# Great Unique Non-English Language Movies **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Tags:** movies\ **Created:** [November 7, 2022, 11:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-unique-non-english-language-movies/974540 "2022-11-07T23:26:32Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![TreacherousCretin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/treacherouscretin/32/476_2.png) [@TreacherousCretin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TreacherousCretin)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2022, 8:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-unique-non-english-language-movies/974540/42 "2022-11-08T20:53:03Z")
**The Secret In Their Eyes** (the original Argentinian film). One of my top ten favorite films. Won the “Best Foreign Film” Oscar. Deservedly. ---
**Author:** ![carrps](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carrps/32/2957_2.png) [@carrps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carrps)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2022, 10:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-unique-non-english-language-movies/974540/43 "2022-11-08T22:17:16Z")
That one was great, too. I agree it most definitely deserved its Academy Award. ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2022, 11:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-unique-non-english-language-movies/974540/44 "2022-11-08T23:01:45Z")
Ah, yes, I saw _Wings of Desire_ in college and it really stuck with me. ---
**Author:** ![EinsteinsHund](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/einsteinshund/32/8400_2.png) [@EinsteinsHund](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EinsteinsHund)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2022, 11:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-unique-non-english-language-movies/974540/45 "2022-11-08T23:25:50Z")
> [@burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](#): > > It’s been a long time since I’ve seen it, but _Das Boot_ made a huge impression on me. English-dubbed version? Great! German version? Great! Maybe some day I’ll be able to find the original German mini-series: that will undoubtedly be great, too! IMHO, the best way to watch “Das Boot” is the German mini-series. I watched it when it was aired first in the early 80s, and though it’s 4+ hours long, not one scene is wasted, and the additional stuff enhances the plot. > [@MortSahlFan](#): > > There’s a lot above I haven’t seen, so thank you all so much! I was hoping I’d watch one or even two today, because I need to stay way from the news until the polls close, but I’ve been up since 4am, and not sure if I can even type, but here’s one of my favorites, and it’s very minimalist, every-day life, funny writing, talented acting/directing. > > [Shadows in Paradise (1986) - Reference View - IMDb](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0092149/reference/) You can’t go wrong with Aki Kaurismäki. They say the Fins are the most stoic people in the world, but this Fin made some of the most emotionally moving, but well, stoic movies of all time. Further recommendations: “I Hired A Contract Killer”, I think the only movie he did in English (it plays in London), with a great Jean-Pierre Leaud in the lead role, and “The Man Without A Past”, which will bring you to tears although it’s played totally laconically. > [@alovem](#): > > Ikiru (1952), directed by Akira Kurosowa. _“A bureaucrat tries to find meaning in his life after he discovers he has terminal cancer.”_ That’s from the IMDB entry because I saw the film just once many years ago and, right now, all I remember is that I liked it very much, despite the subject matter. > > [Ikiru (1952) - IMDb](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0044741/) I still haven’t seen any of Kurosawa’s contemporary films, but I can only wholeheartedly recommend his historical dramas. One of the best directors ever. ---
**Author:** ![burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/burpo_the_wonder_mutt/32/365_2.png) [@burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/burpo_the_wonder_mutt)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2022, 1:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-unique-non-english-language-movies/974540/46 "2022-11-09T01:07:40Z")
> [@EinsteinsHund](#): > > IMHO, the best way to watch “Das Boot” is the German mini-series. I watched it when it was aired first in the early 80s, and though it’s 4+ hours long, not one scene is wasted, and the additional stuff enhances the plot. Bring it on, my fellow K9. ---
**Author:** ![EinsteinsHund](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/einsteinshund/32/8400_2.png) [@EinsteinsHund](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EinsteinsHund)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2022, 1:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-unique-non-english-language-movies/974540/47 "2022-11-09T01:16:58Z")
> [@burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](#): > > Bring it on, my fellow K9. Is this a play on “Kaleun”? Then it’s very clever. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/burpo_the_wonder_mutt/32/365_2.png) [@burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/burpo_the_wonder_mutt)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2022, 1:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-unique-non-english-language-movies/974540/48 "2022-11-09T01:57:48Z")
Umm, I was too lazy to spell out, “canine.” 🤦‍♂️ ---
**Author:** ![EinsteinsHund](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/einsteinshund/32/8400_2.png) [@EinsteinsHund](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EinsteinsHund)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2022, 2:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-unique-non-english-language-movies/974540/49 "2022-11-09T02:09:21Z")
😂 So I overestimated your wit. I had to google K9 to even get the meaning “canine”, and I thought of Jürgen Prochnow’s Kaleun. Kneun, Kaneun, Kaleun, you see…(or maybe it’s just my twisted mind sometimes working in strange ways). ---
**Author:** ![carrps](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carrps/32/2957_2.png) [@carrps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carrps)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2022, 2:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-unique-non-english-language-movies/974540/50 "2022-11-09T02:20:41Z")
I’d like to recommend Kurosawa’s _The Sea is Waiting._ I found it almost hypnotic. And very beautiful visually. ---
**Author:** ![hogarth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hogarth/32/1773_2.png) [@hogarth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hogarth)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2022, 5:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-unique-non-english-language-movies/974540/51 "2022-11-09T05:45:15Z")
> [@MortSahlFan](#): > > Weird question, but is there a foreign movie similar to “Buffalo '66”? Have you ever seen **La grande bouffe**? A group of middle-aged men get together at a villa for the weekend with the purpose of eating themselves to death. A strange premise, but I remember it having interesting dialogue. It has some of the same deadpan sensibility, I think (although it’s been a long time since I’ve seen either movie). ---
**Author:** ![Horatio\_Hellpop](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e5b9ba/32.png) [@Horatio\_Hellpop](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Horatio_Hellpop)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2022, 7:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-unique-non-english-language-movies/974540/52 "2022-11-09T07:12:21Z")
**Sugar Baby** (1985) Original title: _Zuckerbaby_ German Director Stars Marianne Sägebrecht, Eisi Gulp Marianne Sagebrecht made a slightly bigger impact a few years later with _Bagdad Cafe_. She starts an improbable romance with a smaller, cuter man by appealing to him in a way his more traditionally good-looking girlfriend can’t. It ends about the way you’d think it would, but what a charming journey! **Small Crime** (2008) Original title: _Mikro eglima_ Greek Director Christos Georgiou Stars Aris Servetalis, Vicky Papadopoulou, Rania Oikonomidou A particularly feckless young detective appears to be the entirety of law enforcement in a tiny Greek beach community. A dead man on a fallen ladder has a cryptic smile on his face, and eventually we find out why. **The Nasty Girl** (1990) Original title: _Das schreckliche Mädchen_ Director Michael Verhoeven Stars Lena Stolze, Hans-Reinhard Müller, Monika Baumgartner A high school girl in 1980s Germany has a terribly inappropriate relationship with her teacher, but that’s not what is going to get her run out of town. After growing up with bullshit stories about how virtuous her town was during the War years, she does a project for her high school history class and finds out that her family and neighbors were not, in fact, the kind of “good Germans” who would have hidden Anne Frank’s family in the attic (I know, that was in Holland, not Germany). Acid satire and an ending so powerful, he might just have stolen it from Spike Lee, who used the same one two years earlier. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2022, 8:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-unique-non-english-language-movies/974540/53 "2022-11-09T08:52:01Z")
> [@alovem](#): > > Ikiru (1952), directed by Akira Kurosowa. _“A bureaucrat tries to find meaning in his life after he discovers he has terminal cancer.”_ An English remake, titled _Living_, was recently released, with Bill Nighy, it seems to have gotten good reviews. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2022, 9:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-unique-non-english-language-movies/974540/54 "2022-11-09T09:01:27Z")
It’s a pity Emir Kusturica has turned out to be a pro-Polanski Putinist dick, because _While Father Was Away on Business_ and _Time of the Gypsies_ were both masterworks. _Even Dwarfs Started Small_, by Werner Herzog, is certainly unique. ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2022, 9:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-unique-non-english-language-movies/974540/55 "2022-11-09T09:07:33Z")
At the risk of sounding plebian, I’m going to go with _Shin Godzilla_, the 2016 Studio Toho reboot of the Godzilla franchise. It’s a masterpiece as far as disaster/kaiju movies go, and it’s very much a political movie on a level not seen since the original, being a satire of the Japanese government’s response to the Fukushima disaster, and does an amazing job of making the titular creature both terrifying and sympathetic. The scene where Godzilla discovers how to use its atomic breath, set to an orchestral piece with operatic vocals about dying alone and forgotten, sends a chill every time I see it. [![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/iUaoMe7QPVg/maxresdefault.jpg "Shin Godzilla Atomic Breath | Shin Godzilla (2016) [8K Upscale]") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iUaoMe7QPVg) For context, the elderly guy getting onto the helicopter, which Godzilla casually destroys, is the Prime Minister. ---
**Author:** ![Banksiaman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/banksiaman/32/3334_2.png) [@Banksiaman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Banksiaman)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2022, 9:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-unique-non-english-language-movies/974540/56 "2022-11-09T09:22:52Z")
Yes, yes, yes. Almost makes up for Matthew Broderick - it is that good! ---
**Author:** ![DesertDog](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/desertdog/32/11503_2.png) [@DesertDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DesertDog)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2022, 9:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-unique-non-english-language-movies/974540/57 "2022-11-09T09:32:29Z")
> [@BrickBat](#): > > I heartily second ‘Tampopo’. I fourth it and also suggest [_Marusa no onna_](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Taxing_Woman) – _A Taxing Woman_ in the English-subtitled version. The same director and two principles as _Tampopo_, they’re opponents in this one instead of allies. ---
**Author:** ![Pardel-Lux](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pardel-lux/32/20182_2.png) [@Pardel-Lux](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pardel-Lux)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2022, 9:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-unique-non-english-language-movies/974540/58 "2022-11-09T09:59:38Z")
Anything by Aki Kaurismäki is great. Anything. Almodóvar is great too, but maybe too Spanish and absurd. [Women on the verge of a nervous breakdown](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women_on_the_Verge_of_a_Nervous_Breakdown) would be a good start. Jim Jarmush’s [Night on Earth](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Night_on_Earth) is mostly not in English. And the bits in English are an interesting English. I enjoyed that a lot, and the music by Tom Waits is so fitting. Seconding: La Grande Bouffe, Tampopo, Das Boot ---
**Author:** ![Crafter\_Man](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crafter_man/32/458_2.png) [@Crafter\_Man](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crafter_Man)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2022, 10:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-unique-non-english-language-movies/974540/59 "2022-11-09T10:02:05Z")
I’ve seen a lot of war movies, but the1985 Soviet film [Come and See](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Come_and_See) really stands out. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2022, 1:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-unique-non-english-language-movies/974540/60 "2022-11-09T13:30:51Z")
_Chungking Express_ (1994, Hong Kong, dir. Kar Wai Wong) ---
**Author:** ![veryfrank](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/87869e/32.png) [@veryfrank](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/veryfrank)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2022, 2:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-unique-non-english-language-movies/974540/61 "2022-11-09T14:03:03Z")
> [@PatrickLondon](#): > > pretty much the rntire _oeuvre_ of Jacques Tati, but particularly _Jour de Fête_ and _Les Vacances de M.Hulot_. Very little actual language, mostly great sight gags. The Criterion box set of the complete Jacques Tati filmography is an asbolute jewel. Playtime is my favorite of his, just a masterclass is subtle, escalating, human laughs. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-unique-non-english-language-movies/974540.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-unique-non-english-language-movies/974540.md?page=4)