Submitted by dnicklas on

I was a late bloomer not watching my first foreign film until my mid-twenties.  A born and bred Philly girl, my blue-collar upbringing made foreign films sound, well foreign, and by that I mean intimidating.  Typing that makes me sound ridiculously naive, and that may very well have been the case, but if there is one thing foreign films teach us is that a difference in language and border does not make for a difference in the human experience.  To answer my own question:  they aren't...but they are so darn good. 

My first was, The Hairdresser's Husband, and ever since then I've been hooked, lined and sunk.  My most recent, Separation, a story about a couple who are torn apart one parent wanting to leave Iran to make a better life for their child and the other wanting to stay.  A phenomenal film.  Before that it was, The Skin I Live In, a plastic surgeon with a troubled past creates a synthetic skin for his mysterious guinea pig.  This is one mind-blowing thriller.  The next to be checked out, 13 Assassins, this is about a group of assassins that are sent to kill an evil war lord.  How can this be bad?

Here are a few more:  Amelie, Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, City of God, Run Lola Run, 3 Idiots, Young Goethe in Love, and Kitchen Stories.