The best films about totalitarian regimes
Totalitarian, despotic regimes in the 20th and 21st centuries. Eastern Europe, the Soviet Union, South and Latin America, China, Cambodia, Africa, Afghanistan, and North Korea . Excluding fascism and national socialism in Germany and Italy. The best of what I've seen, with my rating from 10 to 7 points.
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- DirectorGoran MarkovicStarsDimitrije VojnovLazar RistovskiPredrag 'Miki' ManojlovicA 10-year-old boy goes through variety of silly situations and confusions during the peak of Marshal Tito's cult of personality in 1950's Yugoslavia.
- DirectorJirí MenzelStarsRudolf HrusínskýVlastimil BrodskýVáclav NeckárSet in the late 1940s, the film concerns the treatment of suspect "bourgeois elements", a professor, a saxophonist, and a milkman, who are put to work in a junkyard for rehabilitation.
- DirectorJan NemecStarsHelena PejskováJana PracharováZdena SkvoreckaA small group of bourgeois guests head for a birthday party of a prominent figure. As they go through the woods and have a picnic, they are suddenly surrounded by a bunch of suspicious strangers.
- DirectorKarel KachynaStarsJirina BohdalováRadoslav BrzobohatýGustav OpocenskýAfter coming home from a Party gathering one night, a Czech official becomes convinced that he is about to be the subject of a political purge and tries to do damage control, while also dealing with his turbulent marriage.
- DirectorJaromil JiresStarsJosef SomrJana DítetováLudek MunzarIn the 1950's, Ludvik Jahn was expelled from the Communist Party and the University by his fellow students, because of a politically incorrect note he sent to his girlfriend. Fifteen years later, he tries to get his revenge by seducing Helena, the wife of one of his accusers.
- DirectorJan HrebejkStarsMichael BeranMiroslav DonutilSimona StasováTwo families, Sebkovi and Krausovi, are celebrating Christmas, but not everyone is in a good mood. Teenage kids think their fathers are totally stupid; fathers are sure their children are nothing more than rebels, hating anything they say.
- DirectorKrzysztof KieslowskiStarsGrazyna SzapolowskaMaria PakulnisAleksander BardiniThe wife of the recently deceased lawyer tries to cope with grief after his loss and to keep his last case going in court.
- DirectorRyszard BugajskiStarsKrystyna JandaAdam FerencyJanusz GajosTonia goes out drinking. She wakes up in prison, not having a clue why she's there. She is tortured to encourage her to confess to a crime she is not aware of.
- DirectorJan Kidawa-BlonskiStarsAndrzej SewerynMagdalena BoczarskaRobert WieckiewiczA government agent enlists his girlfriend to spy on a professor.
- DirectorPawel PawlikowskiStarsJoanna KuligTomasz KotBorys SzycIn the 1950s, a music director falls in love with a singer and tries to persuade her to flee communist Poland for France.
- DirectorAndrzej WajdaStarsKrystyna JandaJerzy RadziwilowiczTadeusz LomnickiA young Polish filmmaker sets out to find out what happened to Mateusz Birkut, a bricklayer who became a propaganda hero in the 1950s but later fell out of favor and disappeared.
- DirectorMárta MészárosStarsZsuzsa CzinkócziÁgnes CsereAnna PolonyHaving lost her parents to Stalin's purges, a girl returns from Soviet Union to her native Hungary to live with her Stalinist aunt.
- DirectorPéter BacsóStarsFerenc KállaiLajos ÖzeZoltán FábriBanned for over a decade for its outspoken criticism of the post-WWII communist regime in Hungary, Péter Bacsó's 'The Witness' has since then achieved unparalleled cult status in its native land. Known as the best satire about communism, 'The Witness' has become a cult classic, which was also well received by critics and general audiences alike when it was finally released outside of Hungary. Its candid and realistic portrayal of the incompetent communist regime has earned great acclaim for both the director and the film itself when it was shown at Cannes Film Festival in 1981. 'The Witness' takes place during the height of the Rákosi Era, which was closely modeled after the ruthless and brutal Stalin regime. The film follows the life of an ordinary dike keeper, József Pelikán, who has been caught for illegally slaughtering his pig, Dezsõ. Instead of doing hard time for his "heinous" crime, Pelikán is elevated into an important position, generally reserved for the communist elite. Of course, Pelikán is utterly clueless about his newfound luck, not to mention his new job. Even his new benefactor, the mysterious Comrade Virág, is reluctant to reveal the real reason behind Pelikán's preferential treatment. Thus, begins Pelikán's hilarious adventure deep within the "sophisticated" communist society. One failure after another the incompetent Pelikán is elevated higher and higher on the communist echelon, all the while remaining completely clueless about his promotions. Until one day, when he gets called for to return the "favour" by falsely testifying against his long-time friend in a mock-up show trial.
- DirectorCorneliu PorumboiuStarsMircea AndreescuTeodor CorbanIon SapdaruA local talk show host organizes an alcoholic professor and a pensioner known for playing Santa Claus to decide whether there was ever a revolution in their town Vaslui.
- DirectorCãtãlin MitulescuStarsDorotheea PetreTimotei DumaIoan AlbuIn Communist-era Romania, people live with hope for a new life of freedom.
- DirectorHanno HöferRazvan MarculescuCristian MungiuStarsDiana CavalliotiRadu IacobanVlad IvanovSeveral urban legends of Communist Romania are dramatized.
- DirectorRajko GrlicStarsPredrag 'Miki' ManojlovicVladislava MilosavljevicMladen BudiscakTomislav is a former Partizan who continues his struggle after the war as a dedicated member of Tito's secret police. He meets and falls in love with a ballet dancer from a bourgeois family. His love affair with the class enemy and his slow adaptation to the post-war realities could seal his doom.
- DirectorGoran MarkovicStarsSemka Sokolovic-BertokBogdan DiklicSnezana NiksicThe staff of elementary school prepare the retirement party for their cleaning woman. The complicated relations within the school will emerge to the surface on the same night.
- DirectorDusan KovacevicStarsBora TodorovicBranislav LecicNatasa NinkovicAfter the collapse of the Yugoslavian government, a former secret agent, now a taxi driver, enters the office of a former university professor, now a firm director.
- DirectorChristian PetzoldStarsNina HossRonald ZehrfeldRainer BockA doctor working in 1980s East Germany finds herself banished to a small country hospital.
- DirectorFlorian Henckel von DonnersmarckStarsUlrich MüheMartina GedeckSebastian KochIn 1984 East Berlin, an agent of the secret police conducting surveillance on a writer and his lover finds himself becoming increasingly absorbed by their lives.
- DirectorSteven SpielbergStarsTom HanksMark RylanceAlan AldaDuring the Cold War, an American lawyer is recruited to defend an arrested Soviet spy in court, and then help the CIA facilitate an exchange of the spy for the Soviet captured American U2 spy plane pilot, Francis Gary Powers.
- DirectorWolfgang BeckerStarsDaniel BrühlKatrin SassChulpan KhamatovaIn 1990, to protect his fragile mother from a fatal shock after a long coma, a young man must keep her from learning that her beloved nation of East Germany as she knew it has disappeared.
- DirectorAndrey SmirnovStarsAnton RivalEvguenya ObraztsovaEvgeniy TkachukIn 1957, a French student Pierre Duran arrives in Moscow for an internship at Moscow State University.
- DirectorIvan DykhovichnyyStarsAleksandr FeklistovUte LemperEvgeniy SidikhinSet in 1930s Moscow. About an aristocratic woman married to a member of Josef Stalin's secret police who embarks on an affair with a baggage handler.
- DirectorArmando IannucciStarsSteve BuscemiSimon Russell BealeJeffrey TamborMoscow, 1953. After being in power for nearly 30 years, Soviet dictator, Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin, takes ill and quickly dies. Now the members of the Council of Ministers scramble for power.
- DirectorPavel ChukhrayStarsRinal MukhametovYuliya PeresildYelisey NikandrovHe miraculously escaped death to return to the house where lives the love of his life. But the hope of happiness turns into a terrible discovery. His beloved is the daughter of his enemy.
- DirectorYuriy KaraStarsAleksey PetrenkoAleksandr FeklistovEvgeniy EvstigneevA dance troupe from the autonomous region of Abkhazia in western Georgia perform for Stalin, Lavrentiy Beria, Abkhaz leader Nestor Lakoba, and other high-ranking party officials in the Black Sea coastal town of Gagra.
- DirectorLev KulidzhanovStarsOlga KaboMikhail GluzskiyYury BelyayevUSSR, 1935. The flywheel of mass repression is slowly but surely gaining momentum in the country. Ksenia is summoned by summons to the NKVD investigator. She thinks that she, as the daughter of a former landowner, is waiting for arrest. Before that, her husband was repressed. However, this time it worked out - the investigator gets into the fate of Xenia and lets her go. The life of Ksenia, her two daughters and her father after that goes on as usual. But one day her father is arrested, and she herself is offered to become an informant.
- DirectorSatybaldy NarymbetovStarsRaikhan AitkozhanovaBakhitzhan AlpeisovSovetbek DzhumadylovThe story of young accordionist who lives in a small post-war village on the south of Soviet Kazakhstan.
- DirectorEvgeniy TsymbalStarsVladimir IlinAlbina MatveyevaTamara ChernovaA Moscow lawyer defends four agronomists during the Great Terror, traveling to the country for evidence and battling different levels of bureaucracy, to surprising results.
- StarsEvgeniy MironovDmitriy PevtsovSergey KaryakinThe film takes place in the USSR in 1949. In the Marfino sharashka near Moscow, convict scientists are working on the order of Stalin himself - a secret telephony apparatus.
- StarsGela MeskhiVasiliy ProkopevAnatoliy DzivaevThis is the story about the son of one of the greatest tyrants of the Twentieth Century- Joseph Stalin's flesh and blood, Vasily.
- DirectorMikhail KozakovStarsKaren BadalovYulyen BalmusovYuriy BaturinParis, 1930s. There is ferment among the Russian emigration: part of it is accumulating strength to overthrow the Bolsheviks, others are illegally, but actively working for the Soviet government.
- StarsEmiliano OchagaviyaYuriy SolominInna ChurikovaMoscow. 1925. Professor Gradov, his wife Mary, their children - Nina, Nikita and Kirill - and long-term friends at home, relatives from Moscow and Tiflis, and those who have yet to enter this family and history are all young and full of hope. Many hopes will come true, but the history of the country in the 30-50s did not leave a chance for a cloudless life for anyone.
- StarsChulpan KhamatovaArmen DzhigarkhanyanYuriy TsuriloThe middle of the twentieth century. Hereditary surgeon Pavel Alekseevich Kukotsky is one of the most famous gynecologists of his time. Kukotsky developed an extensive program to combat illegal abortions and sought the repeal of the 1936 decree banning abortions.
- StarsMarina AleksandrovaLyubov PolishchukAleksandr DomogarovFilm about famous soviet actress Valentina Serova, wife of aviator Serov and poet Konstantin Simonov.
- StarsDanila KozlovskiyElena LyadovaTatyana OrlovaShort stories from the life of the man who's spent seventeen years of his life in Stalin labor camps in Kolyma and survived.
- StarsChulpan KhamatovaEvgeniy TsyganovEvgeniya SimonovaBased on the trilogy of books by Anatoly Rybakov: "Deti Arbata", "Strakh", and "Prach I Pepel". The events circle the 1930's to 1940's. The film leads the viewer into the Kremlin offices, communal flats, university lecture halls and even into prison cells. The viewer also gets to feel what various aspects of life felt like, including Siberian village life, life in various Russian provinces and the tragic events of the breakout of World War II. The story's heroes are the simple lads and girls of the Moscow Arbat and the high-ranking powers: Stalin and his colleagues, workers, head's of scientific institutions and large contractors. The film lets you feel what life was like for these people, their lives and work and the enormous influence of war on the fate of the people.
- StarsValeriy GarkalinZhanna EppleValeri PoroshinThe film is set in the late 1940s - early 1950s of the XX century. It was a time of cruel and incompetent ideological interference in Soviet science, the suppression of everything reasonable and progressive - in particular, in genetics and breeding, a time when scientists often had to choose between an honest name and life. The hero of the film, faced with such a choice, only miraculously manages to escape from the massacre.
- DirectorGrigoriy ChukhrayStarsNina DrobyshevaEvgeniy UrbanskiyNatalya KuzminaDuring the 1950s Sasha Lvova reminisces about the WW2 years when she fell in love with Soviet fighter pilot Aleksei Astakhov.
- DirectorAleksey GermanStarsYuriy TsuriloNina RuslanovaJüri Järvet Jr.Late winter 1953. The lives of nearly half the planet are in Stalin's hands.
- DirectorAkhtem SeitablaevStarsDinara AvazAleksey GorbunovUsnie KhalilovaA story about a tragic date in the history of the Crimean Tatar nation - 18 of may 1944 -Stalin's deportation of the Crimean Tatars. Main character of the film - a pilot, twice Hero of the Soviet Union, Amehtan Sultan - goes on furlough to his native town Alupka in May of 1944 and witnesses the deportation.
- DirectorNikita MikhalkovStarsNikita MikhalkovIngeborga DapkunaiteOleg MenshikovIn the USSR in 1936, shadows of Stalin's repressions fall on a famous, revolutionary hero. The accusations of him being a foreign spy are nonsense, and everyone knows that. However, a slow process of his downfall has already started.
- DirectorVladimir BasovStarsVitaliy KonyaevGeorgiy MartynyukLarisa Luzhina1945 year. Together with other servicemen demobilized after the end of the Great Patriotic War, 22-year-old captain Sergey Vokhmintsev, the commander of an artillery battery, is returning from Germany. A young front-line soldier looks with hope to the future of a peaceful life, which began for him by his acquaintance with a girl geologist Nina.
- StarsVasilina MakovtsevaEkaterina GusevaNikita TarasovAugust 1942. Senior Lieutenant Krotkiy has just started a new post in a remote part of the country when he discovers a disfigured corpse in the port. Although it appears that the seaman was attacked with a harpoon, Bodyagin, the medical officer in charge, cannot provide a clear cause of death. When more bodies are discovered around the island, its terrified inhabitants believe that the spirit of a local medium looking for revenge is responsible for the recent epidemic of deaths. It is up to Krotkiy to stop the murders, expose the real perpetrators and discover the truth.
- DirectorArkadi SirenkoStarsAnna KamenkovaVera GlagolevaAleksey ZemskiyLeningrad. Mid-1930s. An intelligent woman, the widow of a famous doctor, works in a publishing house and is quite loyal to the Stalinist regime. Even after the arrest of her only son, she does not immediately realize what is really happening.
- DirectorAli KhamraevStarsMarianna VelizhevaIrina ShustayevaOlga ZarkhinaLife is a garden if it passes in harmony with nature, living creatures including man, king of nature. Asya, a sixteen years old heroine of the film, lived with her sisters in such a garden. To be more exact - in paradise. If she cried, those tears were tears of love to a young man, if she was afraid of thunderstorm or a goblin from her grandmother's fairy tales. In the rest of the time she enjoyed happiness. At down, fascists' planes appeared in the sky and killed Asya. And not only her, but also young children, old men. Asya's love and her future unborn babies, cats and dogs, bees, ants, birds, faith in kindness and the God. But there is hope that man is a reasonable and life-loving human being. And hope must not die with Asya's death. It is just necessary to remind people, that they still have a chance to survive. The film is about it. It is optimistic and tragic at the same time.
- DirectorValeri AkhadovStarsAnnie GirardotIrina MuravyovaAleksey PetrenkoFrench pianist Marie Lamballe-Bulatova married a Soviet diplomat in the 30s, went to the USSR with him, was repressed together with her husband and spent many years in camps. After her release, she stayed to live in Novosibirsk. It was in those parts that her Moscow niece Masha found her.
- DirectorArdak AmirkulovStarsDokhdurbek KydyraliyevRaikhan AitkozhanovaJanel MakazhanovaTanabay is a proud Kazakh war hero and loyal Communist who is pressured into taking a position as a herdsman in a collective farm after WWII. The pride and joy of the collective is a beautiful stallion named Gulsary. After Gulsary wins a race, the new commissar of the collective lays claim to the beloved and headstrong horse, which leads to a battle of wills. Tanabay and Gulsary are both punished and separated for their refusal to bend to the rules.
- DirectorEvgeniy TsymbalStarsSergey ArtsibashevNatalya DanilovaSergey GarmashThe legendary commander of the Civil War, the winner of Wrangel, arrives in the capital on Stalin's call. In the capital, he is perplexed to learn that the Politburo at a special meeting decided to force him to operate on an old ulcer. The attending physician is convinced that the operation is not necessary, but, obeying party discipline, the old Bolshevik lies down on the operating table.
- DirectorViktor SadovskyStarsBoris ShcherbakovVladimir SteklovAndrei BoltnevThe film is based on a true story of a sport star Bobrov, who happened to become befriended by Vasili, the son of Stalin.
- DirectorStanislav MitinStarsElena LyadovaAnastasiya GorodentsevaNatalya ChernyavskayaA young female-thief, Lyubka, helps a criminal gang to steal a suitcase from a better-off Jewish family on a railway station; she often thinks about the well-dressed girl and dreams of swapping lives with her, living in comfort and care. Several years later, in 1952, fate again brings them together, when pregnant Irina, a young doctor, comes with her mother to a distant Ural city. The Irina's mother dies soon and Irina is forced to decide who'll care for her daughter, Sonya, while she's on duty in the hospital. And then she finds a wayward girl who'd just served her term. She is not like the other criminals.
- DirectorStanislav RostotskiyStarsAleksandr SusninTatyana BedovaSergey BystritskiyStory of life of Fyodor Kuzkin, who shared all the burdens of the 30s Stalins terror and after, WW2 and post-war years. For now Kuzkin decides to leave his collective farm (rus: kolkhoz)
- DirectorVladimir KhotinenkoStarsSergey KoltakovIvan BortnikBoris GalkinTwo casual acquaintances, Sergey Pshenichnyy and Andrey Nemchinov, are transferred almost 40 years ago by the will of mysterious circumstances. This day - May 8, 1949 - begins to repeat itself for them with inexorable constancy.
- DirectorYuriy KaraStarsSergey NikonenkoNina RuslanovaVera AlentovaThis movie is based on a novel by Boris Vasiliev and describes life in a small Russian provincial town in 1940 - one year before Germany invaded the Soviet Union.
- DirectorRégis WargnierStarsOleg MenshikovSandrine BonnaireCatherine DeneuveIn June 1946, Stalin invites the Russian exiled from the 1917 Revolution to return home. When the ships comes ashore in Odessa, the passengers are divided in two groups and one of them is executed. Among the survivors are Dr. Aleksei Golovin, his French wife Marie and their young son. Marie is accused to be a spy, her French passport is torn up and Aleksei accepts to move to Kyiv with his family to save her. They are sent to a room in a communal house and soon Marie befriends the super, an old woman who speaks French. But she is denounced and killed by the government agents. Marie feels guilty and brings her grandson Sasha Vasilyev, who will be evicted, to live in her room with her family. Marie wants to return to her family in France, but Aleksei explains that they are imprisoned in Russia. Marie tries a contact with the leftist French actress Gabrielle Develay to ask for help to leave the USSR. While Marie gets distant from her husband, she gets closer to Sacha, who is a great swimmer and the only chance to Marie contact her family.
- DirectorVera GlagolevaStarsAleksandr BaluevMichael KhmurovFyodor KoposovMay, 8, 1945. Maxim Prokhorov, major of People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs, arrives at a small northern island. There live eleven people: five young women, five children from one to three years, and the captain Karp Nichiporuk. The young mothers were exiled to the island from the territories occupied by fascists, and their children are the children of the German occupieer. Arrival of the major upsets the casual life on the island. The major has to "clean up" the island and the nearest settlements. The military man authorizes a plan to organize a training camp in the region for saboteurs. The night of May, 9, the women ar told about the German capitulation, their hopes for forgiveness and return home become a certainty. They are even allowed to celebrate the Victory.
- DirectorRustem AbdrashevStarsNurzhuman IkhtymbaevBakhtiar KhojaYekaterina RednikovaA Jewish child deported to Kazakhstan is saved and adopted by Kasym, an old Kazakh railway-man. Kasym gives him a Kazakh name, Sabyr, that in Kazakh language means humble. The child grows up in the small Kazakh village along with other deportees Vera, a traitor's wife, and Ezhik a Polish doctor. The Soviet militia harasses the poor peasants and Vera suffered the harassment of a bully cop: Bulgabi. Finally Vera accepts the marriage proposal of Ezhik but the jealous Bulgabi tries to prevent the marriage. The result is a fight in which Ezhik shoots himself accidentally. The old Kasym decides that Sabyr is now old enough to go to seek his real parents. At the end Sabyr, now an adult, decides to return to the village, but the village no longer exists because it was destroyed by a Soviet nuclear test.
- DirectorAleksandr ProshkinStarsValeriy PriyomykhovAnatoliy PapanovViktor StepanovFormer political inmates Sergei and Nikolai live as exiles in a remote Siberian village. After the general Soviet gulag amnesty of 1953 8 pardoned common criminals terrorize the inhabitants.
- DirectorVladimir KhmelnitskyStarsLeonid YanovskiyLidiya Fedoseeva-ShukshinaEvgeniy NikitinRuslan, a shepherd dog, is a camp guard dog who is out of work. The camp was disbanded. Ruslan runs to a neighboring village and there he meets a former prisoner, now a settler. He become the new owner of Ruslan.
- DirectorRoland Suso RichterStarsHeino FerchNicolette KrebitzSebastian KochDuring the Cold War, Germany was divided into two states - East and West. This epic story tells about their dramatic connections.
- DirectorFito PáezStarsCecilia RothGael García BernalLuis ZiembrowskiAn exiled woman returns to her home in Argentina to visit her dying father and leads a double life, one of which involves strange sexual behavior.
- DirectorMarco BechisStarsAntonella CostaCarlos EchevarríaEnrique PiñeyroIn the 70's, eighteen year-old Maria Fabiani lives with her French mother Diane in an old house in Buenos Aires, subletting rooms and giving classes to illiterate adults in the slums. One of the tenants, Felix, has a non-corresponded crush on Maria. When the teenager is abducted in her house by the Argentinean army accused of subversion, her mother seeks her out in the 23rd Precinct where one of the military without uniform tells her that they are heading with Maria. While Diane desperately tries to find information about her daughter, Maria is submitted to torture in the hideous underground of the Garage Olimpo.
- DirectorLuis PuenzoStarsNorma AleandroHéctor AlterioChunchuna VillafañeDuring the final months of Argentinian Military Dictatorship in 1983, a high school teacher sets out to find out who the mother of her adopted daughter is.
- DirectorBenjamín ÁvilaStarsErnesto AlterioNatalia OreiroCésar TroncosoJuan lives in clandestinity. Just like his mum, his dad and his adored uncle Beto, outside his home he has another name. At school, Juan is known as Ernesto. And he meets María, who only has one name. Based on true facts, set in the Argentina of 1979, this film is "one about love".
- DirectorHector BabencoStarsWilliam HurtRaul JuliaSonia BragaA gay man and a political prisoner are together in a prison. The gay man narrates the stories of two fake movies and his own life.
- DirectorCao HamburgerStarsMichel JoelsasGermano HaiutDaniela PiepszykA boy is left alone in a Jewish neighborhood in 1970, when the World Cup coincides with political crackdowns by the military dictatorship.
- DirectorAndrés WoodStarsMatías QuerAriel MatelunaManuela MartelliTwo 12-year-old Chilean children from different social classes become friends in 1973. They both discover each other's world as political tensions in their country increase.
- DirectorLuis MandokiStarsCarlos PadillaLeonor VarelaXuna PrimusA young boy, in an effort to have a normal childhood in 1980's El Salvador, is caught up in a dramatic fight for his life as he desperately tries to avoid the war which is raging all around him.
- DirectorRoberto SneiderStarsAna Claudia TalancónDaniel Giménez CachoJosé María de TaviraSet in 1930's in Puebla, Mexico, a young woman finds herself in an arranged marriage to a prominent politician (Andres Ascencio). As his career progresses, she finds it more difficult to remain a loyal, loving wife.
- DirectorJoan ChenStarsXiaolu LiLopsangZheng QianYoung teen girl Xiu Xiu is sent away to a remote corner of the Sichuan steppes for manual labor in 1975 (sending young people to there was a part of Cultural Revolution in China). A year later, she agrees to go to even more remote spot with a Tibetan saddle tramp Lao Jin to learn horse herding.
- DirectorYimou ZhangStarsXuejian LiTaishen ChengDongyu ZhouRomance sparks between a young woman and a young man from different economic backgrounds during China's Cultural Revolution of the 1960s and '70s.
- DirectorJiarui ZhangStarsWei FanLu HuangHongyi LiAboard a bus in the rural mountains of China, a naive young girl name Li Chunfen attends to passengers' needs, all the while speaking of the virtues of the Communist Party. The always loyal Li is happy to serve the driver, Old Cui, a kind of father figure to her who also acts as the consoling voice of the party. When she develops an acute case of puppy love for a frequent passenger -- an emotion that leads to a chased kiss and a rape report, she learns all too well that her party and driver might not always have her best interests in mind. But how big of hand will the Cultural Revolution play in Li's life? How much control will she have over her own fate? Spanning five decades of Li's life, The Road is a coming-of-age tale of epic proportions. Heartbreakingly beautiful -- the countryside cinematography is jaw-dropping -- and tragically timely, the film stands out as a masterful work from a powerful new Chinese voice, director Zhang Jiarui, reminding us of a painful history and warning us never to repeat it.
- DirectorKaige ChenStarsLeslie CheungFengyi ZhangGong LiTwo boys meet at an opera training school in Peking in 1924. Their resulting friendship will span nearly 70 years and endure some of the most troublesome times in China's history.
- DirectorYimou ZhangStarsGong LiDaoming ChenHuiwen ZhangLu and Feng are a devoted couple forced to separate when Lu is arrested and sent to a labor camp as a political prisoner during the Cultural Revolution. He finally returns home only to find that his beloved wife no longer recognizes him.
- DirectorTerry GeorgeStarsDon CheadleSophie OkonedoJoaquin PhoenixPaul Rusesabagina, a hotel manager, houses over a thousand Tutsi refugees during their struggle against the Hutu militia in Rwanda, Africa.
- DirectorKevin MacdonaldStarsJames McAvoyForest WhitakerGillian AndersonBased on the events of the brutal Ugandan dictator Idi Amin's regime as seen by his personal physician during the 1970s.
- DirectorMichael Caton-JonesStarsJohn HurtHugh DancyDominique HorwitzA Catholic Priest and an English teacher get stranded in a school in Kigali during the 1994 Rwandan genocide.
- DirectorRaoul PeckStarsIdris ElbaCarole KaremeraPamela NomveteWhen the Hutu nationalists raised arms against their Tutsi countrymen in Rwanda in April 1994, the violent uprising marked the beginning of one of the darkest times in African history which resulted in the deaths of almost 800,000 people.
- DirectorRoland JofféStarsSam WaterstonHaing S. NgorJohn MalkovichA journalist is trapped in Cambodia during tyrant Pol Pot's bloody 'Year Zero' cleansing campaign, which claimed the lives of two million 'undesirable' civilians.
- DirectorCosta-GavrasStarsJack LemmonSissy SpacekMelanie MayronWhen an idealistic American writer disappears during the Chilean coup d'état in September 1973, his wife and father try to find him.
- DirectorAbderrahmane SissakoStarsIbrahim AhmedAbel JafriToulou KikiA cattle herder and his family who reside in the dunes of Timbuktu find their quiet lives -- which are typically free of the Jihadists determined to control their faith -- abruptly disturbed.
- DirectorSiddiq BarmakStarsMarina GolbahariZubaida SaharKhwaja NaderAfter the rise of the Taliban in Afghanistan and the restriction of women in public life, a pre-teen girl is forced to masquerade as a boy in order to find work to support her mother and grandmother.
- DirectorHana MakhmalbafStarsAbbas AlijomeAbdolali HoseinaliNikbakht NoruzIn Afghanistan, a young girl wants to go to school and learn to read and write, but is met with hostility or indifference.
- DirectorZhangke JiaStarsHongwei WangTao ZhaoLiang JingdongA theatre troupe from rural Fenyang struggles under the decline of communism and rise of popular culture in China in the 1980s.
- DirectorJoshua OppenheimerStarsAdi RukunM.Y. BasrunVolker HanischA family that survived the genocide in Indonesia confronts the men who killed one of their brothers.
- StarsVladimir VdovichenkovKirill PletnyovEkaterina OlkinaVyacheslav Tolstopyatov, having witnessed the brutal execution of protesters in Novocherkassk in June 1962, completely rethinks his life and attitude towards the state.
- DirectorVitaliy ManskiyStarsLee Zin-MiYu-YongHye-YongA propaganda documentary about North Korea that reveals a few hidden facts because the director continues filming between the scripted scenes.
- DirectorKim Ki-dukStarsRyu Seung-beomLee Won-geunKim Young-minA North Korean fisherman breaks his boat engine by accident and drifts down to South Korea. After enduring brutal investigations in the South, he eventually gets sent back to North Korea.
- DirectorYe LouStarsLei HaoXiaodong GuoXueyun BaiYu Hong leaves her home village and starts university in Beijing, where she develops a consuming and compulsive relationship with another student. The student riots from 1989 then ensue and take a toll on their lives.
- DirectorYimou ZhangStarsYou GeGong LiBen NiuAfter Fugui and Jiazhen lose their personal fortunes, they raise a family and survive difficult cultural changes during 1940s to 1970s China.
- DirectorJuan José CampanellaStarsRicardo DarínSoledad VillamilUlises DumontThe fascinating love story between Jorge and Laura from 1980 to 1999, within a context in which Argentine politics and history transits between the dictatorship, the Falklands war and the nascent democracy.
- DirectorVitali KanevskyStarsDinara DrukarovaPavel NazarovElena PopovaTwo children living in a remote mining town in the distant wastes of Siberia in 1947, survive poverty and hardship through the warmth of their friendship and a shared sense of humour.
- DirectorAleksey UchitelStarsVladimir MashkovAnjorka StrechelYuliya PeresildIn 1945, Soviet war hero Ignat is sent to work as a locomotive mechanic in a Siberian labor camp where he meets an assortment of Germans and Russians.
- DirectorVyacheslav SorokinStarsGalina BokashevskayaAnatoliy KhudoleevSvetlana Kryuchkova1968, a small town in Siberia. Convinced communist Nadia Melnikova works at the local Palace of Culture and brings up a little daughter. One day a woman meets a Muscovite Andrey, who allegedly came to take care of a sick aunt, but in fact he is a dissident and is hiding from the KGB. Soon, a stormy romance breaks out between Andrey and the unsuspecting Nadia.
- DirectorMohsen MakhmalbafStarsNelofer PaziraHassan TantaiIke OgutAfter an Afghanistan-born woman who lives in Canada receives a letter from her suicidal sister, she takes a perilous journey through Afghanistan to try to find her.
- DirectorPhilip KaufmanStarsDaniel Day-LewisJuliette BinocheLena OlinCentral Europe, 1968: A Czech doctor with an active sex life meets a woman who wants monogamy, and then the Soviet invasion further disrupts their lives.