0386 – Nightwatching (2007)

spacetime coordinates: 1640s Amsterdam

Nightwatching is a 2007 film about the artist Rembrandt and the creation of his painting The Night Watch. The film is directed by Peter Greenaway and stars Martin Freeman as Rembrandt, with Eva Birthistle as his wife Saskia van Uylenburg, Jodhi May as his lover Geertje Dircx, and Emily Holmes as his other lover Hendrickje Stoffels. Reinier van Brummelen is the director of photography. James Willcock, known for his esoteric sets, is the art director. The film features Greenaway’s trademark neoclassical compositions and graphic sexuality. The music is by Włodek Pawlik.

Nightwatching is the first feature in Greenaway’s film series “Dutch Masters”. The following film in the series is Goltzius and the Pelican Company.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0446750

0378 – Experimenter (2015)

Experimenter is a 2015 American biographical drama film written and directed by Michael Almereyda, based on the 1961 Milgram experiment. 

The film is based on the true story of famed social psychologist Stanley Milgram, who in 1961 conducted a series of radical behavior experiments at Yale University that tested the willingness of ordinary humans to obey an authority figure while administering electric shocks to strangers.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt3726704/

0377 – Their Finest (2016)

spacetime coordinates:  1940  London

Their Finest is a 2016 British war comedy-drama film directed by Lone Scherfig and written by Gaby Chiappe, based on the 2009 novel Their Finest Hour and a Half by Lissa Evans. The film stars Gemma Arterton, Sam Claflin and  Bill Nighy and tells the story of a British Ministry of Information film team making a morale-boosting film about the Dunkirk evacuation during the Battle of Britain and the London Blitz.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1661275/

0355 – Pupendo (2003)

spacetime coordinates:  Czechoslovakia during the 1980s

Pupendo is a 2003 Czech comedy / drama film directed by Jan Hřebejk. A bittersweet comedy set just prior to 1984, during the era of ‘practical socialism’. For political reasons, Bedrich Mára (Bolek Polívka) has had to give up teaching at Prague’s Academy of Art. He is not allowed to exhibit and has been pushed to the sidelines of interest and lucrative commissions. He and his ceramicist wife (Eva Holubová) and two sons live in a small apartment on the outskirts of Prague.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0357058/

0352 – Detroit (2017)

spacetime coordinates: July 1967, Detroit 

Detroit is a 2017 American period crime drama film directed by Kathryn Bigelow and written by Mark Boal. Based on the Algiers Motel incident during Detroit’s 1967 12th Street Riot, the film’s release commemorated the 50th anniversary of the event.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt5390504/

346 – Dunkirk (2017)

spacetime coordinates: 1940 France

Dunkirk is a 2017 war film written, directed, and co-produced by Christopher Nolan that depicts the Dunkirk evacuation of World War II.  The film is a British, American, French, and Dutch co-production, and was distributed by Warner Bros..

Dunkirk portrays the evacuation from three perspectives: land, sea, and air. It has little dialogue: Nolan sought to create suspense instead from cinematography and music.

Dunkirk has extensive practical effects, and employed thousands of extras as well as boats that participated in the evacuation, and period aeroplanes.

The film received praise for its generally realistic representation of the historical evacuation. It accurately depicts a few Royal Air Force planes dogfighting the Luftwaffe over the sea, limited to one hour of operation by their fuel capacity. In 1940, destroyers and fighter planes were indeed held back from battle, as the Royal Navy and Air Force would have been the sole defenders against invasion. Also praised were accurate depictions of how a small boat attempted to evade aerial attack, and how soldiers returning to England saw a civilian population largely unaware of or unaffected by the war. British officers did initially refuse to evacuate French soldiers, although Churchill later insisted that the French be evacuated alongside the British. The overall realism of the film was acknowledged by surviving Dunkirk veterans, although Branagh said that some thought it “was louder than the battle” (read more: Historical accuracy)

*by_jwolforange13

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http://www.imdb.com/title/tt5013056/

327 – American Made (2017)

spacetime coordinates: 1978 – 1986  USA // Panama // Colombia //  Nicaragua

American Made is a 2017 American biographical crime film directed by Doug Liman, written by Gary Spinelli and starring Tom Cruise, Domhnall Gleeson, Sarah Wright, Alejandro Edda, Mauricio Mejía, Caleb Landry Jones and Jesse Plemons. The plot focuses on Barry Seal, a former TWA pilot who flew missions for the CIA and became a drug smuggler for the Medellín Cartel in the 1980s. In order to avoid jail time, Seal became an informant for the DEA.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt3532216/

Iran–Contra affair