Must watch Features & Documentaries

The listing below is an effort to share my experience and expose friends from non-film backgrounds to variety of ideas and thoughts via films. Some films are already popular and mainstream but there are others that deserve more attention than they get. A link is included for films whose short review is complete.

Feature films:

10 out of 10:

1. Blame it on Fidel (French)
2. Out of Africa
3. Bicycle Thief (Italian)
4. A Peck on the Cheek (Tamil)
5. All the King's Men (1949 version)
6. Citizen Kane
7. Life is Beautiful (Italian)
8. To Kill a Mocking Bird
9. In the Name of Father
10. Dead Poets Society
11. No Man's Land (Bosnian)
12. Gandhi
13. The Lives of Others (German)
14. Once Upon a Time in Anatolia (Turkish)
15. The Shawshank Redemption
16. Before Sunset 
17. American Beauty
18. Casablanca
19. Gone with the Wind
20. LA Confidential
21. Titanic
22. The Lord of the Rings
23. A Beautiful Mind
24. Che - The Argentine Part 1 (Spanish)
25. 12 Angry Men (USA)
26. Pinjra (Marathi)
27. Machucha (Chilean)
28. Selma (USA)
29. Winter Sleep (Turkish)
30. Children of Heaven (Iranian)
31. 
    

9 out of 10

1. North Face (German)
2. Motorcycle Diaries (Spanish)
3. Killing Fields
4. Welcome to Sajjanpur (Hindi) 
5. The Secret in their Eyes (Argentine)
6. The Deer Hunter
7. Scent of a Woman
8. Born on the 4th of July
9. JFK
10. Nixon
11. Shwas (Marathi)
12. Good Night and Good Luck
13. Chicago
14. Network
15. All the President's Men
16. In the Heat of the Night
17. One flew over the Cuckoo's Nest
18. Schindler's List
19. Thirteen Days
20. The Insider
21. Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (Swedish)
22. Path To War (HBO film)
23. The Sixth Sense
24. Apocalypse Now
25. The Gladiator
26. Malcolm X
27. Khamosh Paani - Silent Waters (Punjabi)
28. Battle for Algiers (French)
29. Casino
30. The Usual Suspects
31. Paan Singh Tomar (Hindi)
32. Les Misérables - 2008
33. Wind that Shakes the Barley (Ireland-English)
34. Omar (Palestinian)
35. Shatranj Ke Khiladi (Hindi)
36. Legends of the Fall
37. Court (Marathi)
38. OTTAAL (Malayalam)
39. Unforgiven
40. Sairat (Marathi)
41. Innocent Voices (Salvadorian Spanish)
42. The English Patient
43. Natsamrat (Marathi)
44. Amadeus
45. Rain Man
46. Even the Rain (Spanish)
47. Mississippi Burning
48. Heat

8 out of 10

1. A River Runs Through It
2. Chaplin
3. Mystic river
4. Bridge on River Kwai
5. In Brudges (Belgian)
6. Into the wild
7. Annie Hall
8. Harishchandrachi Factory (Marathi)
9. Uttarayan (Marathi)
10. Taryanche Bait (Marathi)
11. The Social Network
12. Westside Story
13. El Violin (Mexican-Spanish)
14. A Separation(Iran-Persian)
15. Kolya (Czech)
16. Unstoppable
17. American Gangster
18. Any Given Sunday
19. Million Dollar Baby
20. Revolutionary Road
21. A Single Man
22. Hotel Rwanda
23. Black Hawk Down
24. Fargo
25. Kings Speech
26. Traffic
27. Bloody Sunday
28. Shaala (Marathi)
29. Special 26 (Hindi)
30. Tell No One
31. Syriana
32. No (Chile-Spanish)
33. Frost Nixon
34. What Maisey Wants
35. Before Midnight
36. Journey of Hope (Turkish)
37. The Hunt (Danish)
38. Z(French)
39. The Manchurian Candidate 
40. Nowhere in Africa (German)
41. The Edge of Heaven (German-Turkish)
42. Fandry (Marathi)
43. Mongol
44. Bas Vakit (Turkish)
45. Flame and Citron
46. Bullhead (Dutch)
47. Salvador
48. Whats eating Gilbert Grape?
49. The Great Beauty
50. Butterfly (Spanish)
51. Downfall
52. Revanche
53. Two Lives (German)
54. A Streetcar Named Desire
55. Showgirls
56. Pelican Brief
57. People Vs Larry Flynt
58. Primal Fear

7 out of 10

1. Road to Perdition
2. Last of the Mohicans
3. 
   

Special Mention (Features)

1. Me Sindhutai Sapkal (Marathi)
2. Shahid
3. Kon-Tiki
4. Match Point
5. Driving Miss Daisy
6. Monsieur Lazhar (French)
7. A Hijacking (Danish/Somali)
8. The Grey
9. Viva Cuba (Cuban-Spanish)
10. Departures
11. Force Majeur
12. Flame and Citron
13. Sling Blade

Best Documentaries

10 on 10

1. Planet Earth Series
2. The Untold History of United States of America
3. Inside Job
4. Virunga
5. CitizenFour
6. The War on Democracy

9 on 10

1. Inequality For All
2. End of Poverty?
3. Too Big to Fail
4. Senna (Brazilian)
5. Life and Debt (on Jamaica)
6. Blackfish
7. Year Zero
8. Close Encounters at the end of the world
9. Meru
10. Bhutto

8 on 10

1. Wild China Series
2. Fidel
3. South of Border
4. Frontline: Ten Trillion and Counting
5. Zeitgeist Series
6. Katiyabaaz (Powerless)
7. Dirty Wars
8. Who killed the electric car?
9. The Summit

Worth watch due to unique value

Uttarayan (2005) - A tribute to love for all season and ages

Uttarayan is a unique gem that succeeds in questioning social mores of our times while continuing to keep viewers entertained. Bipin Nadkarni positions himself as a thinking man’s director with his bold choice of unconventional subject and further solidifies his multi-disciplinary excellence with a screenplay that would make Jaywant Dalwi proud (based on play by Jaywant Dalwi)

Although the film primarily tackles the romance between two long lost friends in their 50s (Durgi played by Nina Kulkarni and Raghu played by Shivaji Satam, two performers at the prime of their art), it also wrestles issues of patriarchy, nostalgia, generation gap and unfulfilled aspirations in a subtle manner.

Nostalgia is captured through Raghu’s interactions with his friend (Baburao played by Viju Khote) and his daily routines in the lower middle class surroundings that he has returned to after a gap of several years. The backdrop of housing societies, wooden benches in little parks and quaint temple will fondly remind viewers of several Maharashtrian localities in Dadar or Pune (That India of the past is getting fast dismantled is another matter).

Cinematography is exceptional especially in one moment when camera takes a long, low angle sweep at the vast mansion lost by Durgi and her mother (Uttara Baokar in scintillating performance) as it moves toward the servant’s quarters where the two now reside.

The unforgettable quality of the film lies in its depiction of old age romance as primarily a profoundly simple and simply uncomplicated affection between the two protagonist. Romance in the modern parlance has taken such physical connotations that this disarming, platonic love story begs to be called something else. Whatever we brand it, the daily exchanges accompanying their burgeoning relationship are essentially beautiful and that alone is a reason enough to warrant a look at this soulful film.

Rating – 7.5 out of 10
Nitin Sonawane