A woman named Kit moves back to her parent's house, where she receives a mysterious invitation that would fulfill her childhood dreams.
Dolls takes puppeteering as its overriding motif, which relates thematically to the action provided by the live characters. Chief among those tales is the story of Matsumoto and Sawako, a young couple whose relationship is about to be broken apart by the former's parents, who have insisted their son take part in an arranged marriage to his boss' daughter.
Guido Anselmi, a film director, finds himself creatively barren at the peak of his career. Urged by his doctors to rest, Anselmi heads for a luxurious resort, but a sorry group gathers—his producer, staff, actors, wife, mistress, and relatives—each one begging him to get on with the show. In retreat from their dependency, he fantasizes about past women and dreams of his childhood.
When disillusioned Swedish knight Antonius Block returns home from the Crusades to find his country in the grips of the Black Death, he challenges Death to a chess match for his life. Tormented by the belief that God does not exist, Block sets off on a journey, meeting up with traveling players Jof and his wife, Mia, and becoming determined to evade Death long enough to commit one redemptive act while he still lives.
A stranger who may be the trickster magician Kummatty comes to a village in Malabar, India.
A Place of Our Own
A naive young man witnesses an escalation of violence in his small hometown following the arrival of a mysterious circus attraction.
The managers of a textile enterprise use various scams to obtain all kinds of personal benefits, until the machinations exposed.
"In Serieux comme le plaisir, two men and a woman live quite happily together in a romantic liaison. The woman is probably wealthy anyway, so the trio doesn't worry much about money. One day they decide to take a trip in their beat-up car, managing the whole affair in their own special, insouciant manner. They are followed by a suspicious policeman who thinks there's something fishy about this group..."
Former prom queen Joy is now an agoraphobic hoarder who is coping with the death of her husband and empty nest syndrome. Her world is further turned upside down when a man she rejected in her younger days catches up with her and begins to exact his revenge. Joy now must fight for her life -- and fight to regain the life she lost years ago.
Emma approaches adulthood, she tries to live an ordinary life and keep up to her late mothers expectations. However her anxiety weighs over her, stopping her from enjoying the last few youthful years.
Michael Haneke's adaptation of Franz Kafka's unfinished novel Das Schloss. K arrives in a remote village a stranger. In attempting to establish himself there, he enters the nightmarish world of the castle bureaucracy.
A portrayal of the lives of the people living in North Madras, focusing on the politics inside the slums and how their plight remains the same, despite the political class luring them constantly during elections.
Carol White, a Los Angeles housewife in the late 1980s, comes down with a debilitating illness with no clear diagnosis.
After his colleague Schweitzer goes missing during a drug raid, undercover cop Till Hager is tasked with tracking down a mysterious new drug called "Abaddon" - a substance which supposedly drags it's users down the deepest depths of hell.
Lyudmila is a successful realtor in the capital. Pictures from the past pop up in her memory, and the viewer learns at what cost a single mother from the province managed to cherish Moscow's well-being. Lyudmila's story is typical, it reflects, like in a mirror, the pain points of modern life, forcing us to make our hourly choices. Is it worth a deal with the conscience of material comfort? Is it possible to achieve success in a megalopolis today and remain an honest person? Won't a "bright future" built on betrayal of one's own ideals lead to the decline of genuine human values?
A character is inside a cubical room; there is a hole in the roof, which is too high to reach. But pushing on the walls distorts the room in various ways, always appearing to bring the hole closer while still leaving it tantalizingly inaccessible.
The wife of an abusive criminal finds solace in the arms of a kind regular guest in her husband's restaurant.
In the aftermath of a car crash, a man discovers his dreams are tied to a stranger's sleepwalking.
Is there love after death? After he dies suddenly, the hapless advertising executive Daniel Miller finds himself in Judgment City, a gleaming way station where the newly deceased must prove they lived a life of sufficient courage to advance in their journey through the universe. As the self-doubting Daniel struggles to make his case, a budding relationship with the uninhibited Julia offers him a chance to finally feel alive.