The Pedlar

The Natural Son

March 1959 •

Chor Yuen started his directorial career with a bang. From its very first image, The Natural Son establishes Chor as a filmmaker of stylistic flourish, which would be sustained in various forms throughout his long tenure. Adapted from '30 cents' pulp fiction, it is a Kong Ngee melodrama made in the studio's mould, with Westernised characters and trendy middle-class lifestyles. Yet, Chor's first film is not exempt from the social urgency that characterises the Cantonese cinema of his father, Cheung Wood-yau. The film cloaks its entertainment in a moral deliberation on blood ties, its story about the raising of a bastard child a head-on challenge of archaic family values. An ostentatious start for a colourful and eventful career.

The Phantom of the Opera

September 1925 •English

The deformed Phantom who haunts the Paris Opera House causes murder and mayhem in an attempt to make the woman he loves a star.

Wounds of Our Land

April 1971 •Lithuanian

Tragic pages in the history of the formation of the independent Lithuanian state in 1918-20.

Benjamin Britten: Billy Budd

January 2017 •Spanish

The Merchant of Venice

December 2004 •English

Venice, 1596. Bassanio begs his friend Antonio, a prosperous merchant, to lend him a large sum of money so that he can woo Portia, a very wealthy heiress; but Antonio has invested his fortune abroad, so they turn to Shylock, a Jewish moneylender, and ask him for a loan.

A Mighty Nice Man

April 2015 •English

Patricia Highsmith's haunting story of a day in a young girl's life when a kind stranger comes to town.

Winter Love

December 1968 •

Inside a café, on Christmas Eve. Chim Kei meets an enigmatic woman named Mimi Wong who introduces herself as the daughter of an upper-crust family. But the infatuated writer is struck by a spasm of sorrow when he later sees Mimi make her appearance as a taxi-dancer at a party. The lovers are reconciled by the story of her plight told by her sister Annie. However, Mimi goes missing on the engagement day. By a stroke of luck, Chim runs into the elusive woman again and finds out how she was forced into prostitution by her drug-addict husband, his childhood best friend and benefactor Chan Hung-kit. Chim leaves dejectedly, and has since been idling his days away. The frail Mimi confesses her love for Chim on her deathbed, and from not far away, Chan has ended his own life.

Poor Sailor

January 2014 •Spanish

Jonás and Raquel live in the field. Their life is happy and in harmony with the envoronment. One day, Néstor, Jonás's brother, visit them. He's captain in a fishing boat that has docked in a near village. Néstor told her brother the wonderful life in the sea, all money that he has won and the adventures that he has lived. Jonas decides go with him although Raquel doesn't accord. Comic book adaptation "Poor Sailor " by Sammy Harkham.

Confidences d'une femme mariée

April 2020 •French

After ten years of marriage, a woman decides to tell her husband about her libertine past. A cascade of revelations follows, all as unexpected as they are funny.

Such A Girl Like Me

January 2012 •

'...is unsuitable for any man's love.' (Xi Xi, A Woman Like Me) Sum-yin patches up wounds, masks scars and performs other beautician services that, when done well - as she always does - bring comfort to her and appreciation from grateful families. But inside she's hurting. Her job as a mortuary cosmetologist makes her self-conscious about the smell of death that seems to be seeping through and under her skin and looming over her stagnant relationship with Kwan, her oblivious boyfriend. No amount of cigarettes and perfume and cleaning will rid of it. At some point, a decision has to be made.

Stroller

July 1967 •Korean

An old member of Namsadang (a wayfaring group of Joseon Dynasty (1392-1910)) leaves his daughter Gye-yeon at a tavern of Hwagye Market, a traditional market located in Gurye, Jeollanam-do. Son of the tavern owner Seong-gi and Gye-yeon love each other, but the madam owner tries to separate them by sending Seon-gi to a temple. The old man comes back to take Gye-yeon and disclose a secret that the tavern owner is in fact his daughter, therefore Seong-gi is his grand son. Frustrated to hear that he cannot love Gye-yeon, Seong-gi goes for a long journey without destination as his ancestors of Namsadang have done.

Spring, Spring

May 1969 •Korean

Chun-sam is working as a servant at Bong-pil's home to be his future son in-law. His daughter, Jeom-sun has grown enough to get wed. But her father thinks she is too young. But in reality he doesn't want to set her daughter with Chun-sam to begin with. Jeom-sun finds out, and picks up a fight with her father. When Chun-sam decides to play hard on his master, Jeom-sun takes Chun-sam's side.

An Idiot Adada

May 1956 •Korean

Adada's poor husband suddenly strikes it rich. He changes his hovel for a beautiful home, but his character changes as well. He becomes overly proud and shows off his wealth. Adada, despising the money and what it has done to her husband, throws their savings into the river

The Extra Mortals

April 1964 •Korean

In a hospital waiting room, a group of men arrive and meet one another. Choe, is the upbeat fellow who always thinks of the nation and its people. Cheon was wounded in the war and has fallen into despair. Then there's the dentist, run ragged by his hectic life. They commiserate over each man's lot in life and exchange stories about their love affairs.

Antti Puuhaara

November 1976 •Finnish

In 17th-century Pohjola, young Antti Puuhaara is looking for himself, because he has grown up with no knowledge of his childhood. Two actors, the tragedian and the comedian, who were banished from Tsarist Russia to Karelia, had predicted to the crooked merchant Markki Bohattov that Antti's fate would become intertwined with his own. When Antti falls in love with Bohattov's daughter Darja, the father has to arrange for her to marry the tar merchant Arho Mustahatu.

Khanuma

October 1926 •Georgian

Prince bon-vivant Levan Phantiashvili finds himself in a difficult financial situation. To make his life better he agrees to marry the merchant Adam Varakhidze’s daughter, Elo. The merchant is happy for this move opens the door in a high society for him until he finds out that Elo is not quite happy with his decision.

Jons und Erdme

March 1959 •German

Adaptation of Hermann Sudermann's novel about the troubled relationship between the strong willed Erdme and her irascible husband Jons in the Lithunian moors.

For Love Alone

May 1986 •English

Teresa is a spirited young girl chafing under the oppressive attitudes of 1930s society, and her father in particular. She fancies her poverty-stricken Latin tutor Johnathan Crow, without realising he merely considers her a pleasant diversion and nothing more, and eventually follows him from Sydney to London. En route she meets the gentle banker James Quick. Whilst navigating her relationships in London, including with a political poet bound for the Spanish Civil War, she experiences a transformation in her understanding of love. Based upon Christina Stead's best-selling Australian novel.

Small Things Like These

November 2024 •English

While working as a coal merchant to support his family, Bill Furlong discovers disturbing secrets kept by the local convent and uncovers truths of his own; forcing him to confront his past and the complicit silence of a small Irish town controlled by the Catholic Church.

Phantom of the Opera

August 1943 •English

Following a tragic accident that leaves him disfigured, crazed composer Erique Claudin transformed into a masked phantom who schemes to make beautiful young soprano Christine Dubois the star of the opera and wreak revenge on those who stole his music.