Modern Times
Charlie Chaplin
USA – 1936Cast: Charles Chaplin (A factory worker, the Tramp), Paulette Goddard (A gamine, the orphaned girl)
Screenplay: Charles Chaplin
Cinematography: Ira H. Morgan, Roland Totheroh
Production: Charles Chaplin Productions
Language: English
Duration: 87 min
Color: Black and White

Synopsis: Charlie the Tramp finds it difficult to keep up with modernity and the assembly line, which reduces men and women into mere accessories to the machine. When he is ‘volunteered’ for an experiment with a feeding machine to test if production can continue without the nuisance of meal breaks, Charlie suffers a nervous breakdown and is sent to a sanatorium to recover. Cured and on the street, he is quickly re-institutionalized—this time in jail—for unwittingly leading a worker’s protest. In the back of the police paddy wagon he meets a kindred soul, a girl who has escaped the horrors of the orphanage, arrested for stealing a loaf of bread. When he foils a jailbreak, he is released back into society as a fine example of a recovering socialist. Once again homeless on the street, Charlie and the girl try to live with dignity in a cold modern world that, in reality, is greedy and primitive.

Santi-Vina
‘Marut’ Thavi Na Bangchang
Thailand – 1954Cast: Poonpan Rangkhavorn (Santi), Rayvadi Sriwilai (Vina)
Screenplay: Robert G. North, Thavi Na Bangchang, Vijit Kunavudhi
Cinematography: R.D. Pestonji
Production: Hanuman Film
Language: Thai
Duration: 117 min
Color: Color

Synopsis: Vina always comes to the defence of Santi, a poor blind boy who lives with his father. She protects him most often from the bully Krai. Santi’s father sends the boy to learn from Luang Ta, a revered monk, hoping that his son would regain his eyesight by following Buddha’s teachings. Years later, Santi and Vina meet again and fall in love. Krai, who also desires Vina’s attention, is jealous and asks his parents to arrange a marriage to Vina. When the young lovers decide to elope, they are caught and Santi is severely beaten. On Vina and Krai’s wedding day, a disaster forces the monk Luang Ta to give up his life to save Santi. Miraculously, Santi regains his eyesight giving him the chance to attempt to win Vina back, but he realizes that real happiness is not to be found in the dust of life but upon entering the land of the Buddha.

Journey to Italy
Viaggio in Italia
Roberto Rossellini
Italy – 1954Cast: Ingrid Bergman (Katherine Joyce), George Sanders (Alexander Joyce), Maria Mauban (Marie), Anna Proclemer (La prostituta)
Screenplay: Vitaliano Brancati, Roberto Rossellini, Antonio Pietrangeli
Cinematography: Enzo Serafin
Production: Italia Film, Junior Film, Sveva Film, Les Films Ariane, Francinex, Société Générale de Cinématographie
Language: English, Italian
Duration: 97 min
Color: Black and White

Synopsis: Catherine and Alexander, wealthy and sophisticated, drive to Naples to dispose of a deceased uncle’s villa. There’s a coolness in their relationship and aspects of Naples add to the strain. She remembers a poet who loved her and died in the war; although she didn’t love him back, the memory underscores the absence of romance in her life now. She tours the museums of Naples and Pompeii, immersing herself in the Neapolitan fascination with the dead, while at the same time observing the many pregnant women around; he idles on Capri, flirting with women but drawing back from adultery. With her, he’s sarcastic; with him, she’s critical. They talk of divorce. Will this foreign couple find insight and direction in Italy?

Nosferatu, eine Symphonie des Grauens
Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau
Germany – 1922Cast: Max Schreck (Graf Orlok), Gustav von Wangenheim (Hutter), Greta Schröder (Ellen), Georg H. Schnell (Harding)
Screenplay: Henrik Galeen
Cinematography: Fritz Arno Wagner Günther Krampf
Production: Jofa-Atelier Berlin-Johannisthal Prana-Film GmbH
Language: Silent, English / German intertitles
Duration: 94 min
Color: Black and White

Synopsis: Hutter, a German property broker, is dispatched to Count Orlok’s castle in Transylvania to finalize the sale of an estate in Wisbourg. The property happens to be just across the way from Hutter’s own home, where he lives with his dear wife, Ellen. The Transylvanian peasants are nervous at the mention of the Count, and Hutter’s stay at castle Orlok proves quite unsettling as he feels the constant presence of a shadow preying on him—even in the daytime, when the Count is unusually asleep. When Hutter stumbles into the crypt, he begins to fear that there more here than mere superstition and legend. To avoid discovery, Orlock imprisons Hutter and ships himself to Wisbourg inside a coffin, bringing death to every port along the way. Hutter escapes and tries desperately to get home before the Count, also known as Nosferatu the vampire, makes his way to Wisbourgh and brings ruin to the little town – and to Hutter’s own family. In Wisbourg, Ellen can feel the impending darkness as Nosferatu draws closer. She learns that to defeat Nosferatu, a sinless woman must sacrifice herself by luring and killing the vampire.