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For this Sunday Kino Night, first up is The Pawnbroker (1964), a crime drama about a Jewish Holocaust survivor (Rod Steiger) who runs a crooked pawn shop in New York after the war, which he uses to launder money for local gangsters. He is indifferent to the immorality of his actions, as his trauma has left him cold and embittered. Uh-oh, a gangster wants to use his shop as a front for pimping, triggering his memories of his wife’s death in the concentration camp. Will this finally snap him out of his ennui and bring him toward the light? I guess we’ll find out. Director is Sidney Lumet, whose films Fail-Safe (1964), The Hill (1965), Network (1976), The Verdict (1982), and Running in Empty (1988) we previously watched. This is considered one of his best films, so let’s check it out.

After that is 9 Souls (2003), a Japanese black comedy about a group of prisoners who manage to break out of jail, commandeer a van, and trek across the country in search of a stash of buried money near Mt. Fuji. Dark hilarity (and some drama) ensues as the dudes encounter some strange situations on the way there, with some members of the group breaking off from the rest to go out on their own, often to bad results. Director is Toshiaki Toyoda, who is better-known for the high-school delinquent drama Blue Spring (2001), which we have not yet watched. This is one of the highest-rated Japanese films on Letterboxd, so we’ll give it a shot.

We’ll start at 8PM EST on Blorptube, right here:

https://blorp.bot.nu/o/visual_cuisine

Be there, comrades!

Letterboxd:

Doesthedogdie.com links:

CWs for The Pawnbroker:

  • Objectification of female characters.
  • Antisemitism.
  • Nazis.
  • Kissing.
  • Implied sex.
  • Nudity.
  • Prostitution.
  • Implied sexual assault. Not really depicted, though.
  • Beatings.
  • Head injury.
  • Blood and gore.
  • Gun violence.
  • Impalement.
  • Hand damage.
  • Profanity.
  • Racial slurs.
  • Smoking.
  • Alcohol.
  • Sad ending.

CWs for 9 Souls:

  • Implied bestiality.
  • “Man in dress” jokes.
  • Gun violence.
  • Car crash.
  • Cruelty to animals.
  • Deaths of animals.
  • Animal corpses.
  • Profanity.
  • Alcohol.
  • Smoking.

Links to movies: