The longest entry in the franchise, this excellent 20th instalment pits two Japanese swordfighting icons together as friend and foe, directed with assurance by Kihachi Okamoto.
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Zatoichi Meets Yojimbo (1970)
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Author / Eternality Tan
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Love Affair (1939)
A beloved Classical Hollywood tearjerker as love and fate intertwine in this melodrama directed with unassuming grace by Leo McCarey.
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Nixon (1995)
Largely compelling and a history lesson as dramatic entertainment, Stone’s ambitious if sometimes heavy-handed portrait of the flawed presidency of Richard Nixon borders on Shakespearean tragedy.
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Revolution of Our Times (2021)
This politically stirring and at times truly heartbreaking Golden Horse-winning documentary gives us that intense journalistic, on the ground experience of the 2019 Hong Kong protests from start to end.
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American Gangster (2007)
One of the best films of 2007, this is Ridley Scott’s absorbing take on the crime saga.
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Maltese Falcon, The (1941)
Twisting and turning, Huston’s feature debut works excellently as an old-school mystery drama, setting some groundwork for Hollywood noir to flourish in the ’40s.
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Flee (2021)
Animated documentaries may be few and far between, but this is an affecting work that skilfully details an Afghan refugee’s harrowing life story fleeing from war and conflict, and more introspectively, from himself.
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Moulin Rouge (1952)
Huston’s Venice Silver Lion-winning costume drama focuses much more on disabled French artist Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec than the infamous Paris nightclub that he frequently visits in this ruminative take on love and loneliness.
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Musings #4: Winter on Fire: Ukraine’s Fight for Freedom?
The Oscar-nominated documentary, Winter on Fire: Ukraine’s Fight for Freedom (2015), is on Netflix. Harrowing but essential viewing, it shows how Ukrainian youths who were mostly born during the period of post-Soviet independence galvanised their people from all walks of life to protest against the ‘oppressive’ regime, headed by a pro-Russian president, at the time (circa 2013).
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Parallel Mothers (2021)
A mid-tier Almodovar as he weaves a story of mothers and babies against a dark national history—it doesn’t always find a sure footing in terms of tone and theme, but the indelible performances and the auteur’s knack for creating suspense out of melodrama do help.
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