In 1934, as playwright Luigi Pirandello travels to Stockholm, where he is about to receive the Nobel Prize, he begins reliving the drama and magic of the loved ones who have populated his life and inspired his art. Pirandello reminisces about the madness of his wife, his stormy relationship with his children, his controversial stance towards fascism, and his love for Marta Abba, the young actress who became his muse.
Inada plays Betty Yoshida, a singer and dancer from America who arrives in Japan to go on tour, only to be swindled by scheming managers. Penniless and cast to the streets, Betty is taken in by Oki (Nakagawa), a talented tap dancer who introduces her to a group of struggling musicians living and working together.
Vienna, 1937, on the eve of the annexation of Austria into Nazi Germany. The young and inexperienced Franz Huchel begins to learn about both the joys and hardships of life by working as an apprentice to the mutilated war veteran Otto Trsnjek in a small tobacco shop, where he meets the famous psychiatrist Sigmund Freud, a regular customer, who will become a valuable friend in times of chaos and uncertainty.
An Irish-born businessman based in London is kidnapped by colleagues as a joke and flown back to the small village of his birth. There he finds that American gangsters are forcing the local publicans to buy illegally-produced raw spirit with which to adulterate branded products.
As WWII looms, a wealthy widow hires an amateur archaeologist to excavate the burial mounds on her estate. When they make a historic discovery, the echoes of Britain's past resonate in the face of its uncertain future.
Marek starts as a trainee on a container ship. It's 197 meters long, 30 meters wide, and bound for Martinique in the Caribbean. Full of anticipation, he leaves his parents' farm in Western Pomerania in Germany and goes on board his ship at Saint-Nazaire in Brittany. Marek wants to find freedom and falls in love with the enigmatic sailor Jean. Will it just be a fling or will it last forever? Does Jean actually have a lover in every port? On his trip across the Atlantic, Marek may not actually become a sailor, but he does grow up. A romantic coming-of-age trip over the Atlantic and a maritime boy's dream about love under the conditions of modern cargo shipping.
A television production based on Bozena Slančíková-Timrava's short stories about social and moral conditions in a Slovak village in the 1930s.
A former spy in the Chinese Nationalist Party falls for an opium-dealing widow, as China is ravaged by war and revolution.
A political thriller that unfolds during the British Mandate in 1930s Tel Aviv, following two British police officers, Thomas Wilkin and Geoffrey Morton, in their hunt for poet and Zionist activist Avraham Stern, who is plotting to evict British authorities.
Sailor meets singer in Cuba. He's due to ship out, but hits it off with her, so he sticks around. Trouble brewing on many fronts - singer's best friend doesn't like the sailor, and singer has another suitor anyway. Rich guy takes her to all the fancy Cuban sports events - jai-alai, horse racing. Much more glamorous than spending time with Sailor. Can he win her over before he gets in trouble for letting his ship sail without him?
1930's China. The village of a poor family is taken over by the occupying Japanese army. One son, Zhongliang, leaves his wife and young son to join a medic group for the Chinese Army. The other son, Zhangmin goes into hiding to protect his family. The focus shifts back and forth from the brothers' parents and Zhongliang's wife and son to Zhongliang's newfound life of luxury in a town not too far away. The plight of Zhongliang's mother, his wife, Sufan and her son, Kongeson is contrasted with Zhongliang's rise in a flourishing company.
During a solo voyage in the Indian Ocean, a veteran mariner awakes to find his vessel taking on water after a collision with a stray shipping container. With his radio and navigation equipment disabled, he sails unknowingly into a violent storm and barely escapes with his life. With any luck, the ocean currents may carry him into a shipping lane -- but, with supplies dwindling and the sharks circling, the sailor is forced to face his own mortality.
Japan, 1943, during World War II. Young Suzu leaves her village near Hiroshima to marry and live with her in-laws in Kure, a military harbor. Her creativity to overcome deprivation quickly makes her indispensable at home. Inhabited by an ancestral wisdom, Suzu impregnates the simple gestures of everyday life with poetry and beauty. The many hardships, the loss of loved ones, the frequent air raids of the enemy, nothing alters her enthusiasm…
Jerry, Connie, and Franky are small-town girls seeking wealthy husbands in New York City. But, while Connie and Franky are reckless with their affections — one bedding a married man and the other marrying a scoundrel — Jerry is determined to remain practical. As she mothers her wounded, heartbroken friends, she stalwartly but foolishly resists the advances of the good-hearted and affluent Tony Jardine.
When misfortune hits hard on the Jordan family of Chicago's upper class, Bonnie Jordan, a dazzling and witty girl, finds a job as an aspiring reporter; however, his naive younger brother Rodney takes a twisted path and gets involved with the wrong people.
Shanghai gangsters grapple with lust and loyalty on the eve of war with Japan as they try to navigate an alliance with the enemy's army.
Two young Hollywood hopefuls meet during their 1930s screen test. As the story progresses, this film noir portrays the boys slowly becoming enamored with each other in poetic, surrealistic dream sequences.
The fates of Henry - an American correspondent - and Teresa, one of the Republic's censors during the Spanish Civil War.
Salamanca, Spain, 1936. In the early days of the military rebellion that began the Spanish Civil War (1936-39), writer Miguel de Unamuno supports the uprising in the hope that the prevailing political chaos will end. But when the confrontation becomes bloody, Unamuno must question his initial position.
Drenge til Skovs