Peter Sainsbury Movies

Two young people with little in common are thrown together under unusual circumstances in this offbeat drama directed by Clara Law, who made a number of well-received films in Hong Kong before emigrating to Australia. Yoshiyashi (Rikiya Kurokawa) is an expert computer hacker and snake enthusiast who travels to Australia from his home in Tokyo to buy the car of his dreams -- a perfectly restored 1967 Citroen DS. However, when Yoshiyashi arrives at the home of the man selling the car, he makes a shocking discovery -- the owner has killed his wife and turned the gun on himself, leaving behind Deidre (Rose Byrne), the man's niece, who is both blind and emotionally unstable. As it turns out, the Citroen is still for sale, but now Yoshiyashi must make his deal with one of the man's relatives, who lives a five-day drive away. Yoshiyashi brings Deidre along for the ride, who in the course of the trip learns a lot about Yoshiyashi's studied cool, while he gets clearer perspective on the troubled past behind her impulsive eccentricity. The Goddess of 1967 was shown in competition at the 2000 Venice and Toronto film festivals. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

Three women working for a singing telegram company contend with a variety of problems on St. Valentine's Day. The manager is gone, and one woman has lost her voice. The second woman has just broken up with her boyfriend, and the third is caught in a bitter child-custody battle with her ex-husband. One dresses in a gorilla suit to deliver one of the 50 singing telegrams scheduled for the busy day. If the trio ever hopes to find love again, they abandon all hope after meeting the meat-headed males they encounter. ~ Dan Pavlides, Rovi

This documentary does not make its topic -- a British polling service -- seem like it is "stranger than fiction," but on the contrary, makes the company (Mass-Observation) rather bland and stereotypically British. The company was founded in 1937 by three researchers who wanted to know what the Brits actually thought about the abdication of their King, among other topics. That era is re-enacted and lent authenticity by interviews with some older members of the company. From that beginning in Lancashire, the company grew into a multi-million dollar business and is still polling the public today. The Mass-Observation Archives are located at the University of Sussex, and they currently run a web site on the internet -- and are still looking for writers in the U.K.
~ Eleanor Mannikka, Rovi

Much of 1919 takes place in 1984, but the spectre of that year looms large over the proceedings. Paul Scofield and Maria Schell play two of the surviving patients of Sigmund Freud. Currently residing in the US, Schell happens to see Scofield being interviewed on a TV show. She decides to seek her fellow patient out and compare notes. As they recall their long-ago therapy, the film fades back to the past, with Colin Firth and Claire Higgins playing, respectively, the younger Scofield and Schell. Freud himself is never seen, though his voice is heard (courtesy of actor Frank Finlay). Concluding that Freud wasn't all that he was cracked up to be, Scofield and Schell emerge from their nostalgia session with a mutual affection and attraction. The first dramatic effort of documentary filmmaker Hugh Brody (whose recreation of Times Past is succinct and remarkably accurance), 1919 was originally a coproduction of Britain's Channel Four and the British Film Institute. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

After cutting his teeth on 14 years' worth of short subjects, director Peter Greenaway made his feature-film debut with the pseudo-documentary The Falls. The added length does nothing to dilute Greenaway's singular sense of the absurd. The story, if one can truly call it that, deals with a phenomenon involving birds and anacronymically known as V.U.E. The letters stand for Violent Unknown Event, and in the course of the film's hallucinatory 190 minutes we are introduced to 92 of the syndrome's victims whose names all begin with the letters "F-A-L-L." This film is pure avant-garde and obviously not for all tastes. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Set in England's dreary midwinter season, this slow-paced story chronicles the partial awakening from apathy of Robert, a DJ, as he investigates the mysterious death of his brother. As he travels, he is constantly surrounded by music from David Bowie, Kraftwork, Sting and Devo, among others. Despite his apparent intention of looking into his brother's death, he can't bring himself to investigate even the most blatant clues. As his anomie returns, he begins discarding any connection with his surroundings, eventually boarding a train bound for he knows-not-where. Despite the movie's relentlessly grim storyline and setting and its slow pace, some reviewers reported that they found this feature oddly refreshing. ~ Clarke Fountain, Rovi