A Talking Picture (2003)

Director
Manoel de Oliveira

Main cast
Leonor Silveira; Filipa de Almeida; John Malkovich; Catherine Deneuve; Stefania Sandrelli

Genres
War, Comedy, Drama, History

Description
A meditation on civilization. July, 2001: friends wave as a cruise ship departs Lisbon for Mediterranean ports and the Indian Ocean. On board and on day trips in Marseilles, Pompeii, Athens, Istanbul, and Cairo, a professor tells her young daughter about myth, history, religion, and wars. Men approach her; she's cool, on her way to her husband in Bombay. After Cairo, for two evenings divided by a stop in Aden, the captain charms three successful, famous (and childless) women, who talk with wit and intellect, each understanding the others' native tongue, a European union. The captain asks mother and child to join them. He gives the girl a gift. Helena sings. Life can be sweet.


Similar movies

A bombardier in World War II tries desperately to escape the insanity of the war. However, sometimes insanity is the only sane way cope with a crazy situation. Catch-22 is a parody of a "military mentality" and of a bureaucratic society in general.
Three people arrive in a village in Southern England in the early years of World War 2. Alison Smith is a London girl who is due to start working on a farm as a 'Land Girl'. Peter Gibbs is an Englishman conscripted into the army, taking a few days leave before going abroad. Bob Johnson is a U.S. Army sergeant who wanted to go to Canterbury, but got off here by mistake. As they walk into the village, Alison is attacked by 'The Glue Man', a prankster who pours glue in women's hair. The three of them start to explore the area to discover and expose 'The Glue Man' but then get engrossed in the history of the area and the tales of The Pilgrim's Way. The local magistrate, Thomas Colpeper, JP is a local historian and a very mysterious character who leads them further into the mystery.
Through the eyes of a British "documentary", this film takes a satirically humorous, and sometimes frightening, look at the history of an America where the South won the Civil War.
As U.S. troops storm the beaches of Normandy, three brothers lie dead on the battlefield, with a fourth trapped behind enemy lines. Ranger captain John Miller and seven men are tasked with penetrating German-held territory and bringing the boy home.
During WWII, four North African men enlist in the French army to liberate that country from Nazi oppression, and to fight French discrimination.
In September 1942, the German Afrika Korps under Rommel have successfully pushed the Allies back into Egypt. A counter-attack is planned, for which the fuel dumps at Tobruk are a critical impediment. In order to aid the attack, a group of British commandos and German Jews make their way undercover through 800 miles of desert, to destroy the fuel dumps starving the Germans of fuel.
The story of the Tuskegee Airmen, the first African-American pilots to fly in a combat squadron during World War II.
The Great Raid is an inspirational true story of one of the most triumphant rescue missions during World War II. As the war rages, the elite 6th Ranger Battalion is given a mission of heroic proportions: push 30 miles behind enemy lines and liberate over 500 prisoners of war.
The Nazis, exasperated at the number of escapes from their prison camps by a relatively small number of Allied prisoners, relocates them to a high-security "escape-proof" camp to sit out the remainder of the war. Undaunted, the prisoners plan one of the most ambitious escape attempts of World War II. Based on a true story.
An epic about British officer T.E. Lawrence's mission to aid the Arab tribes in their revolt against the Ottoman Empire during the First World War. Lawrence becomes a flamboyant, messianic figure in the cause of Arab unity but his psychological instability threatens to undermine his achievements.
A classic story of English POWs in Burma forced to build a bridge to aid the war effort of their Japanese captors. British and American intelligence officers conspire to blow up the structure, but Col. Nicholson , the commander who supervised the bridge's construction, has acquired a sense of pride in his creation and tries to foil their plans.
A sprawling war film, Midway stars nearly every actor who wasn't in A Bridge Too Far. Charlton Heston, Toshirô Mifune, Robert Mitchum and Henry Fonda are among the familiar faces depicting the American and Japanese forces in a naval battle that became the turning point of the Pacific war. Using some real wartime footage, Midway provides an exciting view of a gigantic battle.
Based on a true story set in 1948, customs officer Mehti is faced with the duty of formally setting up the border between Turkey and Syria, dividing his hometown. He is unaware of the pain that will eminently unfold, as families, languages, cultures and lovers are both ripped apart and clash head on in a village once united.
The mostly true story of the legendary "worst director of all time", who, with the help of his strange friends, filmed countless B-movies without ever becoming famous or successful.
A drama based on Texas congressman Charlie Wilson's covert dealings in Afghanistan, where his efforts to assist rebels in their war with the Soviets had some unforeseen and long-reaching effects.
Union spy Gail Loveless impersonates a black maid in the early days of the Civil War, but complications arise when she falls in love with a Confederate officer.
French colonists in Africa, several months behind in the news, find themselves at war with their German neighbors. Deciding that they must do their proper duty and fight the Germans, they promptly conscript the local native population. Issuing them boots and rifles, the French attempt to make "proper" soldiers out of the Africans. A young, idealistic French geographer seems to be the only rational person in the town, and he takes over control of the "war" after several bungles on the part of the others.
An insane general starts a process to nuclear holocaust that a war room of politicians and generals frantically try to stop. A classic black and white war satire from director Stanley Kubrick starring Peter Sellers.
New York trapper Tom Dobb becomes an unwilling participant in the American Revolution after his son Ned is drafted into the Army by the villainous Sergeant Major Peasy. Tom attempts to find his son, and eventually becomes convinced that he must take a stand and fight for the freedom of the Colonies, alongside the aristocratic rebel Daisy McConnahay. As Tom undergoes his change of heart, the events of the war unfold in large-scale grandeur.
The truthful soldier Stirling didn't know how to lie about his source of information, the talking army Mule, Francis, so he was treated as a lunatic and led to one after another hilarious situations, where the mule was the only one that appeared in his right mind. In the process of all this, the mule assisted in uncovering a spy, Mareen, who pretended to be lost among the jungles, but was actually...
This military service comedy chronicles the misadventures of the U.S.S. Bustard in Japan. The crew has stolen a Buddha statue from a Japanese village, which if discovered missing would threaten Japanese/American relations. Doc Willoughby is the ship's petty officer, whose antics are constantly getting him into trouble with his captain. On shore leave, Willoughby falls for a seemingly demure Japanese girl in a kimono shop, who actually turns out to be a Japanese/American nurse in the US Navy, Lt. Tomiko Momoyama. However, it turns out she was betrothed as a child to a traditional Japanese man named Toshi, who fully intends on enforcing tradition. Willoughby divides his time between trying to return the Buddha statue back to the Japanese village it rightfully belongs to, and trying to woo Tomiko from the traditional Japanese man she rightfully belongs to.
Captain Henri Rochard is a French officer assigned to work with Lieut. Catherine Gates. Through a wacky series of misadventures, they fall in love and marry. When the war ends, Capt. Rochard tries to return to America with the other female war brides. Zany gender-confusing antics follow.
An art instructor and an English teacher form a rivalry that ends up with a competition at their school in which students decide whether words or pictures are more important.
This day-in-the-life cult comedy focuses on a group of friends working at Sully Boyar's Car Wash in the Los Angeles ghetto. The team meets dozens of eccentric customers -- including a smooth-talking preacher, a wacky cab driver and an ex-convict -- while cracking politically incorrect jokes to a constant soundtrack of disco and funk. Some of the workers find romance as the day moves along, but most are just happy to get through another shift.
When recently single Steven moves into his new apartment, cable guy Chip comes to hook him up -- and doesn't let go. Initially, Chip is just overzealous in his desire to be Steven's pal, but when Steven tries to end the "friendship," Chip shows his dark side. He begins stalking Steven, who's left to fend for himself because no one else can believe Chip's capable of such behavior.
Hollywood beckons for recent film school grad Nick Chapman, who is out to capitalize on the momentum from his national award-winning student film. Studio executive Allen Habel seduces Nick with a dream deal to make his first feature, but once production gets rolling, corporate reality begins to intervene: Nick is unable to control a series of compromises to his high-minded vision, and it's all he can do to maintain his integrity in the midst of filmmaking chaos.
Mediterranean ferryboat captain Henry St James has things well organized - a loving and very English wife Maud in Gibraltar, and the loving if rather more hot-blooded Mistress, Nita in Tangiers. A perfect life. As long as neither woman decides to follow him to the other port.
The irreverent host of a political satire talk show decides to run for president. But his stunt to expose Washington corruption goes further than he expects when he actually wins the election. Meanwhile, a software engineer suspects that a computer glitch is responsible for his surprising victory … but will she speak up?
For the past four years, San Francisco cop Jack Cates has been after an unidentified drug kingpin who calls himself the "Ice Man". Jack finds a picture that proves that the Ice Man has put a price on the head of Reggie Hammond, who is scheduled to be released from prison on the next day.
Based on an attraction at Disneyland, the Country Bear Jamboree, "The Country Bears" is one in a long line of live action Disney family films. A satirical, behind-the-music look at rock & roll bands. Beary, a young bear raised by a human family in a world where humans and talking bears coexist, attempts to trace his roots. He meets up with the Country Bears, a long-since broken-up band.
The neurotic New Yorker Woody Allen tells one of the greatest romantic comedies to be set in the city of New York.
8pm in a rundown prison. A prisoner on death row will be executed. He has the right to make a final declaration. But the law doesn't stipulate how long he can talk. So, as long as he talks the execution is postponed…
Famous and wealthy funnyman George Simmons doesn't give much thought to how he treats people until a doctor delivers stunning health news, forcing George to reevaluate his priorities with a little help from aspiring stand-up comic Ira.
The Peruvian army captain Pantaleon Pantoja, a very serious and efficient officer, is chosen by his superiors to set up a special service of 'visitors' to satisfy the sexual needs of the soldiers posted on remote jungle outposts.
Packard Schmidt is a burnt-out, middle-aged college English professor. In a desperate attempt to restore some sense of vitality to his lonely existence he embarks on a series of impulsive romantic exploits resulting in a cavalcade of disaster both personally and professionally. These disasters change and educate Pack and serve eventually as a meditation on the meaning and power of desire, loss, and love.
Objectively, Odette Toulemonde has nothing to be happy about, but is. Balthazar Balsan has everything to be happy about, but isn’t. Odette, awkwardly forty, with a delightful hairdresser son and a daughter bogged down in adolescence, spends her days behind the cosmetic’s counter in a department store and her nights sewing feathers on costumes for Parisian variety shows. She dreams of thanking Balthazar Balsan, her favorite author, to whom – she believes – she owes her optimism. The rich and charming Parisian writer then turns up in her life in an unexpected way.
Encore is a 1951 anthology film composed of adaptations of three short stories by W. Somerset Maugham: "The Ant and the Grasshopper", directed by Pat Jackson and adapted by T. E. B. Clarke; "Winter Cruise", helmed by Anthony Pelissier, screenplay by Arthur Macrae; "Gigolo and Gigolette", directed by Harold French, written by Eric Ambler. It is the last film in a Maugham trilogy, preceded by Quartet and Trio.
The former stars of a TV sci-fi series are reunited for a cruise with members of their fan club.
The unborn child of Mamlakat is telling her story. She is 17, beautiful and vivacious, and dreaming secretly of becoming an actress. She lives with her father and brother in a small village in Central Asia. One night she is seduced by an actor from a travelling troupe, who poses as a friend of Tom Cruise, and makes her pregnant. She tries to abort, but her father and brother become determined to find the seducer, setting in motion a cascade of comic adventures.
Arriving on a deserted beach in the Mediterranean sea, in a time and a place unspecified, Kaspar Hauser is forced to confront the evil of a Grand Duchess who feels threatened by the power she exercises over the community.
While touring abroad in Europe, beautiful American skydiver Fathom Harvill gets wrapped up in international intrigue when Scottish spy Douglas Campbell recruits her to help him on a secret mission. Before long, Fathom realizes that no one around her, including the mysterious Peter Merriweather, can easily be trusted, leading to various adventures that involve bull fighting, beaches and, of course, romance.
The mysterious arrival of a foreigner to a small village in a Mediterranean island, awake the sudden interest from a diverse group of residents, who will appear unexpectedly in the stranger's life, believing that he's going to reopen an old shop. In contrast, the real intentions of the stranger are hidden behind an old Polaroid photo, which has led him to that place in search of answers.
Teenager Jones has opted not to go to college and is instead renting a room in a boarding house to work on his writing skills. Soon, Jones finds himself dividing his time between two women: a young actress named Lisa and a photographer named Jane. After Jane's ex-boyfriend arrives to help her recover from a car accident, Jones begins to understand just how much he cares for her.
More than 100,000 people gather by the Mekong River in North-East Thailand on November Full Moon every year. After sunset, mysterious fireballs rise up from the river and disappear into the sky. Where do the fireballs come from? While the locals still adhere to the traditional myth that they are the dragon, Great Naga, making a sacred offering to Buddha, the Western visitors take a more sceptical stance: Dr. Norati sets out to prove that the fireballs are natural while Dr. Surapol wants to prove the phenomenon a hoax. Meanwhile, temple-custodian Abbot Loh believes his monks have been responsible for the "miracle" for the past 30 years.
Grazia is a free-spirited mother-of-three married to shy fisherman Pietro and living on the idyllic but isolated island of Lampedusa in the Mediterranean Sea. She shows signs of manic depressive behavior — one moment she's laughing wildly and swimming half-naked in the sea, while the next she's curled in a ball on her bed. Out of her earshot, the adult members of her extended family vaguely discuss sending her to a facility of some sort in Northern Italy.
When a fellow scientist asks for Jack's help in locating the mausoleum of China's first emperor, the past collides violently with the present as Jack discovers his amazing visions are based in fact.
My Mother's Castle (Le chateau de ma mere) is a sequel and companion piece to My Father's Glory (La Gloire de Mon Pere), both based on the childhood recollections of Marcel Pagnol. Like its predecessor, the movie explores the adventures of the young Marcel (Julien Ciamaca) during his summers at the family summer home in Provence.
Peggy Sue faints at a Highschool reunion. When she wakes up she finds herself in her own past, just before she finished school.
Years after walking away from her past as a teenage private eye, Veronica Mars gets pulled back to her hometown - just in time for her high school reunion - in order to help her old flame Logan Echolls, who's embroiled in a murder mystery.
Based on the true events surrounding Frank Sinatra's tour of Australia. When Sinatra calls a local reporter a "two-bit hooker", every union in the country black-bans the star until he issues an apology.
To get royal backing on a needed drainage project, a poor French lord must learn to play the delicate games of wit at court at Versailles.
"A Touch of Spice" is a story about Fanis, a young Greek boy growing up in Istanbul, whose grandfather, a culinary philosopher and mentor, teaches him that both food and life require a little salt to give them flavor. They both require... A Touch of Spice. Fanis grows up to become an excellent cook and uses his cooking skills to spice up the lives of those around him. 35 years later he leaves Athens and travels back to his birthplace of Istanbul to reunite with his grandfather and his first love. He travels back only to realize that he forgot to put a little bit of spice in his own life.
Kaan and Mete, co-hosts of a mid 1990s radio show called Kaybedenler Kulübü (Losers' Club), struggle to deal with their daily lives after their show becomes an instant hit. Kaan meets Zeynep, the girl of his dreams, but their relationship comes under pressure as the show continues to stir controversy and attract fans from every segment of Istanbul society.
Film depicts the events on board a luxury liner filled with the friends of a deceased opera singer who have gathered to mourn her.
Johnny Kapahala, a teen snowboarding champion from Vermont, returns to Oahu, Hawaii, for the wedding of his hero -- his grandfather, local surf legend Johnny Tsunami -- and to catch a few famous Kauai waves. When Johnny arrives, he meets his new family including "Uncle Chris" (the 12-year-old son of his new step-grandmother) who resents the upcoming marriage. Chris's only interest is to join a mountain boarding crew led by a teenage bully. When Johnny's grandfather and his new wife open a surf shop that also caters to mountain boarders, they are soon embroiled in a turf war with a rival shop owner who wants to shut their business down.
Benjamin is a 16 year old half-side spastic with lousy grades in math, who switches to a boarding school to reach grammar school. Acclimatization to the new environment is difficult in the first place and he has to struggle with the various problems of coming of age, when he falls in love to the school's dream girl Malen.
David Samuels is from an intellectual Jewish family from the posh Amsterdam Old South, where he is often mistaken as Moroccan because of his dark hair. David is a remarkable man on a mission: to find a ghetto fabulous queen with great tits and thick buttocks. His parents and friends declare him mad, but David continues unabated. His search leads him to the Bijlmer, where, after some wild adventures he is left disappointed. Will David ever find his ideal woman - a large, dark sex goddess with booty and brains?
This comedic drama features two young couples, and two old friends who reapear in the two couples lives. The story takes place mostly in two apartments across the street from each other in Mexico City at the end of the millenium. Intellectual Carlos is not offering as much love as wife Ana needs. Tomas, a world-traveling friend of the couple reappears after many years abroad. Across the street, womanizing executive Miguel and suffering wife Andrea are joined by visiting friend Maria. The presence of guests Tomas and Maria triggers lust, rejection, infidelities, reconciliation and other consequences of suppressed love and marital relations, among the six friends-three guys and three girls. Written by ElianaG
April 5, 1943: a battalion of the Foreign Legion arrives in El Ksour, Tunisia, to escort a fortune in gold bars to the home front. A German ambush awaits, and all but four die. Thanks to the street smarts of Sergeant Augagneur, the Legionnaires successfully counter attack. The bank manager and his seductive wife arrive, and so does a German lieutenant, whom the French arrest. Augagneur wants to steal the gold; warrant officer Mahuzard wants to do his duty. A series of alliances form and break apart, the group dwindles in number, and the gold heads south toward Betahoua. But in whose possession?
"Sleep Sweet, My Darling" shows a bittersweet coming of age of Tomica Skrinjar, starting at the tail end of World War II in 1945.

© Valossa 2015–2024