Against the Current

Release Date: March 24th, 2010

Starring: Joseph Fiennes, Justin Kirk, Elizabeth Reaser, Mary Tyler Moore, Michelle Trachtenberg

Director: Peter Callahan

Writer: Peter Callahan

Studio: Sundance Selects

Genre: Drama

Runtime:1 hour 39 minutes

The events described in this dramatic film are occurred to be in real life. Paul Thompson is writer and a man, who is deeply unhappy due to his traumatic past. He sees no sense in his life and decides to do something really inspiring, extraordinary and somehow even folly. Thinking it over, he comes to an idea of swimming 150 miles through all the length of the Hudson River.

His best friend Jeff joins the journey in Paul’s request, so does his occasional acquaintance Liz. Someway they all are alike: the sad man, struggling with his past; the failure in being an actor and a good husband; and the woman, longing for more than just to be constantly pressed by her mother. This trio is connected by desire to fulfill the dream of Paul as well as to find some way out of the circumstances they have got into.

 This journey becomes the manifestation of the best qualities, the man can possess. Being equally a physical and an emotional trial, it is the way to proof true friendship and also the abilities of human being to withstand the difficulties of life whatever they are.

The drama directed by Peter Callahan is full of beautiful scenes and provided with sensational dialogs.

Toe to Toe

Release Date: February 26th, 2010

Director: Emily Abt

Writer: Emily Abt

Starring: Louisa Krause, Sonequa Martin, Hina Abdullah, Sarah Aschenbach, Dionne Audain, Erica Chamblee

Studio: Strand Releasing

Genre: Drama

Runtime: 1 hour 44 minutes

The story takes place at a politically correct preparatory school in Washington, DC. Here we find two girls,  black and white,  going toe-to-toe.

 Jesse , a white  girl from a privileged background, riotous and sluttish, seems to be on the brink of self-destructiveness.

The other one is Tosha - an African-American girl with unflinching character, a native of the most impoverished area of DC, Anacostia.

There is a world of difference between them. What do they  have in common? Both are new seniors and star players on their school’s lacrosse team. Despite everything, they get along with each other well.

Soon something comes between them and their new-founded friendship begins to fade away. It is  Rashid, a dandified Lebanese deejay,  who becomes their bone of contention.

  As the story unfolds, a shooting incident takes place.  Jesse is expelled from school for making racist graffiti  on Tosha’s locker. That makes her go off the rails and deeply plunges into the life of dissipation.

But Tosha doesn’t leave Jesse in the lurch and  lends her a helping hand.

Jesse proves herself in the right by sacrificing her own well being for that of Tosha’s.

In such a way once bitter enemies grow into each other’s salvation.

Click here to Download TOE TO TOE

The Yellow Handkerchief

Release Date: February 26th, 2010

Director: Udayan Prasad

Writer: Erin Dignam

Starring: Kristen Stewart, William Hurt, Maria Bello, Eddie Redmayne

Studio: Samuel Goldwyn Films

Genre: Drama

Runtime: 1 hour 42 minutes

“The Yellow Handkerchief” is a story of three strangers, occasionally crossed their paths with each other on the road leading to Louisiana. Each of the travelers decides to continue the trip together by own reasons, which are quite different. Brett Hanson, having the traumatic past, is at the parting of the ways, thinking over, whether he should return to his ex-wife May, whom he misses, or stay alone. Martine is a problem teenager, motivated by the intense desire to leave her parents and their home. The hope of Gordy, Martine’s boyfriend is to get closer to her.

During the road trip the relationships between trio progress and vary with circumstances and in many different ways. This journey gives all of the strangers the possibility to change their lives and find love.

“The Yellow Handkerchief” is considered to be an extremely humanistic movie, rich colored by various types of feelings and emotion manifestations. And love is surely the most dominating among of them.

The film was directed by Udayan Prasad, famous by “My Son the Fanatic”, and produced by Arthur Cohn, well-known by “One Day in September”. It’s also brightened up by the amazing play of celebrities, starring in the film, such as William Hurt, Kristen Stewart, Eddie Redmayne and Maria Bello.

Click here to Download THE YELLOW HANDKERCHIEF

The Shinjuku Incident

Release Date: February 5th, 2010

Director: Tung-Shing Yee

Writer: Tung-Shing Yee, Tin Nam Chun

Starring: Jackie Chan, Naoto Takenaka, Daniel Wu, Jinglei Xu, Masaya Katô, Tôru Minegishi, Koichi Muranishi, Jack Kao

Studio: JCE, Emperor Motion Pictures

Genre: Drama

Runtime: 2 hours

Tietou is a Chinese man, engaged in tractor repair. He is in love with beautiful Xiu Xiu and misses her badly since she went to Japan. Neither he, nor her relatives know everything of Xiu Xiu, as she sends no news from there. Tietou immigrates illegally in Shinjuku, Japan, where he had to stay and start working, also illegal. The thing is that he has lost his Chinese documents and therefore can’t return to his native country. Running once from a police raid, Tietou succeeds in saving inspector Kitano from drowning. He manages to drag him out of the water in the sewage system, where the raid took place.

Then accidentally Tietou saves Toshinari Eguchi, a famous Yakuza boss, and gets aquainted with his wife Yuko, in whom he recognizes his sweetheart Xiu Xiu. Yakuza boss offers Tietou one of his dirty jobs and promises to make Tietou a new boss of the quarter, belonging to the Taiwan gang. Thus Tietou receives a position of the boss over numerous Chinese immigrants, living and working in Japan illegally. Unfortunately Tietou methods of ruling appear to be rather peaceful. The quarter immigrants become more and more uncontrolled. Tietou position as a boss is under question now, and the situation is about to develop into a great gang war.

Click here to Download THE SHINJUKU INCIDENT

Terribly Happy

Release Date: February 5th, 2010

Director: Henrik Ruben Genz

Writer: Henrik Ruben Genz, Dunja Gry Jensen

Starring: Jakob Cedergren, Lene Maria Christensen, Kim Bodnia, Lars Brygmann, Anders Hove, Jens Jørn Spottag, Henrik Lykkegaard

Studio: Oscilloscope Laboratories

Genre: Drama

Runtime: 1 hour 30 minutes

Due to a nervous breakdown, a Copenhagen policeman Robert Hanson (Jakob Cedergren) is temporarily transferred to a provincial hamlet of South Jutland. From the first sight the town looks like a peaceful and beauty spot, inhabited by law-abiding people. He succeeds to take a vacant position of marshal there and soon gets acquainted with a seductive but married woman, whom he enters into intimate relations with. Robert Hanson, who got used to work in city conditions, can’t though accept the regular life of a small town with its bizarre behavior and seeming respectability.

Faced with some local customs closely, he starts to suspect something peculiar in the reality he got into. It can’t be true but everything over the place looks too perfect. Finally Robert comes to a conclusion, that townspeople keep something sinister in their strict confidence.

This drama film is directed by Henrik Ruben Genz and based on the original novel by Erling Jepsen. The main idea, they tried to display, is how far people are ready to go in order to save their face and property. The film was awarded in nominations Best Director, Picture, Screenplay, Actor and Actress and won seven Danish Oscars.

Click here to Download TERRIBLY HAPPY

Shutter Island

Release Date: February 19th, 2010

Director: Martin Scorsese

Writer: Laeta Kalogridis

Starring: Leonardo DiCaprio, Mark Ruffalo, Ben Kingsley, Michelle Williams, Max von Sydow, Emily Mortimer, Jackie Earle Haley

Studio: Paramount Pictures

Genre: Drama

Rating: for disturbing violent content, language and some nudity.

Runtime: 2 hours 18 minutes

The events of an intricate and horrible thriller directed by Martin Scorsese "Shutter Island" are set on the island in Massachusetts. Based on the novel by Dennis Lehane, the film describes the local hospital for insane criminals, where the series of incidents take place. This is a criminal story, which demands police action.

Two marshals - Leonardo DiCaprio as Chuck Aule and Mark Ruffalo as Teddy Daniels are to investigate the case of a disappeared woman. Being one of the patients of Ashecliffe Hospital for insane criminals, she suddenly escapes from the hospital, and no one realizes, how it could happen. The woman is under a cloud of suspicion in murder. The investigators are sent to the island where they are totally lost in details of the case. Chuck Aule is a perspective policeman, whose eagerness for work is dictated not only by law, but also by his own points of view.

In the course of investigation more people escape from the hospital, that makes the case even more difficult. On the edge of despair and caught in the toils made by the patients and medical staff, the marshals try to find the way out and to ascertain the truth.

Click here to Download SHUTTER ISLAND

A Prophet

Release Date: February 12th, 2010

Director: Jacques Audiard

Writer: Thomas Bidegain, Jacques Audiard

Starring: Tahar Rahim, Niels Arestrup, Adel Bencherif, Hichem Yacoubi, Reda Kateb, Jean-Philippe Ricci, Gilles Cohen, Antoine Basler, Leïla Bekhti, Foued Nassah, Jean-Emmanuel Pagni, Frédéric Graziani, Slimane Dazi

Studio: Why Not Productions

Genre: Crime, Drama

Runtime: 2 hours 30 minutes

For some people getting into prison becomes a serious ordeal but for Malik El Djebena (Tahar Rahim) six-year-imprisonment is a chance to rediscover his origins and his identity. The film starts with 19-year-old Malik convicted of an unspecified crime. Battered, shocked and crushed, the young Arab has to undergo his apprenticeship of violence and humiliation. No sooner is he in prison than he's involved by the jail's ruling Corsican gang in committing a murder. The terrified Malik is impatient to get the whole business over with – except that his target, Reyeb (Hichem Yacoubi), wants to talk, offering the ignorant youth to start making something of himself.

After being killed Reyeb appears in as a ghost to keep his killer friendly company and offer some advice, introducing the elements of black humor into this realistic, extremely hard-bitten story of crime.

Eventually Malik becomes a crafty autodidact in the Corsican mob under Luciani (Niels Arestrup) carrying out a numerous perilous missions.

Whether Malik is a fully formed personality, or an extremely adaptable man not wasting whatever fate throws at him, he possesses the features of a born survivor.

A Prophet is brilliant in detailing the world behind the bars. Moreover Audiard hired former convicts as advisors to deepen the authenticity of the jail experience that would make Malik turn inside out.

Click here to Download A PROPHET

My Name Is Khan

Release Date: February 12th, 2010

Director: Karan Johar

Writer: Shibani Bathija

Starring: Shah Rukh Khan, Kajol

Studio: Fox Searchlight Pictures

Genre: Drama, Romance

Runtime: 2 hours 25 minutes

This is a sad but promising story of a boy named Rizvan Khan from Muslin family, whose life was outlined after he had been mistakenly diagnosed with Asperger's syndrome. Being clever enough, Khan all his life tried to hide his autism and it couldn’t but influenced on his behavior and the way of thinking.

After his meeting the girl named Mandira and falling in love with her, he finds a glimmer of hope for normal life and family. Against their family and relatives consent, Khan and Mandira decide to become a wife and a husband.

But the events of the 11th of September cause the breakdown of their marriage. Mandira suddenly disappears. Being in utter despair, Khan crosses the border of his native country and rushes to San Francisco. He hopes he could find his beloved girl there.

In the USA the hero finds not only Mandira but the doctor Radha, who gives him a lot of pieces of advice how to adjust in a new country, how to survive and overcome all the difficulties.

All the wishes of a poor boy, who has had nothing during his young years, come true like in a fairy-tale. Even Khan’s desire to meet with the president of the USA appears to be a possible thing.

Happy Tears

Release Date: February 19th, 2010

Director: Mitchell Lichtenstein

Writer: Mitchell Lichtenstein

Starring: Demi Moore, Parker Posey, Ellen Barkin, Rip Torn

Studio: Roadside Attractions

Genre: Drama

Runtime: 1 hour 35 minutes

Two sisters, Laura and Jayne, come back to the house they grew up in, while their senescent father Joe in his seventy and something years old needs care. This movement becomes of great importance for both the sisters and returns them into their memories of being two young girls. Staying at their father’s place, Laura and Jayne face many problems, both concerning their dad and their own imperfect life. Nevertheless Joe tries to enjoy his life at full. He continues playing his prize guitar and even has a relationship with a barefaced and presumptuous woman called Shelly. The interests and opinions of two sisters often conflict, as they have contrary viewpoints on their dad’s condition. So, Laura considers her father to be under constant care, while her sister is of another opinion. Besides the aging father, they both have troubles, concerning their own families and duties connected with them. Laura has three kids to care of and a hard work of environmentalist. Jayne’ attempts to become a mother seem to be useless. Still, their coming back to a place of birth becomes a real adventure. On the one hand it is full of troubles, chaos and pain, on the other - it is not without magic, such as searching for buried treasures. The end promises Laura and Jayne tears, but these are the happy ones.

Click here to Download HAPPY TEARS

Dear John

Release Date: February 5th, 2010
Director: Lasse Hallstrom
Writer: Jamie Linden
Starring: Channing Tatum, Amanda Seyfried, Henry Thomas, Richard Jenkins, Keith Robinson
Studio: Screen Gems (Sony)
Genre: Drama, Romance
Runtime: 1 hour 45 minutes

All began as in any romantic history. He, John Tyree (Channing Tatum), a young soldier from the Army Special Forces, has met Her, Savannah Lynn Curtis (Amanda Seyfried), the student of college in a spring vacation. They have fallen in love in a few days and have wonderfully spent time together. John has acquainted Savannah with the father who has shown her own collection of coins. She supports to John's father. Savannah has presented to John the friend and neighbour Tim and his son Alan sick of autism. All was very good, but it is time to John to leave on compulsory military service for Europe. Savannah promises to wait him.
The some following years beloved lives from the letter to the letter. John, as well as promised, is going to come back home and marry on Savannah. But after terrible events on September, 11th he understands that its real destination - service in army on advantage to the native land. Having arrived for a short while home, John informs on it to the beloved. Savannah does not cease to hope for the best.
While soldier John Tyree participates in the most complicated and most dangerous military operations, letters from Savannah come less often. Eventually, she sends to him a Dear John letter in which informs that her heart belongs to other man. She marries with Tim.
All this history would be absolutely identical to dozens of others, if not the further tragically events …

Click here to Download DEAR JOHN

Blood Done Sign My Name

Release Date: February 19th, 2010
Director: Jeb Stuart
Writer: Jeb Stuart
Starring: Nate Parker, Ricky Schroder, Afemo Omilami, Lela Rochon, Nick Searcy, Michael Rooker, Darrin Dewitt Henson, Gattlin Griffith
Studio: Paladin
Genre: Drama
Runtime: 2 hours 08 minutes

Film BLOOD DONE SIGN MY NAME is an excellent illustration to the «Great Book» about racism and social injustice. Jeb Stuart's picture is founded on the known book of the professor of Afro-American researches Timothy Tyson. In the centre of attention of the film there is an event which has strongly increased a racial gap - the cruel murder which has happened in 1970 in Oxford, N.C. Henry Marrow, the black veteran of war in Vietnam, has been ruthlessly killed. His murderers - the white man and two his sons - have been let off by the court consisting of the white. They have been released, despite the fact that it happened in the presence of the public! A resentment and injustice have expelled on streets many young Afro-Americans who have taken part in acts of vandalism and revolts. However Marrow’s cousin, Ben Chavis (Nate Parker, a leading roles in The Great Debaters and in coming Tuskegee Airmen saga by George Lucas), has decided that the best result will be not from aggression, and from peaceful demonstration near the government building. But the small group of the indignant relatives and friends on this demonstration has united thousand people for the short period of time...

Click here to Download BLOOD DONE SIGN MY NAME

Ajami

Release Date: February 3rd, 2010
Director: Scandar Copti, Yaron Shani
Writer: Scandar Copti, Yaron Shani
Starring: Shahir Kabaha, Ibrahim Frege, Fouad Habash, Youssef Sahwani, Ranin Karim, Eran Naim, Scandar Copti
Studio: Kino International
Genre: Drama
Runtime: 2 hours

Two film directors belonging to different nations - Yaron Shani (Israel) and Scandar Copti (Palestine) – have created cross-cultural drama which was submitted to this year’s Oscars for Best Foreign Film and has already won ten awards at eight film festivals, including the London, Cannes, Thessaloniki and Jerusalem film festivals.
This film is set in Jaffa’s mixed Ajami neighborhood, which is a real melting pot of Christians, Jews and even Muslims. An Israeli girl Hadir (Ranin Karim) and her rich Palestinian boyfriend Omar (Shahir Kabaha) dream of common life together; 13-year-old Nasri (Fouad Habash) and his older brother fear for their life after their uncle foolishly inflicted injury a local criminal; a young refugee from Palestine Malek (Ibrahim Frege) illegally works in Israel to earn money for his mother’s surgery; and a Jewish cop Dando is obsessed with revenge on his brother’s murderers.
The film is divided into parts, in order to help viewers follow the sequence of events as the plot covers so much tense and confusion in such an impartial way. An amazingly authentic film gives razorsharp insights in the lives of different communities. There's no denying that rarely has the nature of the Middle East been so accurately depicted.

Click here to Download AJAMI

Boogie Woogie

Release Date: April 23rd, 2010
Starring: Alfie Allen, Gillian Anderson, Gemma Atkinson, Sidney Cole, Michael Culkin
Director: Duncan Ward
Writer: Danny Moynihan
Studio: IFC Films
Genre: Drama
Runtime: 1 hour 34 minutes

“Boogie Woogie” is a black comedy, based on the original novel written and adapted by Danny Moynihan. The film is a curious debut of filmmaker Duncan Ward, describing the peculiarities of many of the art people’s behavior in private and in public. The manners of the art world in London leave something to be desired, as it can be seen from the scenes of the comedy. Numerous agents, dealers, collectors and artists themselves are mostly ill-tempered, capricious and conceited creatures, who lack morality.
In the world, where success and downfall depend on so many factors, and the first may be easily changed for the second one in a moment, people start to behave very strange. Being on the top of the world, they do not hesitate to represent all their bad qualities, ever possible to exist. The popularity arises lots of problems around them, provoking, as it seems, numerous departures from the rules of conduct.
Among them are disgusting sexual predators, nasty maniacs of any kind, shameless and heartless agents and dealers and eccentric in their unpredictability artists.
Starring in the film are Gillian Anderson, Alan Cumming, Danny Huston, Amanda Seyfriend, Heather Graham, Charlotte Ramping and Stellan Skarsgard.

Click here to Download BOOGIE WOOGIE

Letters to God

Release Date: April 9th, 2010
Director: David Nixon, Patrick Doughtie
Writer: Patrick Doughtie, Art D'Alessandro, Sandra Thrift, Cullen Douglas
Starring: Robyn Lively, Jeffrey Johnson, Bailee Madison, Maree Cheatham, Tanner Maguire, Michael Bolten, Ralph Waite,Dennis Neal, Cris Cunningham, L. Derek Leonidoff
Studio: Vivendi Entertainment
Genre: Drama, Family
Runtime: 1 hour 50 minutes

The film “Letters to God”, directed by two prominent directors Patrick Doughtie and David Nixon, opens to the audience a tragic story of a boy of eight named Tyler Doherty (played by Tanner Maguire), who was terribly ill.
We can only admire the boy’s patience and the willpower he demonstrated. The poor boy, suffering from cancer, didn’t want to give up. With the ray of hope the lethally ill boy wrote letters to God, trying to fight against the disease. But with no certain DA on the envelope, all the letters were opened by the postman. Brady McDaniels (played by Jeffrey S.S. Johnson) read the letters full of hope and it couldn’t but changed his way of thinking. Brandy tried to do everything possible not to let the boy give up and fought together with Tyler.
Being alcohol addicted, the postman made attempts to change his own life and the life of his son and tried to help Tyler. The small boy had changes the life of Brandy and his letters couldn’t but find the responsive chord in the man’s heart.
The example of strong desire for life, willpower and hope for the best in the situation, when there is no way out, is shown in the film “Letters to God”. The film gives us the opportunity to meditate about our own lives and the way we live.

Click here to Download LETTERS TO GOD