John (David Bowie) is the lover of the gorgeous immortal vampire Miriam (Catherine Deneuve), and he's been led to believe that he'll live forever, too. Unfortunately, he quickly deteriorates into a horrible living death, and Miriam seeks a new companion. She soon sets her sights on Sarah (Susan Sarandon), a lovely young scientist, who quickly falls under Miriam's spell. However, Sarah doesn't warm up to the concept of vampirism easily, leading to conflict with Miriam.
A lighthearted take on director Yasujiro Ozu's perennial theme of the challenges of intergenerational relationships, Good Morning tells the story of two young boys who stop speaking in protest after their parents refuse to buy a television set. Ozu weaves a wealth of subtle gags through a family portrait as rich as those of his dramatic films, mocking the foibles of the adult world through the eyes of his child protagonists. Shot in stunning color and set in a suburb of Tokyo where housewives gossip about the neighbors' new washing machine and unemployed husbands look for work as door-to-door salesmen, this charming comedy refashions Ozu's own silent classic I Was Born, But . . . to gently satirize consumerism in postwar Japan.
The world of Gilbert and Sullivan comes to vivid life in director Mike Leigh's extraordinary dramatisation of the staging of the duo's legendary 1885 comic opera The Mikado. Jim Broadbent and Allan Corduner brilliantly inhabit the roles of the world-famous Victorian librettist and composer, who, along with their troupe of temperamental actors, must battle personal and professional demons while mounting this major production. A lushly produced epic about the harsh realities of creative expression, featuring bravura performances and Oscar-winning costume design and makeup, Topsy-Turvy is an unexpected period delight from one of contemporary cinema's great artists.
Juraj Herz's film The Cremator has been described in many ways - as surrealist-inspired horror, as expressionist fantasy, as a dark and disturbing tale of terror.
This brilliantly chilling film, a mix of Dr Strangelove and Repulsion, is set in Prague during the Nazi occupation. It tells the story of Karl Kopfrkingl (Rudolf Hrušínský), a professional cremator, for whom the political climate allows free rein to his increasingly deranged impulses for the 'salvation of the world'.