European Film

Best European Films

From Alfred Hitchcock to Federico Fellini and Ingmar Bergman to Jean-Luc Godard, Europe has birthed many of film’s greatest innovators. And that’s just to name a few. The more you dig into the world of European film, the more and more gems you find. Scroll down to find the best European films currently reviewed on FilmRoot, or pick a country if you know what you’re after:

Albania, Andorra, Austria, Belarus, Belgium, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Greenland, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Kosovo, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, North Macedonia, Malta, Moldova, Monaco, Montenegro, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Russia, San Marino, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, Ukraine, United Kingdom

Scarred Hearts (Romania) – How to Live Life Lying Down

Scarred Hearts Film Difficulty Ranking: 4

“Life is a serious game for which we’ve even invented nickel plating. To live we must believe in their importance. But let us remember that it is all just a game”

You can tell Scarred Hearts was adapted from a novel. Philosophical musings are scattered throughout the film just like the stream-of-consciousness narrative I presume carries Max Blecher’s novel (correct me if my assumption is wrong!). Amazingly, it works! If you’re a big reader and want to convert to the big screen for a few hours without missing out on some philosophy, this one is for you!

Why Watch Scarred Hearts?

To understand the importance of humour in life (and in sickness, much like Diving Bell and the Butterfly)
Feel the political zeitgeist in Romania just before the Second World War
For some great quotes (e.g. “each moment, each pain, each thought, each event I consider important is but an atom in the vast ocean of world events”)
So many beautiful colours (just like a Wes Anderson movie)

The Breakdown

Scarred Hearts starts with the sound of a church choir singing. All we see is a sketched portrait of a man and then a load of old pictures of people lying down. The old pictures are of patients with Pott’s disease, a sort of tuberculosis of the spine. All of them must lie down whilst they are being cured.

But let’s talk about the film. The first thing I noticed was the beautiful colour palettes. There’s the pale blue and cream coloured hallways that match the nurses dress.

There’s the warm pinks and pale reds of the x-ray room.

And, there’s the pale, washed out blues and whites that make up the main hospital ward.

All these colour grades are carefully worked just like you might have noticed if you’ve seen a Wes Anderson film. Beautiful!

I also loved the many quotes that are either written across the screen like in the old silent films or read out by the characters. They question eternal life, religion, and the meaning of life. But while doing so they are also aware of their own fate. Here’s a couple of the quotes which I noted down:

“Life is a serious game for which we’ve even invented nickel plating. To live we must believe in their importance. But let us remember that it is all just a game”
“Fortunate is he who keeps the hour of his death ever present and lives every day as if it was his last”

Conclusion

There isn’t really any driving narrative plot in Scarred Hearts. However, this adaptation (of a Max Blecher novel) works incredibly well. It carries the stream-of-consciousness musings of the author through the character’s and a number of title cards which outline the film. Well worth a watch for anyone who loves literature and philosophical ramblings.

Honeyland – Traditional Lifestyle on the Brink

Honeyland Film Difficulty Ranking: 3

If you love documentaries that stray into the fictional or very real docu-dramas, you’re in for a treat. Honeyland is one step up: it’s a docu-epic. It follows a middle-aged bee keeper in rural North Macedonia living on her own with her frail grandmother. Their survival is delicately in the balance when a large family join them looking for a better life. It’s a tale of modernity vs. tradition, and greed vs. modernity: a real showdown for the ages. Plus it’s shot beautifully.

From: North Macedonia, Europe
Watch: Now Showing in the U.S, Screening Times Elsewhere 
Next: Makala, Hale County This Morning, This Evening, Nobody Knows

Read The Full Review

La Dolce Vita

Film Difficulty Ranking: 3

One of Fellinis classics, La Dolce Vita takes you on a tour of Rome’s superficial upper class world. This one is full of parties, affairs, and paparazzi.

Why watch La Dolce Vita?

Get a feel for that Italian culture without leaving your bed.
For a taste of Italy’s most famous director.
Get invited to a weird mix of parties with a crazy bunch of people.
Feel like someone famous as paparazzi follow you everywhere.

Two helicopters enter flying over Rome’s suburbs, one carrying a statue of Jesus. Children abandon football to chase after the two helicopters captured by sweeping camera movements. There’s even a nice shot of the helicopter carrying Jesus from the other helicopter. A pretty modern shot for the time. The helicopters approach a roof-party where a number of girls are sunbathing on the roof. One of the helicopter passengers leans out of the helicopter to ask for one of the girl’s number. He says he is taking Jesus to the Pope.

Paparrazi are everywhere. Watch out for the camera movement. It often moves with the paparazzi, putting you in their position. The camera moves quickly towards a famous subject just as the paparazzi swarm around them. We are always where there are famous or rich people and we are always invading people’s privacy. Where there is paparazzi there is something going on even if it is of their or Fellini’s own creation.

A superficial world is also presented cleverly by Fellini. I counted two times where non-diegetic music is then stopped by one of the characters on a nearby juke box or record player. What we think is real is actually fake. This superficiality of the parties Marcello attends also seem like big crazy attempts to entertain themselves. The superficiality reminded me of Antonioni’s L’Avventura released in the same year, like The Great Beauty (an homage to Fellini from 2013) and even, to an extent, Harmony Korine’s Spring Breakers (hah! Bet you didn’t expect that to be mentioned.).

Anyway, as a classic, I have to recommend watching this one, even if it is to please your inner film buff. As for Fellini, I did slightly prefer Nights of Cabiria. Enjoy.

Sweet Sixteen – One Teenager’s Quest to Find his Lost Childhood

Sweet Sixteen Film Difficulty Ranking: 2

What were you doing on your sixteenth birthday? Hopefully something better than Liam. Sweet Sixteen came out three years before MTV’s My Super Sweet Sixteen and shows a semi-orphaned teenager waiting for his mum to get released from prison. It’s another brilliantly bleak depiction of working class youth in the U.K. from Ken Loach and a perfect reality check to the super rich spoiled kids which took over MTV screens a few years later.

From: U.K., Europe
Watch: Trailer, Tubi, Amazon Prime
Next: Trainspotting, Girlhood, This is England

Read the Full Review

Investigation of a Citizen Above Suspicion

Investigation of a Citizen Above Suspicion Film Difficulty Ranking: 2

Can anyone ever be above the law? Well this film argues that there are already people who are above the law. It points the finger squarely at the police department of Italy in the 1960s/70s. However, before you get the idea that this film is just a political slow-boiler, read on. This film is a crime thriller like no other. You will be on the edge of your seat repeatedly asking yourself why. Why is no one condemning him? Answer: he’s too damn powerful.

Why Watch Investigation of a Citizen Above Suspicion?

To find out if there can ever be anyone above the law
It won the Academy Award for Best Foreign Film in 1970
For a glimpse of Italian society in the late 1960s/early 1970s; a period of violent student/worker uprisings amidst social and political conflict that came to be known as the “years of lead.”
If you like a great satire – one of the best ways to critique

The Breakdown

Quick cutting and camera movement introduce us to a police inspector walking along a black fence. The camera follows his movement and his eyes as he looks up to a lady in an apartment window. They obviously know each other, as their faces are match cut looking at each other. He opens the gate, walks up the stairs, and enters her apartment. “How are you going to kill me this time?” she asks him playfully. “I’m going to slit your throat” he replies sincerely. And sure enough, after brief foreplay and sex, he slits her throat.

The murderer methodically arranges his own crime scene, takes two bottles of champagne, and drives off. He calmly drives to the police station, jumps out of the car and starts to celebrate his promotion. He walks into the office, orders someone to get glasses and sits down at his new desk with a big map of the city behind him. It is obvious that he is in a position of huge power. That he is in a position that is above suspicion.

The director, Elio Petri, shows us how power is divided in Italy. The powerful hold control of the media, the public, and the police. The police inspector holds power over all three of these. Each one refuses to follow the clues he gives them. Instead they all follow him blindly, or, in the case of the public, represented by the tin-smith, they renounce their testimony out of fear, as if the inspector is a king, and they are worried of being accused of treason by incriminating him. The film is a parable of the corrupt police force that victimised students and labourers, and put themselves above the law.

Conclusion

In his portrayal of the police inspector, Petri exposes the corruption in the Italian police force. He shows the authoritarian position that the police inspector has and shows that they control everything. The media publish what the police give them, the public are too scared to stand up to the police, and his colleagues are too ‘stupid’ to follow the clues he leaves.

The tension in the film doesn’t come from us asking when he is going to get caught, but how far other people go to vindicate him.