Topic: Around the World in 80 DVD's

[richierich]

My new challenge - Around the World in 80 DVD's

Watch 80 dvds, films linked in some way to 80 different countries, starting and finishing in London aka Phileas Fogg, in 80 days or less, following a specific route viewing movies in order to cross the globe. Ideal was to include as many as possible unwatched DVDs

Beginning January 1st, to finish before 21st March.

Map of journey and ongoing progress can be followed here with details of all films to be viewed en-route - http://maps.google.co.uk/maps/ms?hl=en&ie=UTF8&msa=0&msid=104729732379288247668.00044104e7f5007afa007&ll=13.239945,138.515625&spn=123.585916,326.953125&z=2&om=1
(Click on pins to view dvd details)

Copy of route map

1	England	London	Jan 1st	3/10
2	Scotland	Restless Natives	Jan 1st	5/10
3	Norway	633 Squadron	Jan 1st	5/10
4	Finland	Hacking Democracy	Jan 2nd	6/10
5	Latvia	Odessa File	Jan 3rd	6/10
6	Denmark	Breaking The Waves	Jan 4th	4/10
7	Germany	Stalingrad	Jan 4th	5/10
8	Netherlands	Black Book (Zwartboek)	Jan 5th	8/10
9	Belgium	Waterloo	Jan 5th	6/10
10	France	Amelie (Le fabuleux destin d'Amélie Poulain)	Jan 6th	6/10
11	Switzerland	Ashanti	Jan 7th	2/10
12	Austria	Extreme Ops	Jan 7th	1/10
13	Croatia	No Man's Land (Nicija zemlja)	Jan 8th	4/10
14	Vatican City	Stigmata	Jan 9th	6/10
15	Italy	Rome, Open City (Roma, città aperta)	Jan 10th	5/10
16	Spain	Pan's Labyrinth (El Laberinto del Fauno)	Jan 11th	7/10
17	Portugal	Cockleshell Heroes	Jan 12th	5/10
18	Morocco	Casablanca	Jan 13th	8/10
19	Algeria	Patton	Jan 15th	7/10
20	Tunisia	English Patient	Jan 15th	7/10
21	Sicily	Godfather	Jan 16th	10/10
22	Malta	Maltese Falcon	Jan 16th	6/10
23	Hungary	Evita	Jan 17th	3/10
24	Czech Republic	Amadeus	Jan 18th	8/10
25	Poland	Where Eskimos Live	Jan 20th	1/10
26	Ukraine	Everything Is Illuminated	Jan 20th	4/10
27	Romania	Cold Mountain	Jan 20th	8/10
28	Greece	Guns of Navarone	Jan 21st	6/10
29	Kefalonia	Captain Corelli's Mandolin	Jan 23rd	7/10
30	Crete	In Which We Serve	Jan 24th	3/10
31	Egypt	Bubba Ho-Tep	Jan 24th	5/10
32	Israel	Mossad	Jan 27th	1/10
33	Jordan	Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade	Jan 28th	6/10
34	Lebanon	A Different Loyalty	Jan 29th	4/10
35	Saudi Arabia	Malcolm X	Jan 30th	8/10
36	Iraq	No End In Sight	Jan 31st	6/10
37	Somalia	Black Hawk Down	Feb 2nd	9/10
38	U.A.E.	Lawrence of Arabia	Feb 3rd	6/10
39	Iran	House of Sand and Fog	Feb 5th	5/10
40	Turkey	Midnight Express	Feb 5th	6/10
41	Georgia	Georgia Rule	Feb 8th	5/10
42	Russia	Come and See (Idi i smotri)	Feb 10th	5/10
43	Pakistan	The War Within	Feb 11th	3/10
44	Afghanistan	Kandahar	Feb 12th	4/10
45	Sri Lanka	Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom	Feb 13th	4/10
46	India	Gandhi	Feb 15th	7/10
47	China	Curse of the Golden Flower (Man cheng jin dai huang jin jia)	Feb 17th	4/10
48	Bhutan	Tribe: The Adi - Series One Ep 1	Feb 19th	9/10
49	Burma	Return From the River Kwai	Feb 20th	5/10
50	Thailand	Beautiful Boxer	Feb 22nd	3/10
51	Malaysia	Anna and the King	Feb 23rd	8/10
52	Singapore	China Seas	Feb 23rd	2/10
53	Malaysia	The Touch	Feb 24th	4/10
54	Cambodia	Killing Fields	Feb 25th	8/10
55	Laos	Auf Wiedersehen, Pet: The Special	Feb 28th	6/10
56	Vietnam	Uncommon Valor	Feb 29th	4/10
57	Hong Kong	Hard Boiled	Mar 1st	5/10
58	Taiwan	Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon	Mar 2nd	8/10
59	Korea	Old Boy	Mar 4th	5/10
60	Japan	Seven Samurai	Mar 5th	5/10
61	Philippines	Hamburger Hill	Mar 6th	6/10
62	Australia	Incredible Journey of Mary Bryant	Mar 7th	6/10
63	New Zealand	Whale Rider	Mar 8th	5/10
64	Tahiti	Mutiny on the Bounty	Mar 9th	6/10
65	Hawaii	From Here to Eternity	Mar 10th	6/10
66	Alaska	On the Beach	Mar 10th	6/10
67	Canada	Crash	Mar 10th	8/10
68	USA	No Country For Old Men	Mar 11th	5/10
69	Mexico	Mask of Zorro	Mar 12th	5/10
70	El Salvador	Salvador	Mar 14th	6/10
71	Panama	Tailor of Panama	Mar 14th	7/10
72	Ecuador	End of the Spear	Mar 15th	7/10
73	Colombia	Blow	Mar 15th	7/10
74	Cuba	Before Night Falls	Mar 16th	3/10
75	Virgin Islands	Weekend at Bernies 2	Mar 16th	0/10
76	Iceland	Hostel Part II	Mar 17th	4/10
77	Northern Ireland	Hidden Agenda	Mar 18th	8/10
78	Ireland	Evelyn	Mar 18th	7/10
79	Wales	How Green was My Valley	Mar 18th	6/10
80	England	Around the World in 80 Days (1956)	Mar 19th	8/10

COMPLETED IN 78 DAYS

[m.cellophane]

  Wow. It's a really cool idea. How long did it take to pull the list together, and how did you do it? 

[richierich]

Thanks to google maps on and off just a few hours work.
Hardest bit was trying to find some form of link for some of the more obscure countries 

[Tom]

My spot should I participate here.

It's hard to find titles in my collection for a lot of the countries. I started now with using the IMDb keyword search looking for titles.


If we do other marathons like a January marathon parallely, we could make this one open-ended. Otherwise I think it will be too much to fit in.

[richierich]

The journey begins...



When Syd (Chris Evans) learns that his ex-girlfriend London (Jessica Biel) is leaving New York without telling him, he responds by impulsively crashing her going away party. Once there fear catches up to him, rather than confront her, he holes up in the bathroom with a pile of cocaine and Bateman (Jason Statham), an enigmatic Englishman he just met. As the two engage in a drug-fueled conversation that runs the gamut from entropy to S&M to the meaning of life, Syd struggles to work up the nerve to talk to London before it's too late.

Despite being a fan of Jason Statham this was a disappointing film, miserable and self-indulgent machismo crap with excessive foul language and drug abuse without much purpose in supporting the films story. It's not your typical Statham action film, but the acting is okay albeit deep. Impossible to recommend this unless you want a downer. 3/10

[richierich]

and through bonnie Scotland...



Ronnie and Will, two lads from Edinburgh, embark on a non-violent spree of robberies. Dressing up in bizarre costumes the duo act as modern highwaymen, robbing coach loads of tourists in the Highlands; eventually earning them the tag, the Clown and the Wolfman. In the process they become folk heroes to the locals. Their adventures make for a whimsical and gentle comedy, in the Bill Forsyth vein.

An 80's budget film, pretty poor dvd transfer but despite this the film still manages to hold it`s own and has surprisingly aged well. Worth viewing, with some really classic hilarious parts, but don't spend a lot purchasing this unless you are a nostalgic Brit. 5/10

[lyonsden5]

Richie, you ARE the man! Or should we call you Fogg for the next 80 days 

[richierich]

Fogg is fine Rick - it's how my head feels after last night anyway   

And on through the Fjords of Norway...



The brave 633 Squadron have enjoyed many successful sorties, but they are now assigned a seemingly suicidal mission - to bomb a water plant in occupied Norway which is shielded by mountain terrain and guarded by heavy, anti-aircraft artillery. Their task is made even more hazardous by German air raids and the capture of a resistance leader who has been helping them.

Don't watch this expecting to be challenged. Wooden acting, posh accents, an implausible script but plenty of entertainment.
Despite the wooden airplane models repeatedly shown and the poor acting, this war film is good viewing and has a better score than Dambusters. Keep your eye out for Jonny Briggs too     5/10

[richierich]

A very thin link for Finland (a Finnish hacker) but was a documentary I was keen to watch...



How does America count its votes? From Florida and California to Ohio and Washington State, filmmakers Simon Ardizzone, Robert Cohen and Russell Michaels starkly reveal a broken system riddled with secrecy, incompetent election officials, and electronic voting machines that can be programmed to steal elections. Equipped only with a powerful sense of righteous outrage, the activists take on the voting machine industry, exposing alarming security holes in America's trusted voting machines. They even go dumpster diving at a county election official's office in Florida, uncovering incendiary evidence of miscounted votes. But proving our votes can be stolen without a trace culminates in a duel between the Diebold voting machines and a computer hacker from Finland — with America's democracy at stake.

Staggering, do we really live in a democracy and how much we believe is true is actually just manipulated political spin and wrongdoing. This revealing documentary exposes the severe security problems with electronic voting machines in the U.S. A jaw-dropping exposé which I am sure could be mirrored for many other countries voting practices. 6/10

[m.cellophane]

My wish list is now +1 

[richierich]

A quick trip through Latvia...



The plot begins on November 22, 1963, the day John F. Kennedy was assassinated. Peter Miller, a young German reporter happens to see an ambulance on a highway. He chases the ambulance and discovers it contains an elderly Jewish Holocaust survivor who had committed suicide. The reporter obtains the diary of the man, which contains information on his life in the World War II camps, and the names of members of the SS who ran the camp. He makes up his mind to hunt the Nazi Eduard Roschmann who is mentioned in the diary, not just for a sensational cover story, but for a more serious personal reason.

Another powerful post-holocaust movie, superbly directed and acted. Based on thriller writer Freddie Forsyth book, the film masterfully blurs fiction and reality, mixed with tense action and suspense, to make a gem of a production. Recommended 6/10

[richierich]

a trudge through Denmark



In a small coastal village, young and naive Bess marries an oil rig worker despite a strict community's opposition. It is a marriage of spiritual and sexual bliss until an accident severely paralyzes him. Out of open-eyes self-sacrifice and love, she ignores her own safety in the hope that a miracle will bring her husband back to her.

Filmed like a low-budget documentary, a naive young woman who believed her desire to reunite with her offshore oilrigging husband caused the accident that paralysed him. She repents by submitting to his wish that she sleep with other men. The more she degrades herself, the healthier he becomes. Emily Watson is brilliant (clothed and naked), but the movie itself, whilst being gritty and original, was not to my taste, so I could only give it a 4.

[m.cellophane]

I had difficulty getting through that one as well.

Next stop: Germany!

[richierich]

durch kaltes Deutschland



This film is a gritty, devastating retelling of the battle for Stalingrad during World War II, in which more than a million and a half soldiers lost their lives. Told from the point of view of the German soldiers, who were under orders to neither retreat nor surrender, this film realistically portrays the brutality of combat.

Having read so many good reviews for this film, I felt slightly disappointed afterwards. It certainly would have more impact in it's original language, the dubbing sounded Monty Pythonesque and detracted from the films moving content. Graphic war scenes, harsh and bitter tale from the soldiers perspective, the film just didn't quite have enough to make it a classic IMO  5/10

[richierich]

A pleasant jaunt through the Netherlands...



September 1944 - Nazi Occupied Holland'. When her temporary safe house is destroyed by a bomb, the beautiful young Jewish chanteuse Rachel Steinn joins fellow refugees in an attempt to reach safe Allied territory by boat.
Tragedy strikes when a Nazi patrol intercepts their escape, ruthlessly killing everybody onboard including Rachel's family; only Rachel escapes the massacre. Embittered and desperate for revenge, she joins the Resistance where, assigned a new identity as the blond Ellies de Vries, she is charged with infiltrating the German Security Service by seducing senior officer Muntze (Sebastian Koch).
Twenty years in the making, this stunning, sexy war film from the internationally acclaimed blockbuster director Paul Verhoeven ('Basic Instinct', 'Total Recall', 'Starship Troopers') is an epic and moving tale of great courage and fierce emotion - played out against the dying explosive months of WWII.

Now this what makes marathons so appealing, a film that has sat on the unwatched backburner for ages is finally watched, and it's a real masterpiece. Paul Verhoeven's return to his homeland is marked by this excellent movie, and a reason to forgive him for Showgirls. Brutal,sexy,bold and revealing, these stories should be told, and viewed from a Dutch perspective, culminates in a wonderful viewing experience.  Highly recommended. 8/10