and twitter.

Liked how the director covered different perspectives of the events! Learnt more about modern Iran history from the interviews and the nice animation!

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Three Sisters

This is a documentary about three sisters living in a mountainous village of Yunnan.

Liked the nice mountainous scenery and the peaceful village life! Quite amazed by how the kids were able to do complex household chores like maintaining the fire by themselves!

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Devil's Town

The film consists of many inter-related short stories that happened in Belgrade.

Liked how the director slowly introduced the characters and brought them all together towards the end! Some parts were a bit too weird for my taste though.

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Hopscotch

The story is about an ex-CIA employee trying to write a memoir while staying one step ahead of the people who wants to stop him.

Liked how the protagonist managed to outsmart his ex-colleagues! Great action and comedy without too much violence!

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The Emperor's Naked Army Marches On

This is a documentary about a Japanese war veteran's search for the truth behind the execution of two soldiers in New Guinea shortly after the second World War.

Liked the protagonist's determination to uncover the truth to console the dead! At the beginning of the film, I thought he was just an obnoxious old man but I slowly began to understand his actions as the film progressed.

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Von Trier's 100 Eyes

This is a short documentary about the making of "Dancer in the Dark" by the Danish director, Lars Von Trier.

Liked the in-depth interviews with the director and the simple children's story of "Golden Heart"!

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Railroad of Hope

This is a documentary about peasants taking the train from Sichuan to Xinjiang to earn more money by harvesting cotton.

Liked the interviews with the train passengers where they talked about their hopes and dreams! Quite amazed at how the train can pack so many people and luggages!

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Teddy Bear

The story is about a shy bodybuilder who lived with his oppressive mother looking for love in Thailand.

Liked how the director managed to paint a convincing image of a shy bodybuilder as I have always imagined them to be fierce and tough! Great acting by the bodybuilder and his mother!

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A Dedicated Life

This is a documentary about a famous Japanese novelist.

Liked the interesting reconstructed flashbacks to the novelist's childhood days!

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The Makes

This is a pseudo documentary about an interview with a French critic about an Italian film director's work in Japan.

Liked how the director used photographs and speech to tell a story! I could then use my imagination to visualize how wonderful these films were!

Dream Work

The film tries to capture how the dream of a girl might look like.

Liked the special visual effects that created the dreamlike atmosphere!

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Sic

The story is about a girl working in a Japanese bookshop as a censor of photo-books by scratching bits of images away.

Liked how the protagonist brushed the book with a giant feather in the end as it looked elegant!

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Following Diana

The story is about an Indonesian couple slowly drifting apart after the husband announced his intention to marry a second wife.

Liked the quiet moments that featured the interaction between mother and son! Took me quite a while to realize what the husband was showing to his wife on his computer screen as I thought they were just a bunch of mind maps.

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Immoral Tales

The film consists of five short stories set in reverse chronological order: "The Tide", "Therese Philosophe", "The Beast", "Erzsebet Bathory" and "Lucrezia Borgia".

Quite surprised that the last two films were based on actual historical figures! The beast looked scary in "The Beast"!

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It Happened Tomorrow

The story is about the adventures of a reporter when he realized that he had information on the next day's news.

Liked the interesting plot and how everything fell into place in the end! Wonder if "Back to the Future II" was inspired by this film?

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Junun

This is a documentary about a group of musicians from different countries collaborating to make music in an Indian palace.

Liked the nice music played from exotic looking musical instruments! The aerial view of the palace and the street views looked interesting too!

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Parade

The story is about how the performers prepared for a circus performance and the audience's reaction to it.

Liked the amazing juggling performance, the nice songs and how engaged the audience was to the show!

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Minions

The story is about how a group of small yellow cylindrical shaped creatures called Minions searched for an evil master.

Liked the cheerful attitude of the Minions! They could always find something positive out of the worst situations!

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Trafic

The story is about how a camping car company tried unsuccessfully to travel from France to a big car show exhibition in Amsterdam.

Liked the interesting encounters during their journey! The car was an amazing invention, full of gadgets! I also liked the scene where they simulated the movements of the astronauts!

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Execution in Autumn

The story is about the transformation of a man who became a murderer because his grandmother spoilt him from young.

Liked the interesting plot and characters in the film! I learnt that discipline is a key parenting skill!

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Where The Seagull Flies

The story is about the love hate relationship of a couple.

Liked the scenes of Singapore in the 70s and the pretty actress in the film! Great plot with lots of twists and turns!

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Beautiful Duckling

The story is about the father daughter relationship of a family who raised ducks for a living.

Liked the cute little ducklings and the kampong spirit shown by the people in the film! The ending was very well done too as I was surprised by what happened!

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Jour de Fete

The story is about how a French postman became inspired to shorten his delivery time after watching a documentary about American postmen at a village fair.

Liked the interesting stunts in the film! The bicycle seemed to have a life of its own at one point in time!

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Morning for the Osone Family

This is the last film of the Kinoshita and World War II collection. The story is about what happened to the Osone family towards the end of World War II.

Liked how the director helped us understand the hardships that the ordinary Japanese people faced through one family! I could tell he was very unhappy with the Army from his portrayal of the uncle!

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Army

This is the fourth film of the Kinoshita and World War II collection. The story is about how a Japanese family with military background raised their eldest child to join the Army and fight in the front line during the second World War.

Liked how the director encouraged patriotism through his characters! Great acting by Tanaka Kinuyo, the actress who acted as the son's mother! I was surprised by how stern she could be when her son accidentally stepped on his textbook!

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No Woman, No Cry

This is a documentary on the healthcare services for pregnant women in four different countries: Tanzania, Bangladesh, Guatemala and the United States.

Liked how the director weaved the statistics with the personal stories of these women and her commentary at the end of the film!

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Jubilation Street

This is the third film of the Kinoshita and World War II collection. The story is about how a group of people living in Tokyo gradually moved out from the city to live in the countryside in preparation for American airstrike during the second world war.

Liked the interesting people who lived in the neighborhood! A pity we didn't get to see more of the pretty mail lady!

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