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If you have seen quite a few movies it can sometimes be difficult to find a diamond in the rough. Here is a list of some good movies you may have missed.

“The King of Comedy”: Martin Scorsese’s forgotten dark comedy / drama about an aspiring comic, played by Robert DeNiro, who will go to great lengths to become successful in showbiz. DeNiro is hysterical in this film, in a creepy, dark and weird sort-of-way. This film, which came out in 1983, is masterfully directed by Scorsese, and also features some great performances by Jerry Lewis (as himself) and Sandra Bernhard.

“Tape”: If you like car chases and explosions, well, this movie is not for you. Richard Linklater’s 2001 film is about three old high school friends who discuss some events that happened during their high school years in a motel room in Michigan. This whole film literally takes place in a motel, but if you think it’s boring, think again. The acting is superb, the script is intelligent, and the ambiguity of this film will have you thinking about what may or may not have happened for days.

“Dear Frankie”: This 2004 British film is about a deaf boy who desperately wants to meet up with his father that he has never seen. The movie features some outstanding performances by Jack McElhone (Frankie) and Emily Mortimer (Lizzie).

“Mean Creek”: This 2004 drama/thriller, which is written and directed by Jacob Aaron Estes, is an outstanding look at teenagers who seek revenge on a bully. It is a very accurate and heartbreaking portrayal of how kids sometimes act during adolescence. Rory Culkin and others give very strong performances.

“Open Water”: You may have missed this 2003 movie because you heard bad things about it and decided to not see it. Give it a chance. This movie is very underrated. It’s a film about a couple that goes scuba diving in the water and is stuck in the middle of the ocean after their tour boat mistakenly leaves them. Yes, a good chunk of this movie takes place in the ocean, it’s very low budget, and the acting is not exactly Oscar-worthy. But that is why the film succeeds. It comes across as so real that it is frightening. I will not spoil the ending, but it is one of the best in recent memory. It literally left me speechless.

“This Boy’s Life”: This 1993 drama is about a young boy and his mother who flee from his abusive father. Leonardo DiCaprio and Robert DeNiro turn in very good performances in this film.

“In America”: Based on true events, this 2002 film is a fantastic look at an Irish immigrant family adjusting to life in the U.S. Sisters Sarah and Emma Bolger give two of the greatest child performances that I have ever seen. Samantha Morton of “Minority Report” fame and Paddy Considine are excellent as the girls’ parents. This movie will surely touch you.

“Secretary”: In this 2002 drama/dark comedy/romance, Maggie Gyllenhaal works as a secretary after she is recently released from a mental hospital, and she then starts having an affair with her boss played by James Spade of “Boston Legal” fame. Very strong performances and an original script make this one worth watching.

“Ghost World”: This is an excellent film starring Thora Birch and Scarlett Johansson as two high school graduates who find out that the real world is not all it’s cracked up to be. Steve Buscemi is excellent as the middle-aged loser the girls try and play a prank on. This 2001 film’s conclusion is great.

“Welcome to The Dollhouse” directed by Todd Solondz, this 1995 drama/dark comedy is the story of a 13-year-old girl who is picked on both at school and at home. You want to laugh at her for the verbal abuse she receives, but then you remember how painful it was to get picked on at that age. Excellent film.

Keep these movies in mind next time you are not sure what to rent. You will not be disappointed.

Japan’s greatest film actor was 21 before he set foot in the country that would make him an international star. Toshiro Mifune was born in Manchuria, of Japanese parents, and his first job was helping in the studio of his photographer father.

It was as a photographer, and a Japanese citizen, that he was drafted into the Imperial Japanese Air Force during World War II, serving under the Imperial flag until 1946.

Suddenly Mifune was cast adrift in a country he barely knew. Fluent in both Mandarin and Japanese, he opted to stay in Japan because his parents were dead and he had nowhere else to go. Once again, it was photography that proved the key to the future.

Mifune started work as an assistant cameraman for Toho Productions in 1947, but the striking looking man wouldn’t go unnoticed for long. At an audition for new talent, Toho Productions discovered that its assistant cameraman was even more effective through the lens - and it brought together for the first time Mifune and the man with whom he would have one of the most productive partnerships in the history of film.

Present at that audition was film maker Akira Kurosawa, who watched Mifune act the part of a drunk with growing excitement. “The speed of his movements was such that he said in a single action what took ordinary actors three separate movements to express,” Kurosawa said later.

Even so, Mifune’s first film was not directed by Kurosawa, although the script was written by him. Ginrei No Hate (known in English as Snow Trail) was directed by Senkichi Taniguchi, who saw in the fiery young actor exactly the qualities needed for role of the paranoid bank robber Eijima.

A year later he began his collaboration with Kurosawa with the film Yoidore Tenshi (Drunken Angel), playing the gangster Matsunaga.

Once Mifune’s stunning presence was established on screen, Japanese film goers couldn’t get enough of him. But it was their fifth film together that awoke international attention. Rashomon took the basic story of a woman raped by a bandit and told it from four different points of view, including the woman’s dead husband. It was one of the most honored foreign films of 1950, winning awards in Britain, Venice and the US. The American Academy of Arts and Sciences created a special category of Best Foreign Film to award it an Oscar.

With Kurosawa’s premier story telling abilities, and Mifune’s ability to create complex, mesmerising screen roles, the pair continued to create stunning cinema until 1965, when they fell out over the filming of Red Beard. The rift kept them apart for 30 years and ended a legendary collaboration.

But Mifune was well established as one of the world’s great actors by this time. He had played a Mexican Indian in Ismael Rodriguez’ Animas Trujano, studying the part phonetically so he could speak his lines in perfect Spanish.

In 1966 he took on his first English speaking film, Grand Prix, playing a Japanese business man, and the owner of a Formula 1 racing team.

Two years later he appeared in Hell in the Pacific, playing a marooned Japanese officer to Lee Marvin’s shot down US pilot.

Between these films he starred in five movies and a TV mini series in Japan.

His next international role was as the Japanese Ambassador to Britain with English actor David Niven. Paper Tiger was something of a pot boiler, and Mifune quickly got back into warrior mode with the TV series Ken to Kaze to Komoriuta (The Sword, the Wind, and the Lullaby).

He followed that with the role of Admiral Yamamoto in Midway, a US WWII epic bristling with stars, including Charlton Heston and Henry Fonda. Heston later wrote that if English were Mifune’s first language, he would put them all out of work.

But even while acknowledging his powerful screen presence, Hollywood never really came to grips with Mifune - he continued working in Japan, making occasional forays into Hollywood, such as the 1980 mini series Shogun in which he played Lord Yoshi Toranaga opposite Richard Chamberlain’s Major John Blackthorne. The series was hugely successful in the west, but a walk in the park for Mifune, who had already played this role many times over.

His best English film role was in Red Sun with Charles Bronson, when western film goers finally got to see the many layered performance skills of the Japanese star. In his scene with a young Mexican bar girl, Mifune’s humanity shone through. It remains a well deserved favorite with his fans.

Mifune made his last film, Fukai Kawa (Deep River), in 1995. But he was already in poor health, under the care of his wife Sachiko. He had married her in 1950, overcoming the opposition of her parents. The couple had two sons, Shiro and Takeshi. Mifune’s affair with another woman produced a daughter Miko, but Sachiko returned to care for him after he suffered a stroke in 1992.

Her death in 1995 saw Mifune’s physical and mental health fall into a deep decline. he died on December 24, 1997 at the age of 77. He was briefly reconciled with Kurosawa before his death but the two men never regained their old camaraderie.

But his legend lives on, and his children Shiro and Miko continue the acting tradition in Japan.

War films abound and each year sees new releases on the subject — everything from ancient battles to the most recent conflicts. The following selections showcase the struggles and challenges war brings to a variety of points of view. The following films from different historical wars portray various angles of the crisis that impact different parties — commanders, soldiers, reporters, women, children, civilians, etc… They make for dramatic viewing based on historical accuracies.

Saving Private Ryan is a recent dramatic replication of D-Day when the allies landed in France during the darkest days of WWII to face the Germans. Starring Tom Hanks and Matt Damon, this Steven Spielberg offering is a graphic telling of the race to save the last of a family of fighting brothers. Critically acclaimed, this is the closest thing to D-Day most of us will ever witness.

Apocalypse Now, though a war film classic, still deserves acclaim from modern audiences. Based on Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness, it is reset during the Vietnam conflict and stars Marlon Brando and Charlie Sheen. While portraying the war and its horrific atmosphere, it also delves into the corruption of power, the dark acts that humans seem capable of inflicting.

Zulu starring a young Michael Caine is a war film based on the British conflict with the Zulu tribes of the South African region. Originally released in 1964, this film is based on a true event — when 140 British soldiers faced the impossible task of defending themselves against 4,000 Zulu warriors.

Paradise Road, also based on true events, tells the story of women trapped behind enemy lines and held by the Japanese in prison camps on the island of Sumatra during WWII. While portraying the hardship the women faced in captivity with graphic realism, it also demonstrates their hope and courage demonstrated by their use of music to uplift them in their struggles. The film stars Glenn Close, Julianna Margolis and Jennifer Ehle.

Gettysburg is a testament to the generals — to the commanders and soldiers of the Civil War. The film is lengthy, but so factually detailed as to bring the history of this pivotal battle to life. Also graphic, it is a star-studded cast that acts so brilliantly you forget who they are — they are soldiers and the movie is well-deserving of its critical acclaim.

The Patriot is the blockbuster featuring Mel Gibson and Heath Ledger in a film about the Revolutionary War. All the action and period history one comes to expect from a film of this nature — it does everything right: good historical detail, dramatic battle scenes and a fine back story that add the personal touch to draw in its audience — an excellent film about a nation’s birth.

Enemy at the Gates stars Jude Law and Rachel Weiss. It is a film about the battle of Stalingrad, but is specifically about the role of snipers with a dramatic back-story that is at once believable as it is compelling. The Russians faced off with the Germans in one of WWII’s bloodiest battles which reduced most of the city to rubble. It does a good job retelling a battle that most Americans may not be familiar with.

A Very Long Engagement is a foreign film set during WWI, or rather, the years just after but with multiple flashbacks to the war. Several men are sent to no man’s land by their own troops as punishment for self-inflicted wounds. One woman does her utmost to find out if any survived including her lover. An interesting tale about a practice that has a basis in truth.

Platoon is an interesting selection because it does not portray the traditional war story of enemy against enemy. Instead, it depicts the dilemma of fighting within ones own ranks — when one’s fellow soldiers are corrupt. Set during the Vietnam War, it is also a graphic portrayal of war from an angle not usually seen. Fine acting from its stars — Willem Dafoe, Tom Berenger and Charlie Sheen.

The Killing Fields, also based on fact, is from the point of view of reporters caught in Cambodia at the time the Khmer Rouge took over — during the Vietnam War era. Starring Sam Waterson, Haing S. Ngor and John Malkovich, this award-winning film depicts the plight of war correspondents struggling to report with accuracy and forced to risk their lives to get their stories to press.

Hope and Glory is a British film about a boy’s memory of the Blitz — German air raids across London and what he and is family faced with both humor and desperation. One laughs and cries equally hard during this movie which will probably go down as a classic.

Blackhawk Down depicts the battle U.S. troops faced with the Somalis during the 1990s. The city of Mogadishu is the scene of the battle when a handful of troops seemed to have the whole city against them. Highly dramatic and realistic, it showcases the plight of combat troops in desperate situations.

Life is Beautiful is a foreign film set in Italy. Its poignancy is breathtaking. This is a holocaust film that is remarkably uplifting — see it for that irony alone. In any case, one family faces the camps with both imagination and ingenuity.

Master and Commander is war at sea when ships depended on its sailors to man the sails of galleons and corsairs. Starring Russel Crowe, this adventure is another realistic offering about war at sea in the era of cannon fire when the Brits faced off against the French in every corner of the watery world.

Finally, Titus features the Shakespearian play brought to life showcasing Anthony Hopkins as the Roman general who captures a Goth queen. Graphically dark, it is ancient war and intrigue brought to the screen. The film also stars Jessica Lange at her wicked best.

Of course, there are many fine war films not mentioned—one could certainly include The Deerslayer, Tora Tora Tora, Dances with Wolves, etc…but these are a few that provide different wars seem from differing angles.

Let me know whether you enjoyed these war movies, and whether there are any other war movies you enjoyed, by adding your comment below.

There is no shortage of films that portray dogs. The following article features just a few standouts dog-lovers can now rent on DVD. Most are geared for families and both children and adults are bound to love them.

My Dog Skip is as delightful as it is poignant. One of the best dog movies released in the last decade, it has universal appeal. Set in a small Mississippi town, it is a young boy’s coming of age story as well as the story of a family forever changed with the introduction of a dog named Skip.

Because of Winn-Dixie is based on the Newberry Award winning novel by Kate DiCamillo. It is the coming of age story of a young girl. Her sour luck changes when she meets up with a mutt near her local grocery store.

Where the Red Fern Grows in based on the novel of the same name by Wilson Rawls and features a couple of coon-hunting hounds and a young boy’s love for them. This one gets my top pick for best dog movie.

The Shaggy Dog is a classic Disney fantasy recently re-released to Dvd. This comedy portrays a boy is able to transform himself into an Old English Sheep Dog, a.k.a. the shaggy dog. It’s lots of fun for children to imagine life from a dog’s eye view.

Far From Home: Adventures of Yellow Dog is survival story of a boy and his pet yellow lab. After surviving a sailing accident, the two set off to try to survive life in the wilderness. A great film for hard-to-please boys — it’s a film nearly impossible not to pay close attention to.

The Journey of Natty Gann is another survival story — though this one features a girl traveling the rails across America to find her father in the Northwest. Along the way she meets and is accompanied by a wolf-dog. The film also stars a young John Cusack as a fellow rail-rider.

Homeward Bound: The Incredible Journey is the hilarious trip taken by three pets — two dogs and a cat — across plains and mountains to find their owners. Don Ameche, Sally Field and Michael J. Fox provide the voices of these animals that have lots of personality.

Snow Dogs is a recent hit starring Oscar winner Cuba Gooding Jr. Based on a Gary Paulsen novel, this film is set in Alaska and stars some snow-loving sled dogs who drive this movie into action. A very good choice for families.

A Dog of Flanders is based on a nineteenth century children’s tale. The adventures of a young orphan named Nello and his dog Patrasche are recounted with lots of period detail.

The Sandlot is the story a group of boys whose baseball games are plagued by a beastly canine. This film is another surefire hit for boys, but girls will certainly enjoy it too!

For animated doggy fun, try All Dogs Go To Heaven. Set it New Orleans during the 1930s, it stars Charlie B. Barkin, a not-so-saintly German Shepherd who cannot go to heaven until he performs a good deed.

There are a few doggy films made just for adults too. Try Must Love Dogs starring Diane Lane and John Cusack and The Truth About Cats and Dogs starring Uma Thurman for a dog-day double-feature.

All of these films are available on DVD to be rented or purchased.

Have I missed any good dog films? What do you think of these dog movies? Let me know by adding your comments below.

Transamerica stars Emmy award winning actress Felicity Huffman of Desperate Housewives fame, but this role is quite unlike the one you are used to. In Transamerica, Huffman plays a transsexual male named Bree who is on his way to becoming a woman. But just a few days before his final surgery, Bree realizes that he has a son from one of his early heterosexual relationships, and the two travel across the country on an odd journey of mutual bonding.

Transamerica is the debut film by writer/ director Duncan Tucker, but you honestly would not know it by the quality of the film. The dialogue is superb, the cinematography is great, and the acting, well, the acting is pretty damn good too.

The concept of a female playing a male may sound silly at first, but Huffman pulls it off by deepening her voice in a believable manner, and various steps were taken to make her look a bit less female. While it may not be flattering, Huffman give a very powerful performance, much like the one Charlize Theron gave in Monster, in that she paints a very convincing portrait of something that is rarely explored in american culture, let alone in Hollywood movies. Most definitely an Oscar-worthy performance. Kevin Zegers does a pretty good job too, but Huffman definitely steals the show.

The bottom line is this: Transamerica is a touching film that lays on plenty of emotion, but without being trite or condescending. Quite frankly, I feel this is essential viewing for everyone.

Let me know whether you agree or not by adding your comment below.

When famed Japanese director and writer Akira Kurosawa died in 1998 the film world mourned one of its most inspiring identities.

Kurosawa was a true emperor – his influence spread far and wide beyond his own borders, given homage in a range of western movies, from the `spaghetti westerns’ of the 60s and 70s, to the Star Wars saga.

The man who would be the world’s greatest writer and director was born in Tokyo in 1910, the youngest of nine children. His early life was marred with tragedy. He witnessed the devastation and death caused by an earthquake in 1923, and his beloved older brother Heigo committed suicide.

Kurosawa found solace in art. By the age of 19 he was exhibiting his paintings, but in 1936 his destiny took a hand and he entered to the world of filmmaking. He directed his first film Sugata Sanshiro in 1943, but it wasn’t until 1950 that he made the film that marked as one of the world’s great directors.

Earlier in his career, Kurosawa had worked with a young Japanese actor called Toshiro Mifune. In Rashomon, the two combined forces to begin a movie partnership that would spawn some of the most imitated films in screen history.

In Rashomon, Mifune plays Tajomaru, a bandit accused of killing a samurai and raping his wife. Tajomaru and the injured wife give radically different versions of what happened – a psychic is called in top channel the murdered husband, but a different version of events is heard. Finally a woodcutter who witnessed the crimes offers his own version.

Kurosawa’s many layered way of looking at a story continues to be imitated – as recently as 2002, the Chinese film Hero used the same approach, telling the one story from different points of view.

Kurosawa and Mifune made 16 films together, including Seven Samurai, Yojimbo and Throne of Blood (based on Shakespeare’s MacBeth) and are still widely regarded as one of the most dynamic actor/director teams ever to have existed.

But the collaboration ended in a rift with the completion of Red Beard in 1965 – the red beard Mifune had to grow for the title role kept him from working on other projects and put the actor under financial strain. The two remained estranged for 30 years but were briefly reconciled before both men died.

But the movies from that period of collaboration created an international sensation. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences created a `foreign film’ category of its Oscar awards so that Rashomon could be honored. The character Mifune and Kurosawa created for Yojimbo of the down at heel ronin (masterless samurai) became the inspiration for Clint Eastwood’s nameless character in the spaghetti western `Dollar’ films. Seven Samurai was remade by Hollywood as The Magnificent Seven – even Rashomon was remade by Hollywood as The Outrage. George Lucas cited The Hidden Fortress as a major influence on Star Wars. Lucas also made good use of Kurosawa’s favorite `wipe effect’ to change scenes.

The rift with Mifune, and a failed attempt to direct his first American film Tora! Tora! Tora! led to a bout of depression in 1971, when Kurosawa attempted suicide by slashing his wrists. The attempt failed, but it wasn’t until 1975 that he again won a best Foreign Language Film Oscar for Dersu Azala, which he made in the Soviet Union.

In 1980 he returned to full strength as a director, when admirers Francis Ford Coppola and George Lucas helped finance Kagemusha, the story of a poor thief who is recruited to impersonate a dead warlord.

His next film Ran was a Japanese version of King Lear, which set him firmly back on his throne as the Emperor of Film. Ran was an international success, and like Kagemusha, starred Kurosawa’s new muse, actor Tatsuya Nakadai.

Kurosawa made only three more films before his death, and each was an intensely personal retrospective of the events of his own life. Dreams drew on actual dreams Kurosawa had as a child and a young man, presented in eight bittersweet vignettes.

Rhapsody in August looks back at the dropping of the atomic bomb on Nagasaki in 1945.

His final film, Madadayo, is a gentle, Goodbye Mr Chips kind of story about a retired schoolteacher. He was planning to make another film when he died of a stroke at 88. His greatest muse and estranged friend Toshiro Mifune had died just ten months earlier.

In 1990, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences presented Kurosawa with a lifetime achievement award. In 1998, George Lucas and Martin Scorsese were among the 35,000 actors, directors and admirers that gathered to mourn him at a public funeral service held at the Kurosawa studios in Yokohama.

Hostel, the second feature film from Director/ Writer Eli Roth, is a gore-heavy, sex-filled ultra violent opus that follows two American college students and their new European friend on a backpacking trip across Europe.

The film begins in Amsterdam, where the guys party, dance, and engage in more than a few activities that are illegal in America and most parts of of the world. Eventually the three friends decide to go to Slovakia in search of making out with some attractive girls. They find what they were looking for at a particular Hostel, but they also find something they weren’t looking for … Death.

I absolutely love Cabin Fever, the other film that Eli Roth directed, so I was really looking forward to Hostel. I had read plenty about the movie, and I had a vague idea of what to expect when I walked into the theater, but for the most part I had no idea what it was going to be, I just assumed it was going to be good. I mean, with both Roth and Quentin Tarantino working together, it has to be great, right? Well, not completely …

One of the main complaints that people have about this movie is the amount of sex and violence in it. Well, to be rather frank, neither of those two things happen to bother me in the slightest. I am a large horror buff, and I’ve seen plenty of gore and sex on celluloid. What bothers me is not the nudity or gore, it’s the lack of real direction and pacing that bugs me.

The first half of Hostel consists of three very annoying frat boys getting high and having sex. The characters in Cabin Fever were pretty annoying too, but the movie was more about characterization, and the pacing was not extremely slow in that film. In Hostel, you really just don’t care about what is going on during the first forty five minutes or so. It isn’t until things start to get violent that the movie really takes off.

And I must say, there is some mighty gruesome gore here. If you are very squeamish, I recommend staying away from this film. I’m a fan of this kind of thing, but I know this just goes past what a lot of people can tolerate. The violent half of the film is the really good part, so if you are not fond of violence, you are unlikely to appreciate this film at all.

As soon as the violence starts, the acting gets better, the cinematography gets sharper, and the overall essence of the film becomes far more serious and ominous. Fans of horror will certainly love the second half of the movie, but I have my doubts about whether or not the average viewer would appreciate it.

All in all, Hostel is a good film. But the first half of it is very tedious, and it most definitely takes away from what could have been an amazing film. If you’re looking for some sex and violence, this is your film, but if you’re looking for much else, I recommend you pick up a copy of the director’s first film.

Let me know what you think of this movie by adding your comment below.

This is Dumb and Dumber, Australian style, and while Angus Sampson and Nathan Philips are no Jim Carrey and Jeff Daniels in the acting stakes, they serve a plateful of Aussie humor so thick that it will probably be incomprehensible anywhere else.

The film opens with scenes from the childhood of best mates Jeffrey and Phillip, accompanied by the repeated refrain of “You and your stupid mate..!” It’s a bit heavy handed but we get the point. These two could be living next door to anyone.

Jump a few years and Jeffrey and Philip are settled in a lifestyle that is nothing short of idyllic, living in a user-friendly caravan park on the dole, eating beans and watching their favourite soap, Sons and Surf.

It looks like nothing can get these two lovable slackers off their behinds and out into the world in search of real jobs. Phillip is deeply involved with the Gang Show, a Scout revue that takes place once a year, while Jeffrey devotes himself to maintenance of the Sons and Surf fan website.

Naturally, a combination of events catapults the pair out into the jungle – Sons and Surf is cancelled, and they get a new case manager at the Jobs 4 U job agency.

The writers, two stand up comics from Melbourne called Mark O’Toole and Dave O’Neil, obviously intended this to be an hilarious look at life in modern Australia, and strangely enough, in spite of production values that came out of a carton of breakfast cereal, they do succeed. You and Your Stupid Mate is like your best mate – he’s a bit of dill, but you can’t help liking the mongrel.

Angus Sampson plays Jeffrey as an innocent boofhead who doesn’t realize when he is being given the flick by a TV soap star, while Nathan Phillips capers happily as the gang Show-obsessed overgrown boy scout Philip.

Some strong supporting performances help the pair keep a grip on the material. William McInnes plays the case manager Peter Rossiter, whose efforts to get the pair employed finally drive him to madness; Tayler Kane, who played the dumb security guard in The Dish, gives a nice performance as soap star Evo, who befriends the boys.

Surprisingly, one of the highlights is leggy Rachel Hunter as Karen, a hippy earth mother type, surrounded by children and playing the harp outside her caravan. Clearly, Karen is a goddess and we are left in no doubt of that.

Madeleine West as soap star Emma obviously relishes the funny side of soap stardom, mugging her way through the Sons and Surf scenes, and sweetly learning that even her dumbest fans have more merit as human beings than TV executives.

All right, it’s not Shakespeare, but it delivers some real belly laughs and some genuinely inspired moments. But, if you are not Australian, don’t see it without an Aussie in tow to explain the gags.

One cannot always get a grand sense of a country even when one travels there. The history of a nation and the particular stories bound up in the lives of its inhabitants are not readily apparent in the one- or two-week stints one normally has for vacations. The following films provide a sense of Australia and New Zealand through fictional films and films based on actual facts to give the viewer a greater personal and historical sense of a place and its peoples. Also, the films are simply good and fun to watch.

The Piano, directed by Jane Campion, is set in the wilderness of Victorian-era New Zealand. It stars Holly Hunter who won an Oscar for her marvelous performance of a mute woman who travels to a foreign land with her daughter to marry a man she does not know. A young Anna Paquin also won a supporting Oscar for her portrayal as the woman’s precociously cartwheeling daughter. The piano plays a pivotal role in the machinations of the film’s drama. Beautiful and not to be missed by film connoisseurs.

Rabbit-Proof Fence focuses on the plight of Aboriginal peoples — specifically half-caste children who were removed from their Aboriginal families to be assimilated into the white culture. The film that stars Kenneth Branagh demonstrates strong performances from its young stars — especially from the Everlyn Sampi who plays the eldest girl determined to trek across Australia to return to her home. Based on true events, you will not forget this film once you’ve seen it.

Japanese Story directed by Sue Brooks features actress Toni Collette playing the role of her company’s tour guide to a rich Japanese client. Their subsequent driving tour does not go as planned — but this film is not some comedic misadventure. Instead it is a rich documentation of person and place, of individual culture and universal humanity. It is riveting and will last with the viewer long after the film has been watched.

Gallipoli directed by Peter Weir stars a young Mel Gibson and Mark Lee as fast friends in Australia during World War I. The initial part of the film is set in western Australia and the desert in which the pair become stranded. The latter half of the film sees them enlist in the Australian army, train under the pyramids in Egypt and meet their separate fates in Turkey. This powerful film should not be missed — it is rare to find this part of the Great War on film and the storyline is quite well-written.

Oscar and Lucinda stars Cate Blanchett and Ralph Fiennes in a unique film set in the Australian outback. The captivating scenes are visually stunning and portray a subtle characterization. Gambling and interest in glass provide the catalysts for the plot which is rather thought-provoking in its odd way. See it simply for the glass church—if nothing more; that is a most brilliant touch!

Other must-see Aussie films include The Adventures of Priscilla, Picnic at Hanging Rock and Walkabout. As many of today’s big screen stars hail from Australia, we may see more films from its actors and directors set there.

Let me know what you think of these films, or can recommend any other movies from down under.