The Seagull's Laughter (2001)
Director
Ãgúst Guðmundsson
Main cast
Margrét Vilhjálmsdóttir; Ugla Egilsdóttir; Heino Ferch; Hilmir Snær Guðnason; Kristbjörg Kjeld
Genres
Comedy, Drama, Foreign
Description
Post-war provincial Iceland: around 1950, Freyja, who'd been a plump teen, returns from America, a widow with a 20-inch waist, seven suitcases of dresses, and a list of who ever wronged or slighted her. She moves in with an aunt and socialist uncle: finding a new husband is high on her agenda, and she's mistrusted by Agga, a pre-teen who's our eyes and ears. The social order and Freyja are more complicated than they seem at first, and so may be her prospects. Class divisions, families ties, pride, the onset of puberty, and the power of Eros sliver the ice.
Ãgúst Guðmundsson
Main cast
Margrét Vilhjálmsdóttir; Ugla Egilsdóttir; Heino Ferch; Hilmir Snær Guðnason; Kristbjörg Kjeld
Genres
Comedy, Drama, Foreign
Description
Post-war provincial Iceland: around 1950, Freyja, who'd been a plump teen, returns from America, a widow with a 20-inch waist, seven suitcases of dresses, and a list of who ever wronged or slighted her. She moves in with an aunt and socialist uncle: finding a new husband is high on her agenda, and she's mistrusted by Agga, a pre-teen who's our eyes and ears. The social order and Freyja are more complicated than they seem at first, and so may be her prospects. Class divisions, families ties, pride, the onset of puberty, and the power of Eros sliver the ice.
Similar movies
Four directors tell tales of Eros fit for a 1970s Decameron. Working-class lovers, Renzo and Luciana, marry but must hide it from her employer; plus, they need a room of their own. A billboard of Anita Ekberg provocatively selling milk gives a prudish crusader for public decency more than he can handle. The wife of a count whose escapades with call girls make the front page of the papers decides to work to prove her independence, but what is she qualified to do? A buxom carnival-booth manager who owes back taxes offers herself for one night in a lottery: a nerdy sacristan and a jealous cowboy make for a lovers' triangle. In each, women take charge, but not always happily
When the retired seventy-seven years old hypochondriac widower Fred moves to an apartment in Madrid, his temperamental daughter Cuca has an incident with his next door neighbor, the elder Argentinean Elsa. Later, they meet each other and Elsa seduces Fred with her reckless behavior and view of life and they have a romance.
Nihal Singh from Chandigarh is a seemingly simple yet unconventional boy. He talks too much, questions everything and builds complicated gadgets in this spare time. He has a brilliant mind and an oddball sort of charm. He adores his mother, has dreams of studying in the most elite institute of science and always looks for big ideas in small things. But, there is a big but... Nihal has a secret.
Gautam (Saif Ali Khan) is an incorrigible flirt, who runs after every girl he sees. Meera (Diana Penty) is a pretty girl with desi values and attire, who comes to London from Delhi for a fresh start. Veronica (Deepika Padukone) is the spoilt bombshell who loves partying and drinking. Though different from each other, these three are perfect friends staying under one roof until friendship becomes confusing, and love becomes complicated.
Suicide-prone Sonia believes her boyfriend, Dr. Samir Malhotra, is married to Naina, who he is about to divorce, and she wants to meet her. Samir arranges a meeting, but neglects to inform an annoyed Sonia that he is also the father of two children. Samir attempts to patch things up with visits to Mumbai's Juhu and Dubai's Jumeirah beaches; deals with Sonia's nosy neighbor, Pyare Mohan, while coming to terms with Naina's boyfriends. Things get even more complicated with the entry of Samir's feisty Hoshiarpur-based mom - who is determined to stop the divorce proceedings by hook or by crook.
A seemingly ideal marriage is thrown into embarrassing turmoil in Patrice Chéreau's period drama, based on the short story The Return by Joseph Conrad.
Ludovic is a small boy who cross-dresses and generally acts like a girl, talks of marrying his neighbor's son and can not understand why everyone is so surprised about it. His actions lead to problems for him and his family.
Ample teen Tracy Turnblad wants nothing more than to be on the hip local TV dance program, "The Corny Collins Show" -- and when her dream comes true, her lively moves and bubbly personality meet with unexpected popularity. But after witnessing firsthand the terrible state of race relations in 1960s Baltimore, Turnblad becomes an outspoken advocate for desegregation.
When two college students, Sam and Thea, meet Coles at a party, their mutual attraction is immediate, leading to a passionate and awkward night together, and the onset of an intensely charged bond. As they continue to push the sexual boundaries of their friendship, however, they are tested by Sam and Coles' incipient romance and Thea's increasing recklessness, until the relationship dissolves amid a cloud of fear, resentment and mistrust. Eight years later they reunite. An animator for a high-profile ad agency, Coles now lives with Claire, his girlfriend of five years. Thea is happily married to Miles, with whom she owns a flourishing restaurant. And Sam has just returned to Manhattan after working in London where she recently broke off her engagement. Yet upon reconnecting, the three are drawn back into the complicated dynamic that defined their relationship from the start and are forced to confront the true meaning of commitment and love.
A water balloon suddenly dropping from the sky exploding on a motherâs head in the frantic first moments of this striking debut feature, announces its director, Alonso Ruiz Palacios, as a bold new voice of Mexican cinema. Set amidst the 1999 student strikes in Mexico City, this coming-of-age tale finds two brothers venturing through the city in a sentimental search for an aging legendary musician. Shot in beautiful black-and-white, Gueros brims with youthful exuberance. In Spanish with subtitles.
A Michigan farmer and a prospector form a partnership in the California gold country. Their adventures include buying and sharing a wife, hijacking a stage, kidnapping six prostitutes, and turning their mining camp into a boom town. Along the way there is plenty of drinking, gambling, and singing. They even find time to do some creative gold mining.
Divorced and demoralized Amy Minskyâs prospects look bleak when she is condemned to move back in with her parents at the age of 35. Everyone wants to help, but, as her patience level with advice is plummeting, a bold teenage boy enters her life, igniting her last bit of self-esteem. What ensues is an unconventional love story infused with all the good things Amy needs to get on in life, and that just may include great sex.
The mating rituals of two teenage surf chicks from the southern suburbs of Sydney.Meet Sue, a teenage Australian girl in the late 70s, whose life mainly consists of doing what everyone else does - watch the surfing boys and have sex with the same surfing boys. The girls have to follow lots of strange customs, e.g. do not eat or go to the bathroom when a boy is around. Ugly girls have two choices - being bitches and hate boys, or being generally cheap and looked down upon by everyone. The afternoons are spent on the beaches, in the backseats of car or at home-alone-parties where sex and alcohol are the main ingredients. Parents and teachers are trying to straighten the kids out, but that is not easy.
Thirteen-year-old Ernest Chin lives and works at a sleazy hourly-rate motel on a strip of desolate suburban bi-way. Misunderstood by his family and blindly careening into puberty, Ernest befriends Sam Kim, a self-destructive yet charismatic Korean man who has checked in. Sam teaches the fatherless boy all the rites of manhood.
Maurice is an aging veteran actor who becomes absolutely taken with Jessie - the grandniece of his closest friend. When Maurice tries to soften the petulant and provincial young girl with the benefit of his wisdom and London culture, their give-and-take surprises both Maurice and Jessie as they discover what they don't know about themselves.
The film that started the classic TV series. Although he's only seven, Eddie's got it all figured out. He wants his father, a widower, to get remarried - to the girl next door. Unfortunately, she's not one of the women that his dad's been dating. Sweet family comedy.
Georgy has resigned herself to being one of life's accidents. She disapproves somewhat of her father's butlering James Leamington. She's tall, plump, sloppy and wistfully envious of what she conceives to be the life led by her beautiful, but icy roommate. Where her roommate, Meredith, is cool and calculating, Georgy gets so involved with the people around her she behaves like an affectionate puppy. Most of all she burns to be a mother. But it is Meredith that is in the hospital having an unwanted child.
Explores sisters, in their twenties, their parents, and family dysfunctions. Kay is gangly and slightly askew, consulting a fortune teller and then falling in love with a man because of a mole on his face and a lock of hair; then, falling out of love when he plants a tree in their yard. Sweetie is plump, imperious, self-centered, and seriously mentally ill. The parents see none of the illness, seeing only their cute child. Kay mainly feels exasperation at her sister's impositions. Slowly, the film exposes how the roots of Sweetie's illness have choked Kay's own development. Can she be released?
Paul à Québec is quite simply about life, at its happiest and at its most challenging. Paul and his in-laws offer us a window onto the everyday life of the Beaulieu family, but we also witness the decline of his father-in-law, Roland. Paul à Québec is a hymn to life that reminds us, among other things, of the beauty of those small moments when, in spite of the farewells, life shows us how important it is to savour every instant.
Babe is a little pig who doesn't quite know his place in the world. With a bunch of odd friends, like Ferdinand the duck who thinks he is a rooster and Fly the dog he calls mom, Babe realizes that he has the makings to become the greatest sheep pig of all time, and Farmer Hogget knows it. With the help of the sheep dogs Babe learns that a pig can be anything that he wants to be.
In Lapa, Rio de Janeiro, the idle aspirant writer Zeca has been living with Arts Professor Júlia for five years. He is stuck on page 50 of his novel for a long time and Zeca claims lack of inspiration to conclude the plot. He leads a comfortable life from inheritance left by his mother and administrated by his father Humberto. When Zeca sees Júlia alone with her best friend Carol in his flat, he believes that they are having a love affair and becomes obsessed with Carol, following her. Júlia travels to São Paulo with work giving Zeca the perfect opportunity to have an affair with Carol. So begins his complicated life: while Júlia works and studies for her doctorate, Zeca has sex with Carol during the days and with Júlia during the nights. Zeca plots a scheme to stay with either Carol or Júlia but his plan does not go as he hoped.
Adolescence is like a heavy rain. Even though you catch a cold from it, you still look forward to experiencing it once again. Ko-Teng has several close friends who had a crush on Shen Chia-Yi. Those friends of Ko's thus moved in unison from Ching Chengs junior high school straight into the senior high school division in pursuit of her. Naughty in nature, Ko was ordered by their homeroom teacher to sit in front of honor student Shen for her to keep close tabs on him. The two hadn't hit it off at first but Ko gradually fell for Shen, who was always pressuring him to study hard. On the other hand, Shen became impressed by the contrasting values Ko represented. Ko started pursuing Shen but Shen remained hesitant.
Johnny, a freewheeling, motorcycle-riding musician, rolls into a small town with his band, and meets Kathy, an honor student who catches his eye. Meanwhile, Kathy's father, after being in the Witness Protection Program, is finally found by the two corrupt cops he escaped from years ago, who claim he owes them a lot of money.
Sotiris is a police investigator in Athens who lives by a strict moral code. An honest man, he carries himself as though held down by the weight of the world. Dora is a cleaning lady, struggling to get by any way she can. Dealt a rough hand in life, she has developed a rich layer of cynicism and mistrust that informs her every action. When a man Sotiris believes is innocent is arrested for a brutal crime, his attempt to uncover the truth results in a grave mistake. Finding himself on the other side of the law for the first time, he places his fate in Dora, the only witness to his malfeasance and the only person who can help him, for better or for worse.
The Tulse Luper Suitcases reconstructs the life of Tulse Luper, a professional writer and project-maker, caught up in a life of prisons. He was born in 1911 in Newport, South Wales and presumably last heard of in 1989. His life is reconstructed from the evidence of 92 suitcases found around the world - 92 being the atomic number of the element Uranium. The project includes three feature films, a TV series, 92 DVDs, CD-ROMs, and books.
A corrupt businessman blackmails the lovelorn reprobate Atsushi into watching over his suitcase full of embezzled cash while he serves a jail sentence. Rather than wait for the man to retrieve his money, however, Atsushi decides to spend it all in one libidinous rushâfully expecting to be tracked down and killed.
Three American brothers who have not spoken to each other in a year set off on a train voyage across India with a plan to find themselves and bond with each other -- to become brothers again like they used to be. Their "spiritual quest", however, veers rapidly off-course (due to events involving over-the-counter pain killers, Indian cough syrup, and pepper spray).
When their regal matriarch falls ill, the troubled Vuillard family come together for a hesitant Christmastime reunion. Among them is rebellious ne'er-do-well Henri and the uptight Elizabeth. Together under the same roof for the first time in many years, their intricate, long denied resentments and yearnings emerge again.
Homer Grindstaff is a big named banker in Glory and Doc Council is a prison official and they team up to plot to kill Appleyard and his ex-convict friends who were attempting to open up a general store in Stone Coal, West Virginia and then to take the money.
When the thoughtless comfort of her middle-class life is disrupted, a German flight attendant suddenly ditches it all in pursuit of new meaning, making her way through a series of unexpected, oddly humorous and slightly surreal encounters in her search for grounding in a complex and dislocated world.
Powerful magic cast by Alex spells trouble for the Russo's. The kids must go on an adventure to save their family and their existence.
Rajiv Mathur decides to go conditionally steady with fellow collegian, Payal, so that be can be permitted to go on an outing. Payal accepts, and accompanies him. During the outing, he gets intoxicated, and attempts to molest her, and she decides to dump him. Thereafter, slighted but not beaten - Rajiv turns on his charms on another beauty - the gorgeous Alisha Sahay. But will she be as permissible as Payal?
Based on David Walliams' best-selling children's book, with an all-star cast including Jennifer Saunders, James Buckley, David Walliams and Kate Moss, The Boy in the Dress is a celebration of creativity, difference, football and fashion. Dennis feels different - an ordinary boy in an ordinary house in an ordinary street, playing football with his mates and living with his dad and brother, but frustrated by the boring grey world he inhabits. Life has never really been the same since his mum left. However, transformation can happen in the most unexpected places. Aided by Lisa, the coolest girl in the school, Dennis creates a whole new persona and puts it to the ultimate test - but can a boy wear a dress, and what will the headmaster, his dad and his friends on the football team think if they find out?
A Bollywood update of Jane Austen's classic tale, in which Mrs. Bakshi is eager to find suitable husbands for her four unmarried daughters. When the rich single gentlemen Balraj and Darcy come to visit, the Bakshis have high hopes, though circumstance and boorish opinions threaten to get in the way of romance.
Bahia Benmahmoud, a free-spirited young woman, has a particular way of seeing political engagement, as she doesn't hesitate to sleep with those who don't agree with her to convert them to her cause - which is a lot of people, as all right-leaning people are concerned. Generally, it works pretty well. Until the day she meets Arthur Martin, a discreet forty-something who doesn't like taking risks. She imagines that with a name like that, he's got to be slightly fascist. But names are deceitful and appearances deceiving..
Fantasy comedy about a young window dresser who kisses a statue of Venus, which then comes to life in the form of Ava Gardner. The problems begin, however, when Venus falls in love with him.
Gerald is a smart, young, high-flying American banker. Everything is great until his wife finds another woman's underwear in their bedroom and subsequently throws him out. He finds lodgings with Monica, a recently divorced 50-year old housewife, who is smitten with Gerald. But after their first night of love, Gerald avoids her. Monica feels used and betrayed until Gerald confesses he likes to dress up as a woman. Monica learns to accept and eventually support Geraldine, Gerald's alter ego. Based on the novel by Monica Jay.
Rita, a hairdresser with a sharp wit, is married to Denny, and at 26 doesn't want a baby. She wants to discover herself -son she joins the Open University. Dr. Frank Bryant Is a disillusioned university professor of literature. His marriage has failed, his girlfriend is having an affair with his best friend and he can't get through the day without downing a bottle or two of whisky. He refers to himself as an appalling teacher of appalling students. What Frank needs is a challenge ... along comes Rita. In this hilarious and often moving drama, the story tells how two people find a now lease of life through each other.
Two families, Sebkovi and Krausovi, are celebrating christmas, but not everyone is in a good mood. Teenage kids think their fathers are totaly stupid, fathers are sure their children are nothing more than rebels, hating anything they say. Written by AntonÃn
A clinically depressed teenager gets a new start after he checks himself into an adult psychiatric ward.
Ronnie, Wal, Andy and Vic are four bored, unemployed teens in dreary, rainy Glasgow. Ronnie comes up with a great idea. He has noticed that stainless steel sinks are worth a lot of money and comes up with a complicated scheme: to steal sinks from a warehouse dressed as girls and using a stop-motion-potion.
Rebellious 16 year old Poppy from Mailibu is sent to an English boarding school. Realising her Father isn't coming back to rescue her she tries to get expelled.
While attending a retrospect of his work, a filmmaker recalls his life and his loves: the inspirations for his films.
Over the course of his summer break, a teenager comes into his own thanks in part to the friendship he strikes up with one of the park's managers.
A young girl named Juno gets herself pregnant and tries to stand on her own. She soon learns a few lessons about being grown up.
A look at some Texas teens on their last day of school in 1976, centering on student Randall Floyd, who moves easily among stoners, jocks and geeks. Floyd is a star athlete, but he also likes smoking weed, which presents a conundrum when his football coach demands he sign a "no drugs" pledge.
An American Pie-like teen comedy in which a high school senior tries to become the first student in years to complete the Dirty Deeds, an outrageous series of challenges that must be completed by the Homecoming banquet at 9 a.m.
Der Bewegte Mann is a German comedy about a heterosexual man, Axel, who is thrown out of his girlfriends home for cheating and ends up moving in with a gay man. Axel learns the advantages of living with gay men even though they are attracted to him and when his girlfriend wants him back he must make a tough decision.
Life really sucks for a group of gay and lesbian teenagers living in Los Angeles. Their parents kicked them out, they're broke and bored, their lovers cheat on them, and they're harassed by fag-bashers. If things are going to be this way, maybe suicide isn't a bad idea; at least not in the mind of Andy, our major protagonist, who gives the film its title by describing himself as "totally fucked up".
Teenage Mary Cummings, who has "been Born Again her whole life," is about to enter her senior year at American Eagle Christian High School near Baltimore with her Fundamentalist Christian friends Hilary Faye and Veronica, the three of whom have formed a girl group called the Christian Jewels. Everything seems perfectâuntil Maryâs "perfect Christian boyfriend" Dean tells her, as theyâre swimming underwater, that he thinks he's gay.
A lone prospector ventures into Alaska looking for gold. He gets mixed up with some burly characters and falls in love with the beautiful Georgia. He tries to win her heart with his singular charm.
A sex therapist goes through puberty after the successful removal of a benign tumor resting against his pituitary gland. He experiences all the changes and effects of puberty over a three-week period.
Waxing nostalgic about the bittersweet passage from childhood to puberty in this tender coming-of-age tale, four childhood girlfriends -- Teeny, Chrissy, Samantha and Roberta -- recall the magical summer of 1970. During their walk down memory lane, they reconcile experiences with boys, secrets, bullies and more.
The movie is about an old disabled lady who lives with her spinster daughter. The lady desperately wants her daughter to marry, and the daughter, driven by the supposed imminent death of her mother, invites a total stranger home and introduces him as her boyfriend. The man and the prospective mother-in-law eventually start to like each other, and he makes every effort to be liked by the daughter. With the intervention of a fantasy granddaughter, quasi-miraculous healing, and a lot of hilarious repartee in between, the movie has a happy ending.
Eugene, a young teenage Jewish boy, recalls his memoirs of his time as an adolescent youth. He lives with his parents, his aunt, two cousins, and his brother, Stanley, whom he looks up to and admires. He goes through the hardships of puberty, sexual fantasy, and living the life of a poor boy in a crowded house.
Frankie is brought up in a strict middle class family, but like any other adolescent, he is curious about sex during puberty, so he turns to his "sex mentor" - porn magazines and his mate Jing. With the help of Jing, Frankie has the opportunity of camping with his crush Zoey, and spending time alone with her, during which he loses his virginity to her... not quite! He turns out to be doing the well-known ugly she-boy from school! The episode devastates Frankie, and he decides to leave Hong Kong for the U.K. to continue his study, where he acquaints with lecherous senior James. Frankie is in a stable relationship with Zeta after graduating. Their only problem is their sex life: Zeta is sexually anxious and sets certain restrictions. Not only does that prevent Frankie from being sexually satisfied, it also indirectly leads to their breakup. Frankie then begins his journey back to the mainland with Jing to pick up chicks in clubs.
It's South Africa 1990. Two major events are about to happen: The release of Nelson Mandela and, more importantly, it's Spud Milton's first year at an elite boys only private boarding school. John Milton is a boy from an ordinary background who wins a scholarship to a private school in Kwazulu-Natal, South Africa. Surrounded by boys with nicknames like Gecko, Rambo, Rain Man and Mad Dog, Spud has his hands full trying to adapt to his new home. Along the way Spud takes his first tentative steps along the path to manhood. (The path it seems could be a rather long road). Spud is an only child. He is cursed with parents from well beyond the lunatic fringe and a senile granny. His dad is a fervent anti-communist who is paranoid that the family domestic worker is running a shebeen from her room at the back of the family home. His mom is a free spirit and a teenager's worst nightmare, whether it's shopping for Spud's underwear in the local supermarket
31 year-old Tristan remembers the time when he was 15 and had just hit puberty. But he is not alone in this, he is with a large group of friends: Specki, a fat kid who is always stuffing himself, Streusel, a cheeky boy covered with spots, Tümai, a pretty Turkish girl, Kerstin, best friend of Tümai and very sporty, Elrond, with a heavy stutter, but regardless extremely popular and good looking, Lars and Simone, so far the only couple in the class who spend most of their time smooching and Long Jana, a girl who is at least 6 foot tall and extremely skinny.
A boy named Tok is the prospective inheritor of his family that has been working as comedians for generations. But something goes wrong as Tok seems not to inherit any hilarity from his family: he can make no one laugh. When Tok meets Namkaeng, the only woman who does laugh at his jokes, their story of friendship begins.
Widowed U.S. president Andrew Shepherd, one of the world's most powerful men, can have anything he wants -- and what he covets most is Sydney Ellen Wade, a Washington lobbyist. But Shepherd's attempts at courting her spark wild rumors and decimate his approval ratings.
© Valossa 2015–2024
