I love it because it's one of the few dark fantasy movies natively made in Spanish. The dead fascists are a bonus.
One of my favorite details that is easy to miss if you aren't a native speaker is that Pan speaks in medieval Spanish. It honestly almost sounds like French
I can't find anything to really support the note about the faun speaking an early version of Spanish; do you have a link I could read/watch?
I've found people noting that Doug Jones is dubbed by the Spanish voice actor into Castilian (rather than any Central or South American dialect) and that his language is formal and somewhat archaic.
Quick correction, Castilian and Spanish are he same thing. It's not an old dialect or an old language. Spain has lots of languages, and the renaming of Castilian to Spanish was a "recent" (last 100 years) attempt from a dictator to delegitimize all of the other languages (also prohibiting them from being taught in schools or being used officially).
Also I strongly dislike the use of dialects here, although there are many different accents the language remains the same. If we start to call Mexican or Argentinians Spanish into dialects we might as well call Texan or Californian English as dialects as well, since they're equally different.
Also, also, Mexico (the largest Spanish speaking country by population is in North America), not sure why you only mentioned South and Central.
That being said, yes, the Faun speaks very formally. It's not necessarily archaic, but the sort of language one might expect in a court room. But yeah, that used to be the colloquial Spanish a while back.
Thanks. I really wrote "Castilian" to mean that sources on the web suggest his dialogue is at least somewhat modern Spanish Spanish (so to speak) -- but I'm ignorant of the differences between Spanish spoken in the Americas, including North America as you rightly point out, and the Iberian peninsula. I didn't mean to suggest that Castilian was archaic.
Looked into it a bit more. It seems it's not exactly medieval Spanish but just old and really formal Spanish, akin to Shakespearean. Nevertheless, not something you'd hear nowadays. Everyone else just speaks with a Spaniard accent, there's no Latin American dialects in the movie.
I remember looking up the script a little while ago. Here's an excerpt
You will see a luxurious banquet. Don't eat or drink any of it while you're there
(Fwiw, I'm from Latin America so Spaniard accents all just sound weirdly posh to me, like that video of a British kid complaining about the ice cream man)
I would enter "memories of murder". It goes toe to toe with Rear Window as one of the best suspense movies ever made, and MOM would go on my top 50 in any language any genre.
I was just going to say Memories of Murder. It's my favorite Bong Joon Ho film, and possibly my favorite Korean language film (that I've seen).
It's so fucking good. The fight scenes have to be some of the most realistic looking I've seen. At times it looks like they're really throwing each other around. There's one scene where the main cop guy comes flying in from off screen and full on drop kicks a dude, and he commits completely. Made me lol the first time I saw it, I had to rewind and watch it again.
Spirited Away is so good in Japanese and does lose something being dubbed. Run Lola Run is so good in German, I don't know if there is a dub because there is no reason to seek it, the dialogue was perfect for subtitling and the story is based on slightly different loops in time so you pick up what is happening each loop through. Very cool.
Likewise with Kiki's Delivery Service for me, although probably because Disney felt the need to fuck with the music as well as the dialogue in their dub.
How this did not result in Miyazaki, Hisaishi, and Sugimura going on a rampage in Disney's offices with their katana, Walther P-38, and magnum is beyond me.
There are so many, but I think my first choice would probably have to be Seven Samurai. It is such an amazing piece of cinema. One of the most influential pieces that has inspired almost all of the film we still see today.
Came here to write this, so many movie tropes have their roots in that movie and Kurosawas genius directing. Also the sounds and emotions in the original Japanese language are so brilliantly conveyed, it loses so much in dubbing.
There is no end to the cheap “plot twists” a filmmaker can get away with if the audience is willing to accept “lol everyone was hypnotized” as an explanation for glaring holes in the narrative.
It has been over 20 years since I have seen Amélie but it still lives rent free in my head. What a lovely warm whimsical movie with a fantastic soundtrack.
7 Samauri, I am not fluent in Japanese but was conversational. That movie illustrates the Japanese and their system of honor, which can be very odd and flexible.
All of the Ghibli movies are great, though they're some of the only foreign films I will watch dubbed, because the voice casts they get are insane. The English dub of Totoro with the Fanning sisters while they were still children is just fantastic.
Life is Beautiful is one of my favorites that should really only be watched with subtitles. It's a really sad movie, but sticks with you in a good way.
City of God has the best child acting of any movie I've ever seen. It is so good I sorta suspect they weren't even acting in some scenes. I have to imagine they straight up pulled in random kids and told them they were going to gun them down in the street and just filmed it.
It's ridiculous, and I loved it for that. I've seen a couple of Indian action movies now. They lean into the crazy action and don't care that it's nonsense.
I'll be damned if I can find it now, and I wouldn't swear to it being Indian, but I also really enjoyed a movie last year about a prison break, where a kid gets smuggled in to see their dad by the friendly prisoners. We learn about the individual prisoners and what brought them there. I think it was called something like "cell block 3" or "the man in cell 5".
There are some really good ones here. I'm not sure if it's my favorite because moods change, but I want to give a shout out to Le Pacte des Loups or Brotherhood of the Wolf was the English dub.
Nothing wrong with the English version but I saw it in French first and really enjoyed it (and I don't like live action dubs in general because the words don't match the lips). It's schlocky French medieval martial arts mystery, so nothing as artistic as Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, but it was fun.
Tho I prefer the English dub over subtitled Chinese because the subtitles lose a lot of the flavor and is extremely basic. If I understood, I think its Cantonese, I would like to hear the original poetry that I'm sure it actually has.
I don't know if this qualifies, but Bon Cop, Bad Cop is a French and English Canadian film that's hilarious. The conjugating French swear words had me in stitches.
I assume that works only because you've seen it enough times you remember the intent of what is being said, even if you don't understand it to listen to?
Oh. Yes, I've seen it enough to understand what's going on. I think, it's also because it's such a quintessentially Japanese story (in the same sense that Back to the Future movies, The Breakfast Club, Grease, and the like are called "Americana"), comparing the lives of people in Tokyo with those living in a much more rural community, with connections to things (the city) as opposed to folklore (the town), it just takes me out of its element to hear them speaking English, even though the English voice acting is very good.
There's actually a fan-made subtitle file that improves the translations a lot better. So, if I do watch with subtitles, I use fansubs.
It's the little things. So there is a scene in which a person opens their hand to see what is written, and it was supposed to be somebody's name, but it's not. I can't really say more without spoiling an amazing scene. But the official English subs do just that. Before the hand even opens, the subtitle prints the whole thing across the bottom, so the character's delayed reaction has far less impact. With the fansubs, the kanji are translated individually as they read them, so the character's reaction matches the viewer's and it feels way more authentic.
Another aspect is the songs. So writer/director Shinkai wanted the songs to be available in English, because English speaking people had such a good reaction to his previous film. So he got a band whose singer claimed to be able to sing in English, but what the guy really meant was he knew how to use Google Translate and he could sing what the machine spat out. So, Shinkai achieved his goal, sort of. If you watch the film in Japanese, the songs play in Japanese. If you watch in English, the songs play in English, but there's something kind of off about them. Now, if you watch the film in Japanese with the fansubs, the lyrics make a LOT more sense. One of the translations was so bad that it was held back from the soundtrack. The song was re-released on the band's album and they used that one instead. So the Japanese version on the soundtrack is this epic nine-minute power ballad with four or five minutes of ambient sound in the middle. And you get that in English, too, but only in the movie. On the soundtrack, the English version doesn't have the instrumental bit in the middle, it actually has another verse or two in there, and it's way shorter. It's... okay, but it lacks the gravitas of the Japanese song, and especially given what is going on in the story at that time, it really needs that gravitas. They needed to go hard, and they absolutely did in Japanese, but the English effort is far less impactful.
It's not just the subs. When 君の名は。 (your name.) came out in theaters, I would have had to drive 8 hours each way to see it. It wasn't shown any closer than that. When its soft sequel 天気の子 (Weathering With You; not really a sequel but considered by Shinkai to be part of a series with it, about natural disasters) came out, I was able to see it in theaters because I chose to drive over 2 hours to see it. But it was worth it. When the third one, Suzume, released, it was shown just up the road from me. People talk about anime films as being so big now. It's not just about the rising popularity of anime itself. That really blew up in 2012 and 2013 with Attack on Titan and Sword Art Online. My Hero Academia, Demon Slayer, Jujutsu Kaisen, Chainsaw Man, and the other big ones came a bit later. But in 2016, you had to drive 8 hours to see a big anime movie in theaters, and a lot of anime clubs, game stores, and the like would rent buses and you could chip in and ride. Unless, of course, you lived in one of the 5-8 big cities it played in, or closer to them. I have a good friend who has never seen an episode of Demon Slayer, but went to see the recent movie and loved it. I didn't, because I haven't seen the season leading up to it. They said it didn't matter, they explain everything. But I can't bring myself to watch out of order. I did see the first Demon Slayer movie, Infinity Train (or Mugen Train) in theaters — that movie is now considered Season 2. I've seen all the My Hero Academia movies in theaters, but those are pretty bad IMO (I like the series, though). Sword Art Online's movies are a bit better, but they feel like long episodes — like some Star Trek movies. Attack on Titan should have been shown in theaters. But back in 2012 it wouldn't have worked.
Subtitle mistakes and bad timings is something that bothers me a lot too.
I've only ever watched the sub for Kimi no na Wa so I didn't experience the English soundtrack, but the Japanese was banging and really helped make the movie.
I Am Not an Easy Man (French). It's outdated now, but when I watched it as a teenager/ young woman it opened my eyes to a lot that I took for granted. I still think of it all the time when I'm brushing my teeth.
Does it have to be exclusively in a foreign language, or does it still count if a dub exists as long as that's not the original? If I can count it, A Silent Voice/Koe no Katachi (2016).
There’s so many good ones to choose from, but the one that sprang to mind first for me was the movie Metro. Something about how all the characters felt so believable and the set design was phenomenal.
I'm cheating a bit but the French movies Asterix: Mission Cleopatre and La Grande Vadrouille (1966) are both criminally underappreciated in the English speaking world.
A journalist who had a stroke and got locked in syndrome wrote a memoir about his life before and after. He had to dictate it by blinking his left eye. This is the film adaptation of the memoir.
Im Westen Nichts Neues (All Quiet on the Western Front).
There are some historical inaccuracies, sure, but it is an amazing movie showing the horrors of trench warfare and the careless nature of the commanding officers in the First World War. It leaves you with a sense of dread, something war movies should do more often imo.
The Hairdresser's Husband, a French movie I saw @25 years ago when Bravo was still doing artsy-fartsy instead of brain-rot. I took 4 years of French in H.S., but I don't claim to be fluent.
Not a movie, an episode of What If - Kahhori Reshaped the World? Disney worked with the Mohawk Nation. I don't understand a word of it but it is musical.
That trio of French films that came out in the last few years, the two musketeer ones and the third one Count of Monte Cristo... the latter is one of my favourite films, so well made and acted.
Lots of great suggestions here. One movie I’d like to highlight is Beyond the Infinite Two Minutes, which I found to be fun, clever, and utterly charming.
Memories of Murder is probably my favorite Korean language film.
Tokyo Story is amazing. Ozu doesn't get as much credit as Kurosawa, but pop over to his rotten tomatoes page and look at how many films he made, and what the ratings of them are.
I don't think I've ever seen a filmography that stacked. Dude made like 50 films, and the lowest rating is like 80-something
It is about a futuristic prison, where food is distributed to inmates in a vertical prison. They have elected to be there, on promise of reward on release. They are fed on a vertical table, the descends, level by level.
IMO, it is really about humanity and the choice between self service and a greater good.
Oh. Uh.
Hanzo the Razor: Sword of Justice (1972)
Hanzo the Razor: The Snare (1973)
Hanzo the Razor: Who's Got the Gold? (1974)
They're, uh, something. I think that they're probably part of the reason that I really got into shibari. The films are graphically, cartoonishly violent, misogynistic, as close to pornographic as you can get in 'mainstream' Japanese cinema, and there's just something about them. My partner HATES them, so use your best judgement before attempting to watch them.
You must be very young,
haven't seen many movies,
only seen the worst movies,
or else you really need to get into directing and make a movie that will put everything else to shame.
Or maybe that's the translated name of some movie I've never seen. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Although, I am curious, what would it take to make a good movie in your opinion? Or what do current movies seem to be lacking in?
Pan’s Labyrinth for me
I love it because it's one of the few dark fantasy movies natively made in Spanish. The dead fascists are a bonus.
One of my favorite details that is easy to miss if you aren't a native speaker is that Pan speaks in medieval Spanish. It honestly almost sounds like French
I can't find anything to really support the note about the faun speaking an early version of Spanish; do you have a link I could read/watch?
I've found people noting that Doug Jones is dubbed by the Spanish voice actor into Castilian (rather than any Central or South American dialect) and that his language is formal and somewhat archaic.
Quick correction, Castilian and Spanish are he same thing. It's not an old dialect or an old language. Spain has lots of languages, and the renaming of Castilian to Spanish was a "recent" (last 100 years) attempt from a dictator to delegitimize all of the other languages (also prohibiting them from being taught in schools or being used officially).
Also I strongly dislike the use of dialects here, although there are many different accents the language remains the same. If we start to call Mexican or Argentinians Spanish into dialects we might as well call Texan or Californian English as dialects as well, since they're equally different.
Also, also, Mexico (the largest Spanish speaking country by population is in North America), not sure why you only mentioned South and Central.
That being said, yes, the Faun speaks very formally. It's not necessarily archaic, but the sort of language one might expect in a court room. But yeah, that used to be the colloquial Spanish a while back.
Thanks. I really wrote "Castilian" to mean that sources on the web suggest his dialogue is at least somewhat modern Spanish Spanish (so to speak) -- but I'm ignorant of the differences between Spanish spoken in the Americas, including North America as you rightly point out, and the Iberian peninsula. I didn't mean to suggest that Castilian was archaic.
Looked into it a bit more. It seems it's not exactly medieval Spanish but just old and really formal Spanish, akin to Shakespearean. Nevertheless, not something you'd hear nowadays. Everyone else just speaks with a Spaniard accent, there's no Latin American dialects in the movie.
I remember looking up the script a little while ago. Here's an excerpt
You will see a luxurious banquet. Don't eat or drink any of it while you're there
(Fwiw, I'm from Latin America so Spaniard accents all just sound weirdly posh to me, like that video of a British kid complaining about the ice cream man)
Thank you, that's interesting to know!
I mean it's gotta be Parasite (the Korean Movie)
I would enter "memories of murder". It goes toe to toe with Rear Window as one of the best suspense movies ever made, and MOM would go on my top 50 in any language any genre.
I was just going to say Memories of Murder. It's my favorite Bong Joon Ho film, and possibly my favorite Korean language film (that I've seen).
It's so fucking good. The fight scenes have to be some of the most realistic looking I've seen. At times it looks like they're really throwing each other around. There's one scene where the main cop guy comes flying in from off screen and full on drop kicks a dude, and he commits completely. Made me lol the first time I saw it, I had to rewind and watch it again.
Spirited Away or Run Lola Run
Spirited Away is so good in Japanese and does lose something being dubbed. Run Lola Run is so good in German, I don't know if there is a dub because there is no reason to seek it, the dialogue was perfect for subtitling and the story is based on slightly different loops in time so you pick up what is happening each loop through. Very cool.
Likewise with Kiki's Delivery Service for me, although probably because Disney felt the need to fuck with the music as well as the dialogue in their dub.
How this did not result in Miyazaki, Hisaishi, and Sugimura going on a rampage in Disney's offices with their katana, Walther P-38, and magnum is beyond me.
Godzilla minus one
There are so many, but I think my first choice would probably have to be Seven Samurai. It is such an amazing piece of cinema. One of the most influential pieces that has inspired almost all of the film we still see today.
Great choice. In a similar vein - Rififi.
Very solid choice! It's another one that has been an inspiration to so much of modern cinema.
Most obviously including La Cercle Rouge by Melville which I prefer to Rififi
Came here to write this, so many movie tropes have their roots in that movie and Kurosawas genius directing. Also the sounds and emotions in the original Japanese language are so brilliantly conveyed, it loses so much in dubbing.
that rain... love it
that rain... love it
Shaolin Soccer
Shaolin Soccer is great, but I think Kung-Fu Hustle edges it out for me.
Akira Kurosawa's Seven Samurai, hands down. Possibly the best movie ever made. Every shot is just beautiful.
Not actually my favorite as that's too difficult, but Kung Fu Hustle is great
I'm here to laud Kung Fu Hustle as a masterpiece. The knife throwing scene... Peak physical comedy.
Das Boot, maybe.
The movie about starting up a German computer
I heard they're doing a remake, Das Reboot
This is a good one as is Good Bye, Lenin!
Goodbye Lenin is fantastic.
The Lives of Others is amazing too.
and the 5 hour version. I still got the dvd and it wasn’t easy to find.
Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
Troll Hunter
Yojimbo
Akira Kurosawa + Toshiro Mifune = Some of the best movies ever!
Battle Royale.
Pretty sure it was the first foreign language film I've watched.
Kung Fu Hustle
Excellent film, and shaolin soccer is brilliant too from the same guy. Steven chow.
Came here to mention this one, and here it is! I love Shaolin Soccer.
Right on. At least half of Stephen Chow's catalog came to mind when I read this question.
Old Boy.
RRR is fantastic
This one is just off the hook, very enjoyable
I will never understand the love for this movie.
There is no end to the cheap “plot twists” a filmmaker can get away with if the audience is willing to accept “lol everyone was hypnotized” as an explanation for glaring holes in the narrative.
Did you respond to the wrong comment? Because I’m having trouble imagining what you could possibly be referring to
I absolutely did. Ha!
This meant to be a response to whoever said “Oldboy.”
Leaving it just to maximize confusion.
Amélie
It has been over 20 years since I have seen Amélie but it still lives rent free in my head. What a lovely warm whimsical movie with a fantastic soundtrack.
They made a musical of it a while back. It didn't do very well on Broadway, but it had some good songs in my opinion.
I've really enjoyed Parasite, I didn't scroll to read everyone's answers but didn't see that one mentioned
I think the marketing needs a tweek. I went in expecting a horror.
Pan's Labyrinth
Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon
I admit that the list of foreign made films I am familiar is quite small.
Love both of those!
Also Talk to Her, Amelie and Run Lola Run.
Crouching Tiger's probably my #1.
I didn't even realize Pan's Labyrinth wasn't in English... I need to watch more movies.
City of Lost Children is my pick. It has such amazing worldbuilding. Drops you in cold with no apologies and trusts you to just go on the ride.
The flea scene blew me away the first time I saw it. Still does. Also, Ron Perlman is always awesome.
Oh what a ride it is.. that scene with the ship.. Holy cats!
My favorite line.. "Silence, legume!"
7 Samauri, I am not fluent in Japanese but was conversational. That movie illustrates the Japanese and their system of honor, which can be very odd and flexible.
City of God
If you liked that you might also enjoy Elite Squad.
Les untouchables. Way better than the American remake.
Is that the same as Intouchables? If so, I loved that film!
"Come over here. READ. Now you print, print, print and get out of here!"
(╯°□°）╯︵ ┻━┻
Why would anyone remake a perfect film?
Why wouldn't you want to inject Kevin Hart and Jared Leto into the perfect film? Sounds like audiences would really go for that combo!
Uh, it's Brian Cranston, but still... It didn't need to be done.
Ah, sorry, I had a running joke with a friend about Leto being injected into films for unclear reasons and it escaped here. My bad.
Oh gawd .. I'm now tempted to watch it to see just how bad it is hahaha
Great film. Brilliant performances. I think the actor playing Driss is one of the most charismatic. He really nails that role.
Omar Sy
Let the right one in.
There was also a French film very similar to Chappie that was decent.
Let the Right one in is such an excellent movie!
Great movie!!
Probably Your Name for me. Beautiful movie, score, story, art.
Ditto, easily one of my favorite movies of any genre
Great choice
Nausicaa
The Triplets of Belleville
Literally no speaking. Solid choice.
Not true, there are like 10 sentences in the whole movie! But yeah, you can understand this movie without speaking the language.
Okay it's obvious I need to re-watch it. Thanks for putting this one back on my radar!
The only possible answer to this is Amelie.
Maybe but they would likely pretend otherwise so that they could answer with Amelie as well!
Der Untergang
Oh man, tough...
All come to mind first.
Cinema Paradiso is a masterpiece.
Until you watch the extended version
Oh, is that no good? I downloaded it a while ago but have never gotten around to watching it.
It is great. Not for kids.
Train to busan
My pic as well! Korean cinema is cranking out bangers these days.
My Neighbor Totoro
All of the Ghibli movies are great, though they're some of the only foreign films I will watch dubbed, because the voice casts they get are insane. The English dub of Totoro with the Fanning sisters while they were still children is just fantastic.
The sketchy site I used only had the Japanese version unfortunately.
Such a perfect heartwarming movie.
Seven Samurai!
So many, it's hard to pick. But a few off the top of my head
*The lives of others (Germany, 2006)
*Akira (Japan, 1988)
*Red Beard (Japan, 1965)
*The Seventh Seal (Sweden, 1957)
Tampopo
Makes me think I should watch the rest of his movies. 
Life is Beautiful is one of my favorites that should really only be watched with subtitles. It's a really sad movie, but sticks with you in a good way.
LA Dolce Vita or The Queen Margot (1994).
Without being able to log into my Jellyfin atm, so relying on the jelly between my ears:
There is no 'favorite' in cinema imho!
Very solid picks!
Stalker
Wings of Desire. (Der Himmel über Berlin)
German, Wim Wenders, 1987. Solveig Dommartin was so beautiful in that.
Was remade into a movie called City of Angels with Nick Cage that didn't even come close to being as good.
So good, I need to rewatch it soon.
Two from me that haven't yet been mentioned (as far as I can see)
Dark Water: A beautiful Japanese horror that was released at a similar time to Ringu, but didn't get an English language remake.
City of God: A stunning portrait of gang rivalry in Rio de Janiero that bears repeat viewings.
City of God is great. Watched it as part of some recommended films list and it stuck with me.
City of God has the best child acting of any movie I've ever seen. It is so good I sorta suspect they weren't even acting in some scenes. I have to imagine they straight up pulled in random kids and told them they were going to gun them down in the street and just filmed it.
Would you believe, there was a Dark Water English remake?
Have seen both. The original is better.
Well, TIL
RRR was pretty fun
The scene where the car flies into the air and the guy takes a sniper shot mid flight cemented it for me.
It's ridiculous, and I loved it for that. I've seen a couple of Indian action movies now. They lean into the crazy action and don't care that it's nonsense.
What others do you recommend?
Baahubali has a palm tree catapult!
Singham is about a super cop.
I'll be damned if I can find it now, and I wouldn't swear to it being Indian, but I also really enjoyed a movie last year about a prison break, where a kid gets smuggled in to see their dad by the friendly prisoners. We learn about the individual prisoners and what brought them there. I think it was called something like "cell block 3" or "the man in cell 5".
Check out Bahubali (1 and 2) if you haven't already. It has some over-the-top action scenes too, I enjoyed both.
Black cat white cat
Yojimbo which apparently was the basis for Last Man Standing.
Also A Fistful of Dollars. It's kind of crazy how many people just ripped off Kurosawa films
The Lives of Others.
There are some really good ones here. I'm not sure if it's my favorite because moods change, but I want to give a shout out to Le Pacte des Loups or Brotherhood of the Wolf was the English dub.
Nothing wrong with the English version but I saw it in French first and really enjoyed it (and I don't like live action dubs in general because the words don't match the lips). It's schlocky French medieval martial arts mystery, so nothing as artistic as Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, but it was fun.
Run Lola Run
Guimba (AKA Guimba the Tyrant)
Saraounia
Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
Tho I prefer the English dub over subtitled Chinese because the subtitles lose a lot of the flavor and is extremely basic. If I understood, I think its Cantonese, I would like to hear the original poetry that I'm sure it actually has.
I really liked "Battle Royal" i feel like the hunger games may have been written taking HEAVY influence from this film.
Wages of Fear (1953) One of the best thrillers I've ever seen.
It was remade in 1977 and called "Sorcerer". I've never seen that version and neither has anyone else because it opened against Star Wars.
https://youtu.be/ET_MnC_pFPs
Clip from 'Sorcerer.' You can see it on YouTube and it's worth the price.
I love both movies.
Your Name, the soundtrack is so good too.
One is The Irony of Fate, which is a Soviet New Year's movie, fittingly. So charming! Give it a shot!
I don't know if this qualifies, but Bon Cop, Bad Cop is a French and English Canadian film that's hilarious. The conjugating French swear words had me in stitches.
Aniara
All Quiet on the Western Front
(The 2020 Netflix version)
Quest for fire.
I see what you did there.
I didn't see a call out for Perfect Blue.
Rififi
Parasite
Seven Samurai
Manon Of The Spring
Babette's Feast
Intouchables.
It's one of my favourites too.
Oh it's so good
Hero (2002)
Drunken Master (1978)
Shaolin Soccer (2001)
Nezha Conquers the Dragon King (1979)
Taegukgi: The Brotherhood of War (2004)
Ugly Stepsister
Troll Hunter Amelie The Orphanage The Host
I notice one of those is not like the others.
Had to scroll too far to find The Orphanage. Seriously in my top 5 of all time
Surely it would be more well-known if it had been filmed in English. Really haunting film.
The Lure is a musical about carnivorous mermaid twins who work as strippers in a seedy club. It's Polish.
Carnivorous or cannibal?
Eating people but not each other, whichever that means for mermaids
With Fire and Sword (Polish). We rewatch it every few years. Amazing!
I have two:
The City of Lost Children (French)
Pan's Labyrinth (Spanish)
City of Lost Children is amazing
君の名は。 (your name.)
Also my favorite overall movie.
It is available in English but I prefer to watch it in Japanese. Without subs.
I assume that works only because you've seen it enough times you remember the intent of what is being said, even if you don't understand it to listen to?
Oh. Yes, I've seen it enough to understand what's going on. I think, it's also because it's such a quintessentially Japanese story (in the same sense that Back to the Future movies, The Breakfast Club, Grease, and the like are called "Americana"), comparing the lives of people in Tokyo with those living in a much more rural community, with connections to things (the city) as opposed to folklore (the town), it just takes me out of its element to hear them speaking English, even though the English voice acting is very good.
There's actually a fan-made subtitle file that improves the translations a lot better. So, if I do watch with subtitles, I use fansubs.
I'm surprised the official subs are bad for such a big release, but I can believe it.
I kinda miss the days when fansubs were the only way to watch stuff, as much as that meant wating!
It's the little things. So there is a scene in which a person opens their hand to see what is written, and it was supposed to be somebody's name, but it's not. I can't really say more without spoiling an amazing scene. But the official English subs do just that. Before the hand even opens, the subtitle prints the whole thing across the bottom, so the character's delayed reaction has far less impact. With the fansubs, the kanji are translated individually as they read them, so the character's reaction matches the viewer's and it feels way more authentic.
Another aspect is the songs. So writer/director Shinkai wanted the songs to be available in English, because English speaking people had such a good reaction to his previous film. So he got a band whose singer claimed to be able to sing in English, but what the guy really meant was he knew how to use Google Translate and he could sing what the machine spat out. So, Shinkai achieved his goal, sort of. If you watch the film in Japanese, the songs play in Japanese. If you watch in English, the songs play in English, but there's something kind of off about them. Now, if you watch the film in Japanese with the fansubs, the lyrics make a LOT more sense. One of the translations was so bad that it was held back from the soundtrack. The song was re-released on the band's album and they used that one instead. So the Japanese version on the soundtrack is this epic nine-minute power ballad with four or five minutes of ambient sound in the middle. And you get that in English, too, but only in the movie. On the soundtrack, the English version doesn't have the instrumental bit in the middle, it actually has another verse or two in there, and it's way shorter. It's... okay, but it lacks the gravitas of the Japanese song, and especially given what is going on in the story at that time, it really needs that gravitas. They needed to go hard, and they absolutely did in Japanese, but the English effort is far less impactful.
It's not just the subs. When 君の名は。 (your name.) came out in theaters, I would have had to drive 8 hours each way to see it. It wasn't shown any closer than that. When its soft sequel 天気の子 (Weathering With You; not really a sequel but considered by Shinkai to be part of a series with it, about natural disasters) came out, I was able to see it in theaters because I chose to drive over 2 hours to see it. But it was worth it. When the third one, Suzume, released, it was shown just up the road from me. People talk about anime films as being so big now. It's not just about the rising popularity of anime itself. That really blew up in 2012 and 2013 with Attack on Titan and Sword Art Online. My Hero Academia, Demon Slayer, Jujutsu Kaisen, Chainsaw Man, and the other big ones came a bit later. But in 2016, you had to drive 8 hours to see a big anime movie in theaters, and a lot of anime clubs, game stores, and the like would rent buses and you could chip in and ride. Unless, of course, you lived in one of the 5-8 big cities it played in, or closer to them. I have a good friend who has never seen an episode of Demon Slayer, but went to see the recent movie and loved it. I didn't, because I haven't seen the season leading up to it. They said it didn't matter, they explain everything. But I can't bring myself to watch out of order. I did see the first Demon Slayer movie, Infinity Train (or Mugen Train) in theaters — that movie is now considered Season 2. I've seen all the My Hero Academia movies in theaters, but those are pretty bad IMO (I like the series, though). Sword Art Online's movies are a bit better, but they feel like long episodes — like some Star Trek movies. Attack on Titan should have been shown in theaters. But back in 2012 it wouldn't have worked.
You've clearly thought about it a lot.
Subtitle mistakes and bad timings is something that bothers me a lot too.
I've only ever watched the sub for Kimi no na Wa so I didn't experience the English soundtrack, but the Japanese was banging and really helped make the movie.
Perfect Days is a beautiful movie.
Perfect Blue is all sorts of fucked up in the best way. Really anything Satoshi Kon made.
Cure, it's a Japanese psychological horror/thriller film. Honorable mentions also include Pulse (also Japanese) and Incubus (in Esperanto).
Under Sandet (danish)
A film about a group of 14 y/o war prisoners that have to clean up the mines on the beach, and about the officer that guards them.
I Am Not an Easy Man (French). It's outdated now, but when I watched it as a teenager/ young woman it opened my eyes to a lot that I took for granted. I still think of it all the time when I'm brushing my teeth.
And the version of "You're the One that I Want" plays in my head all the time! So good!
Merci!
Heavy Trip
Does it have to be exclusively in a foreign language, or does it still count if a dub exists as long as that's not the original? If I can count it, A Silent Voice/Koe no Katachi (2016).
I say it counts if you prefer the foreign audio! That’s how I answered. If you just watch it in English it doesn’t fit the description.
There’s so many good ones to choose from, but the one that sprang to mind first for me was the movie Metro. Something about how all the characters felt so believable and the set design was phenomenal.
Maria Full of Grace
I'm cheating a bit but the French movies Asterix: Mission Cleopatre and La Grande Vadrouille (1966) are both criminally underappreciated in the English speaking world.
The most recent The Count of Monte-Cristo from France is an absolute work of art:
https://m.imdb.com/title/tt26446278/
Victoria, German film from 2015 Excellent heist thriller.
El Hoyo (En: The Platform)
It's also in English but i watched it in Spanish.
The City of Lost Children
Same!
RRR
The Diving Bell and the Butterfly.
A journalist who had a stroke and got locked in syndrome wrote a memoir about his life before and after. He had to dictate it by blinking his left eye. This is the film adaptation of the memoir.
The Raid: Redemption.
Upvote for a great question that garnered some great foreign film recommendations!
Howl's Moving Castle Martyrs Paadmavaat
Oh I totally forgot about animated films
Departures (2008)
Den Brysomme Mannen (2006)
Mon oncle. Jacques Tati, and obstensibly French even though it has almost no dialog.
Some great titles here! I'm adding C'est arrivé près de chez vous, inexplicably retitled Man Bites Dog for the anglophone market.
Edit: just had to add a few more... Сталкер (Stalker), Titane and Mandibules.
I’m a fan of Angel-A by Luc Besson.
Probably Libertarias.
Idk if it fully counts cause I watched the dubbed version but Your Name is amazing.
No, Your Name is amazing.
Im Westen Nichts Neues (All Quiet on the Western Front).
There are some historical inaccuracies, sure, but it is an amazing movie showing the horrors of trench warfare and the careless nature of the commanding officers in the First World War. It leaves you with a sense of dread, something war movies should do more often imo.
RRR. Incredible movie.
There are so many foreign language films I love. Several have already been mentioned here, but I'll add a few that haven't been:
Mars Express. Very good French anime.
Shall We Dance?
Tag - 2015
It's a gory as hell japanese horror flick that I had to watch after seeing a gif of the bus scene (tw: death/blood)
Redline by studio madhouse, it's eye porn if you love animation.
Riki-Oh, hands down the most unintentionally hilarious movie ever made.
Impossible to choose: Pusher or Los Cronocrimines
The Hairdresser's Husband, a French movie I saw @25 years ago when Bravo was still doing artsy-fartsy instead of brain-rot. I took 4 years of French in H.S., but I don't claim to be fluent.
Fritz Lang's 'M'
They Call Me Jeeg, funny Italian superhero underdog movie
Train to Busan
Das Boot might be my favourite movie full stop.
Extreme Job, a Korean comedy.
Not a movie, an episode of What If - Kahhori Reshaped the World? Disney worked with the Mohawk Nation. I don't understand a word of it but it is musical.
Yes! I am a Marvel fan, but wasn’t super into What If but that episode was so damn cool and the language was faaaaaaaantastic!
That trio of French films that came out in the last few years, the two musketeer ones and the third one Count of Monte Cristo... the latter is one of my favourite films, so well made and acted.
Seven Samurai, and The Hidden Fortress.
A girl walks home alone at night, 2014, Farsi
That one has been in my bucketlist since it came out and I have not been able to watch it yet. It looks great!
The Iranian movie Bachcha-e-Aasmaan (English name: Children of Heaven).
Italian movie Cinema Paradiso. This movie is the embodiment of my love for cinema.
Both of them feel so raw and genuine it makes me come back to them time and again.
A Very Long Engagement (MMM) (french)
Fantastic Planet.
Le Chant du loup. A very decent submarine action movie.
Chungking Express
Babette's Feast
Brotherhood of the Wolf
Bajrangi bhaijaan.
(2015 Hindi comedy-drama film starring Salman Khan as a devotee of Hanuman who helps a mute Pakistani girl).
Lots of great suggestions here. One movie I’d like to highlight is Beyond the Infinite Two Minutes, which I found to be fun, clever, and utterly charming.
Tampopo is up there for sure...
Memories of Murder is probably my favorite Korean language film.
Tokyo Story is amazing. Ozu doesn't get as much credit as Kurosawa, but pop over to his rotten tomatoes page and look at how many films he made, and what the ratings of them are.
I don't think I've ever seen a filmography that stacked. Dude made like 50 films, and the lowest rating is like 80-something
Idk about favourite (too many choices) but I watched Salaam Bombay! Last night and it was amazing.
The platform, aka El Hoyo
It is about a futuristic prison, where food is distributed to inmates in a vertical prison. They have elected to be there, on promise of reward on release. They are fed on a vertical table, the descends, level by level.
IMO, it is really about humanity and the choice between self service and a greater good.
It is a great movie. The sequel... Eh.
Confessions. The soundtrack is odd, but the rest makes up for it. One of the very few movies that I think is better than the book.
"Happy Times". A chinese film about a grifter and a young blind girl.
Late, Autumn
Inu-Oh. I don't like musicals but this one stole my heart.
Monrak Transistor
Persona by Ingmar Bergman
Train to Busan
Oh. Uh. Hanzo the Razor: Sword of Justice (1972) Hanzo the Razor: The Snare (1973) Hanzo the Razor: Who's Got the Gold? (1974)
They're, uh, something. I think that they're probably part of the reason that I really got into shibari. The films are graphically, cartoonishly violent, misogynistic, as close to pornographic as you can get in 'mainstream' Japanese cinema, and there's just something about them. My partner HATES them, so use your best judgement before attempting to watch them.
In China They Eat Dogs. I Kina Spiser de Hunde.
A Serbian Film
I've never watched a good movie in my life
You must be very young,
haven't seen many movies,
only seen the worst movies,
or else you really need to get into directing and make a movie that will put everything else to shame.
Or maybe that's the translated name of some movie I've never seen. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Although, I am curious, what would it take to make a good movie in your opinion? Or what do current movies seem to be lacking in?