Central do Brasil

 

Director: Walter Salles

Stars: Fernanda Montenegro, Marília Pera

Year: 1998

Awards: Won the Golden Bear, Berlin International Film Festival

Plot Summary:

Dora, a dour old woman, works at a Rio de Janeiro central station, writing letters for customers and mailing them. Josue is a 9-year-old boy who never met his father. His mother is sending letters to his father through Dora. When she dies in a car accident, Dora takes Josue and takes a trip with him to find his father. 

Os Outros

 

Original title:  The Others

Director: Alejandro Amenabar

Stars: Nicole Kidman

Year: 2001

Plot Summary:

A woman named Grace retires with her two children to a mansion on Jersey, towards the end of the Second World War, where she's waiting for her husband to come back from battle. The children have a disease which means they cannot be touched by direct sunlight without being hurt in some way. They will live alone there with oppressive, strange and almost religious rules, until she needs to hire a group of servants for them. Their arrival will accidentally begin to break the rules with unexpected consequences.

Um Coração Poderoso

Original title: A Mighty Heart

Director: Michael Winterbottom

Stars: Angelina Jolie

Year: 2007

Plot Summary:

On January 23, 2002, Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl is to fly from Karachi to Dubai with his pregnant wife, Mariane, also a reporter. On the day before, with great care, he has arranged an interview in a café with an Islamic fundamentalist cleric. When Danny doesn't return, Mariane initiates a search. Pakistani police, American embassy personnel, and the FBI examine witnesses, phone records, e-mails, and hard drives. Who has him? Where is he? There's also the why: because of U.S. abuse of prisoners at Guantanamo, because of a history of Journal cooperation with the CIA, because Pearl is a Jew? Through it all, Mariane is clearheaded, direct, and determined.