I’ll second Oldboy and Life is Beautiful, and add Amores Perros (Spanish), insomnia (Norwegian), L’Ete Meurtrier (French), Funny Games (German), and Man Bites Dog (French).
Also, I highly recommend avoiding the American remakes of Oldboy and Insomnia. They were awful remakes.
Yes! I came to post this. Get the subtitled one, not the dubbed one. One of my favorite movies.
Delicatessen
City of Lost Children
Both directed by Marc Caro and Jean-Pierre Jeunet (latter also made Amelie).
A few off (or near) the top of my head:
Hotel du Nord (1938)
Les Disparus de St. Agil (1938)
Panique (1946)
Un Revenant (1946)
Bob le Flambeur (1956)
Death in the Garden (1956)
Beyond Oblivion (1956)
Les Espions (1957)
Man on the Tracks (1957)
Classe Tous Risques (1960)
The Graceful Brute (1962)
Three Outlaw Samurai (1964)
The Saragossa Manuscript (1965)
The Sword of Doom (1966)
Branded to Kill (1967)
A Colt is my Passport (1967)
Goyokin (1969)
Horrors of Malformed Men (1969)
Hunter in the Dark (1979)
The Tin Drum (1979)
The Feather Fairy (1985)
Swordsman II (1992)
Brotherhood of the Wolf (2001)
Crime Spree (2003)
In French, Jean de Florette and its sequel (or part II) Manon des sources
In English, French, and German, on the topic of the Christmas Truces of WWI: Joyeux Noel
The Pillow Book (1996) Its been a long time since I’ve seen it so I checked it on imdb & realized the characters probably speak English, but the calligraphy, which is more important to the film, is Japanese
Nine Queens – Argentina . The 2004 English version was titled ‘Criminal’ and does not compare to the original
Farewell My Concubine
Chunking Express
Eat, Drink, Man, Woman
Interesting recommendations being shared. Japanese seems to be quite popular although not something I’ve explored – yet. I am currently reading a Japanese classic mystery novel so maybe it’s opportune timing to get into the movies!
Some other modern movies I would recommend:
Fermat’s Room - Spanish locked room thriller. Great fun if you’re interested in those kind of stories of a group of strangers being invited to a remote location ostensibly for a professional purpose but in reality it is that they are specifically chosen to be participants in a game.
Look Who’s Back - German satire movie based on a best-selling book about the ludicrous premise of Hitler coming back from the dead by waking up in modern day Berlin where his bunker once stood and his mind stuck in 1945. It has elements of good comedy and satire in it but the film also examines the dark and dangerous sociological undercurrent that exists even all these years later. It uses a lot of unscripted shots of ordinary members of the public reacting to a guy looking like Hitler showing many people outraged but also that many others would sympathize with those ideological views they wanted Germany to embrace once again. The movie was released in 2015 and the final scene acted as a warning to the rise of nativist populism and anti-immigration hate crimes that were festering around the world.
Lagaan - Another Indian movie which did very well overseas as a sort of half epic half sports movie telling a story of Indian resistance against their British rulers in the late 19th century and how the game of cricket and beating the British at their own “gentlemen’s game” was a way to fight back. Put an asterisk against this movie as there is British actors obviously and therefore English dialogue is involved but it was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Movie in 2002.
Which is why I posted it early. These threads tend to slant towards only foreign films, while American films made in foreign languages get pooh poohed. These are good films, get over it.
So many.
La Belle et La Bete (Cocteau) – the definitive version of Beauty and the Beast. Magic in every frame.
M. Hulot’s Holiday (Tati) – classic comedy in the Buster Keaton role. Tati’s Playtime is even better, but you must see it in as big as screen as possible to spot everything that’s going on.
Blancanieves – retelling of Snow White, only she’s a matador, the dwarfs are the bullfighting equivalent of rodeo clowns, and the evil queen is into kink. (A silent film, so I suppose it might technically not be foreign language, but watch it anyway).
Shame (Bergman)
La Strada (Fellini)
Z (Costa-Gavras) – intense political thriller
The Discrete Charm of the Bourgeoise (Bunuel) – surrealist comedy
The Tall Black Man with One Black Shoe (Robert) – terrific comedy
Jean de Florette/Manon of the Spring (Berri) – Tragedy on the grand scale
Black and White in Color – comedy about the French and German colonies in WWI.
The Gods Must be Crazy – The danger of Coca-Cola
Osama – heartbreaking story of life under the Taliban
Children of Heaven – Life in Iraq, where a pair of shoes can mean the difference between survival and failure.
Grand Illusion (Renoir) – powerful antiwar film
Good Bye Lenin! An East German young man’s mother awakes from a coma in 1990. As the doctors have told him any shock could kill her, he has to recreate the experience of living in the DDR even though it no longer exists.
Reading this crazy description reminded me of the bizarre Western El Topo. I haven’t seen it in 20+ years, but it left a deep impression on me!
Europa, Europa. A Jewish boy on his own tries to pass himself off as German to avoid a concentration camp.
Mexican. Same director of Babel and The Revenant.
I was trying to provide the languages of the movies.
Best foreign language movie I’ve seen has to be Das Boot. There are dubbed versions around but the skill with which this was made, and the awesome realism, absolutely demands that you see it in the original German with subtitles.
Love this film. For some reason my brain keeps insisting this is a Bergman film, which it is definitely not.
Anyone who enjoys this should also enjoy:
Tales from the golden age : Romanian urban myths of the '80s (2009) by Ioana Uricaru.
If you like urban myths, if you’d like to see how people can survive when a country has gone out of whack…
Here’s a thread from three years ago with the same topic:
Man bites Dog - A classic. Black comedy of a serial killer being filmed by a crew, but so much more.
Run Lola Run (Lola Rennt) - German film in three repeating timeloops of a day in a life a woman running to save her boyfriend.
The Secret in Their Eyes - An Argentinian retired detective revisits a brutal old case from the times of the Dictatorship of Franco. Remade in English, I’ve never watched the remake.
Post Mortem - In the last days of Allendes presidency (pre Pinochet), a Mortician hunts for someone as the country collapses into civil war.
Hidden (Cache) - A french couple begins receiving video tapes of themselves through the post. The husband searchs for who and why they are being sent.
There’s also one I can’t remember the name of, and my google fu can’t find it. It’s French, and set by the sea, and a detective is investigating something. I remember a severed arm in a boat, perhaps cannibalism. From recent times (2000s perhaps 2007). Anyone help me there?
A Tale of Two Sisters - After spending time in a mental institution, two devoted sisters return to the home of their father and cruel stepmother. Once there, in addition to dealing with their stepmother’s obsessive, unbalanced ways, an interfering ghost also affects their recovery.