Like mother, like daughter, they say. It's difficult enough to be a mother to a young developing woman, but having an atypical mother can be equally hard. Those who were raised by housewives wish for more entertaining and open-minded guardians. Those with reckless beasts pray for a bit of normality. Sometimes, the roles change and daughters take over the responsibilities of the mother. Sometimes, both have such opposite characters that it is impossible to get along, especially if their vision of happiness is completely different. Three strong female characters under one roof. One move which is about to either change or tame them all. The 90s classic with generation icons: Cher, Winona Ryder, and Christina Ricci. Mermaids.
Finding a good idea for a story might be hard, especially if your inspiration is derived from real people, real problems, and real events around you. Sometimes, you can experience writer's block which can amount to bigger breaks in your writing routine. You know, success is nice, but it is equally hard to digest. It's good then to find someone equally interested in the world of books, someone who can be your friend, guide in the complex world of literary jealousy, and a safe harbor for your personal troubles. But isn't having someone so close a little bit dangerous? Can your identity be stolen? Can you be a victim of a bigger plot? Or a plot that is the figment of your imagination? Based on a True Story.
Once there was a time when kids didn't spend all day at home, playing computer games and surfing the web. Once the magic happened outside, in the backyards, gardens, and parks. You would climb the mountains of your imagination, ride a bike all day long, trespass adults with your own ideas about the grown-up world, discuss life and relationships with your friends, and just hang out, accepting disappointments, parents' loves, and your own life-changing events which shaped you for the years to come. An epitome of the 90s' childhood, a girl whom everyone loved, and a story which could and did happen to so many young people when life was more of a tangible experience than a digital world of social media. My Girl. And of course, there's a sequel.
What are the limits of personal closeness? How many years do you have to stay in a relationship to feel free to talk about your traumas, exchange your dreams, body fluids, and show your best and worst emotions? Is it enough to know each other for a day? What are your barriers and which you are not willing to break under any circumstances? Can relationship change the way you look at things and why some people just happen in our lives for some reason? An interesting experiment and a modern view of emotions and intimacy. Duck Butter.
No one promised that managing a newborn would be easy. Sleepless nights, constant struggles with lactation, smaller and bigger problems with the rest of the family, and you alone to balance it all. It has little to do with the promised "happiest" days of your life and the miracle of life that first grows under your heart and then under your watchful eye. A very practical outlook on motherhood, taking off the fairy tale aspect of pink and blue balloons from the reality of depression, insomnia, tiredness, and despair. What if this burden could be taken off your shoulders by the appearance of one friendly night nanny? Tully.
Relationships with our parents seem to be hard. We wish for the support and unconditional love, but very often we get too high expectations, abuse, negligence, and the lack of understanding. The same is with siblings - it's a lottery game when you're not really sure whether they will turn out to be your enemies or friends. We all need a positive relationship in our lives, but family ties are very often complex and layered. To unwrap these layers takes time and emotional engagement of both sides. Life is also full of surprises. Totally unaware, you can discover that you have a sibling that will change your views on the family conflict and reevaluate all your priorities. A great portrayal of autism and brothers' bond in Rain Man. Enjoy.
It's mean to spoil the expensive wedding cake, ignore the beautiful and carefully chosen wedding dress, and disregard invited family and friends. But marriage is more than one-day ceremony. It's supposed to last years and very often it ends in the middle of the way, leaving at least one spouse heartbroken. The hell of divorce usually touches upon more than parents. If there are children, there are decisions to be made, legal arrangements to agree on, and sides to compare. Who is a better-suited parent? Why balancing family and career is so hard for both sexes, it is almost impossible? Why it is mothers who usually win the custody of the child? How to get back on one's feet once the fairy tale of love is over? Realistic and practical for everybody, regardless of the price of the dress. Kramer vs. Kramer.
There's something tempting in the life of young urban professionals. It's easy to name a few. Their immaculate dress code, their rigorous routine of exercises for the purpose of achieving a perfectly sculpted body. Their high earnings, which guarantee luxurious apartments, meals at fancy restaurants, designer clothes, lavish parties, and the charm of business cards, which state their position among lower income classes. They have the world at their feet and they are not afraid of taking what it is bound to offer to them. But falling for all that glitter can push you to extremes in another sphere of life. There was one man who used his resources to organize a more sophisticated, more bloody, entertainment. A parody of American success story, American Psycho. Enjoy.
Remember the gentleness of Leon the Professional, who could kill in the blink of an eye, but cared so deeply about his plant and his child protegee? Human beings are so complex that they can comprise the most beautiful and caring aspects of life and at the same time within a minute turn most violent and start a massacre. If you wish to see a complex individual whose core of values is on both sides of the spectrum, who can love, hate, and disassociate himself from emotions, you'd love the protagonist of this film. We all crave a little bit of bloody action. We are all taking sides. But which side is the side of evil? You Were Never Really Here.
If you established a relationship with a pet, you know the feeling. The fondness, loyalty, instinctive protection, friendship and a lot of fun. Once your pet is dead, you might end up sobbing for weeks. Imagine a boy who went on a rescue mission to save his beloved protector, imagine an island occupied by dogs taken away from their owners. Finally, imagine a political system which doesn't allow for dogs, and a power which in an unscrupulous way can deprive its citizens of the friendship it had established centuries ago. With a dose of cynicism, great story-telling and canine animation, which blows your mind, Isle of Dogs.
Can you distinguish between an original and counterfeit? How can you tell the difference between a genuine work of art and a fake but produced by an equally brilliant artist? It takes knowledge, experience, years of practice. But if you are an unsurpassed professional in one field can it mean that you are naive in other aspects of life? Can you be a victim of another type of fraud? Or will you be sure that you take part in a genuine story blessed by true feelings? With a twist, a story about a man who devoted his life to art. The Best Offer. Enjoy.
A couple of hundreds of years ago the only way to learn about the world was to travel with the first explorers or listen to their stories after they managed to come back. Now it's enough to turn on the TV or watch traveling vlogs on YouTube to see the most distant places all over the world. But some circumstances don't allow you to see. What is more, they don't allow you to see at all, shedding the curtain on what you tend to take for granted from the moment of your birth. How to explore the terrifying reality of darkness, how to learn to feel and sense what is around instead of seeing it with one's own eyes? Finally, how to show the world of blind people by means of a film, which in itself is part of visual arts? Sometimes it's enough to Imagine. Enjoy.
Everything is well in the village life of its citizens. They have their masses to attend, family feuds to solve, christenings, communions, and funerals to celebrate, parties to dance for. There's a place for love, romance, and dreams. But what will be the reaction of the local community when you suddenly lose a face and will have the unprecedented face transplantation? Can you go back to normal? Will you be judged by prejudices and narrow-mindedness? Can blindly following a religion make people look like idiots in the developed world? A great parody of Polish national vices and one untold story of a mug. Enjoy.
Do you remember Second Life where you could completely change your looks, integrate with people all over the world and turn your boring existence into an exciting adventure where there are no limits? Remember the thrill of the Sims, which gave you endless possibilities of social interaction and rise to wealth? Finally, do you still feel the pang of fear mixed with adrenaline while completing a virtual race and reaching a virtual finish line? It is now a fact that we jump between two worlds, we meet online, we get married in real life, we order goods online to appreciate purchase in the real world. Fancy a reality of the future of both worlds: virtual and real, which developed significantly for the cyberspace, leaving the real world behind? Classic Spielberg's fun and quite a possible scenario for the future. Ready Player One.
You can plan more or less everything in life. The place of your habitation, the career path, let's say the number of children (there are still accidents, and these unplanned babies might be a blessing in disguise). Plans have little to do with emotions, and occasionally you will find yourself hit by the bug of love. It starts innocently to spread like a virus all over your body and leave you with memories, scars, and lessons from your past mistakes. Every person that you encounter is for something, every conversation has some meaning and there are moments which shape you and change you forever. When a guy meets a girl, a bitter-sweet truth what relationships are all about: (500) Days of Summer. Enjoy.
Nudity sells well. You can see it in music videos, flashing limbs, breasts, bottoms, and bellies. You can observe it in the fashion world, allowing nipples to be seen through the most transparent of materials, you can notice it in films, coloring your perception with artistic eroticism. You can also view it in porn and porn attracts millions of unsatisfied viewers. But can you use nudity for some higher good? Events inspired by the true story and real women uncovering their bodies for the sake of collecting money for cancer. Calendar Girls. Enjoy.
Sometimes you just know that some lifestyle is for you. Sometimes the place at the far end of the world pulls you with its unexplainable force, letting you know that your fate has been pre-written. You can fight with it, you can delude yourself that it's just a feeling, that's it's not meant to be. But fight with destiny is lost from the start. Sometimes you just know. You know what profession is fit for your predispositions, what place you will call home, what passion will accelerate your days and what love will turn your life upside down. And even if you are an untrained young beautiful woman who has never been in Africa, you soon realize that your place has been chosen by the higher force. An amazing story of a pioneer in animal observation and research, an extraordinary lifestyle, and a woman who made her dreams come true. Jane Goodall in Jane.
Very rarely the cinema has the courage to talk about a topic which is hidden behind the walls of social institutions, which is mentioned only when it comes to rationalizing abortion, which is shared between parents in the lonely lifetime of struggle and family support or total ignorance and fight with the world. Down syndrome. In the highly opinionated world of those who made this and that decision, we rarely focus on those who are already around us, and even though different, need to fit in the world and its norms. What if a man who has his personal struggles met a man who had a whole world of different struggles? What if two lonely people found each other in the hostile world of ignorance, hatred, family relations and heartbreak? A gem from the previous century, still adequate and true. The Eighth Day.
We rarely talk about it. You're more likely to talk about gastric problems than boast about your mental breakdown, visits to the psychiatrist, inability to work or build your personal life from scratch after losing someone you love. Life is unpredictable. Major shifts and changes make you mature and develop, but they often take away the fuel of your life motivation. You become an outcast among your family members, workmates, and friends. Your work-life balance is stretched and you cannot cope, your personal life is in pieces, your behavior is irrational and you are on drugs which numb you and blur your senses. Can you find the light at the end of the tunnel after a major breakdown, is there a chance for love and new beginnings when all hope has been lost? Uplifting. Silver Linings Playbook. Enjoy.
You cannot predict your life. You can't really tell whether it will reward you with bliss and happiness or punish you with struggle and pain. Even if everything seems to go well, there are moments which can surprise you, knock you on the floor of disease, loss, a failed marriage, and disappointment. How to take everything what life has to offer with a pinch of salt, how to get back on your feet when your husband leaves you for another woman, how to have the dignity to die, and why life is a never-ending process of losses and gains. And it never stops being fun. It's only up to us how we decide to live it. Finding Your Feet.



















