Looking for film's similar to The Cranes are Flying...

April 27, 2015 6:14 PM

So the qualities I adored about The Cranes are Flying (just watched it yesterday!) were the striking cinematography and the hopeful, humanist melodrama-- it felt like a romantic American melodrama in ways and yet had a sense of dark reality I more so associate with foreign art-house fare... and once again, incredible cinematography! I cannot for the life of me decide on what to watch tonight so I thought I'd throw it out to the Hive Mind to choose for me!
posted by dr handsome to Media & Arts (4 answers total)

Dersu Uzala possibly maybe.

Also, have you seen The Best Years of Our Lives?; it's Hollywood melodrama but has some dark. This may also seem like an odd suggestion, but maybe also try Seven Samurai.
posted by gudrun at 6:45 PM on April 27, 2015

My first thought for you was Sergei Parajanov's Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors or, my personal favorite, The Color of Pomegranates. The Color of Pomegranates makes my soul ooze.

But after thinking a little harder about "romantic American melodrama ... yet had a dark sense of reality I more so associate with foreign art-house fare": anything by Douglas Sirk. All That Heaven Allows is the obvious classic.
posted by nightrecordings at 7:03 PM on April 27, 2015

Haskell Wexler on the film.
Days of Heaven might be to your taste.
posted by Ideefixe at 8:40 PM on April 27, 2015

I think you might like Almodovar's Volver.

Mr hgg recommends Ballad of a Soldier and Ivan's Childhood.
posted by hurdy gurdy girl at 9:52 PM on April 27, 2015