Classic Foreign Dramas on Netflix
Last updated April 19, 2024
The Red Balloon
1956 | NR | 4.0 out of 5 StarsA young Parisian boy (Pascal Lamorisse) finds a balloon -- or does the balloon find him? Together, boy and balloon wander the streets of Montmartre and the adjacent neighborhoods, encountering adults and gangs of local kids as the balloon becomes the boy's inseparable companion. Directed by Albert Lamorisse (who won a Best Original Screenplay Oscar), the fanciful 34-minute film also won a special BAFTA Award.
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Man with a Movie Camera
1929 | NR | 3.9 out of 5 StarsThis landmark silent film highlights the buzz of everyday city life (shops, traffic, children, coal miners, nature) as seen through the eyes of a roving cameraman. Filmic devices are used to comment on life, Marxism and modernity in the Soviet Union.
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8 1/2
1963 | NR | 3.8 out of 5 StarsDog-tired movie director Guido Anselmi retreats to thoughts of yesteryear when his producers, his wife and his mistress all pressure him to start making another movie in director Federico Fellini's rumination on the joys and rigors of filmmaking.
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Kagemusha
1980 | NR | 3.8 out of 5 StarsThree warlord clans are battling for control of medieval Japan. When the leader of the Takeda clan, Lord Shingen (Tatsuya Nakadai), is mortally wounded, he orders that his death be kept secret from his enemies. The clan searches for a "shadow warrior," an exact double, to take his place. Now, a thief named Kagemusha (Nakadai in a double role) must fight for an empire in this stunning film from legendary Japanese filmmaker Akira Kurosawa.
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The Bicycle Thief
1948 | NR | 3.7 out of 5 StarsPoverty-stricken Antonio needs his bicycle to do his new job. But the same day he buys it back from a pawnshop, someone steals it, prompting him to search the city in vain with his young son.
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The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari
1920 | NR | 3.7 out of 5 StarsIn this silent classic, an inmate in an insane asylum explains to his psychiatrist how he came to the institution, telling the shrink the story of the evil hypnotist Caligari and his unwitting pawn, the sleepwalker Cesare.
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Giorgio Moroder Presents Metropolis
1984 | NR | 3.7 out of 5 StarsOscar-winning composer Giorgio Moroder's labor of love restores Fritz Lang's silent sci-fi classic and adds songs by the biggest names in 1980s pop. Color tinting and sound effects also enhance the film, which incorporates long-lost footage.
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Farewell My Concubine
1993 | NR | 3.6 out of 5 StarsA seemingly unshakable friendship between two Chinese opera stars gets put to the test in the face of war, a communist takeover, the Cultural Revolution and the intrusion of a woman who tempts both of them. In a plot that captures 50 years of Chinese history, the once-inseparable Duan Xiaolou (Zhang Fengyi) and Cheng Dieyi (Leslie Cheung) find themselves increasingly at odds after Xiaolou weds a lovely courtesan (Li Gong).
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The Battleship Potemkin
1925 | NR | 3.6 out of 5 StarsDirector Sergei M. Eisenstein's cinematic landmark charts the events that led to the Bolshevik Revolution. The rebellion of a battleship crew ignites a citizens' uprising, resulting in czarist troops' infamous slaughter of insurgents and bystanders.
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The Blue Angel (German Version)
1930 | NR | 3.6 out of 5 StarsBrusque professor Rath is determined to stop his pupils' visits to hear speakeasy singer Lola. An obsession for the siren blossoms, and Rath's life spirals out of control in this classic story of a man who's forced to confront his deepest weakness.
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A Woman Is a Woman
1961 | NR | 3.6 out of 5 StarsStriptease artist Angela (Anna Karina) is desperate to have a child, but her boyfriend, Emile (Jean-Claude Brialy), isn't as anxious. Although he cares for Angela and wants to keep their relationship going, he's not ready for that kind of responsibility. Instead, he suggests that she get together with his buddy Alfred (Jean-Paul Belmondo) -- a proposal Angela ultimately accepts, to Emile's shock and dismay. Frenchman Jean-Luc Godard directs.
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War and Peace
1956 | NR | 3.6 out of 5 StarsWith great attention to detail and historical accuracy, personal stories, love affairs and philosophies are woven throughout this massive, intricate tapestry of Russia during Napoleon's invasion at the turn of the 19th century. A decade of preparation and two years of filming went into the making of this engaging version of Leo Tolstoy's 20th-century masterpiece, an epic drama starring Audrey Hepburn and Henry Fonda.
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The Sacrifice
1986 | NR | 3.5 out of 5 StarsThis double bill packages Andrei Tarkovsky's final film, The Sacrifice, with a documentary chronicling the production of the film. In The Sacrifice, a birthday party is interrupted by news that World War III has begun and mankind faces annihilation.
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Black Girl
1966 | NR | 3.4 out of 5 StarsWorking as a governess for a wealthy French family, a young Senegalese woman (Mbissine Therese Diop) accompanies her charges on a vacation to the French Riviera, where her white mistress (Anne-Marie Jelinek) suddenly expects her to do the work of a common maid. This racially charged drama from Senegalese writer-director Ousmane Sembene is often recognized as one of the seminal works of African cinema.
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Strike
1925 | NR | 3.4 out of 5 StarsThe suicide of a worker unjustly accused of theft prompts the laborers working at a Moscow factory to call a strike. The managers, the owner and the Czarist government dispatch infiltrators in an attempt to break the workers' unity.
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L'Age D'Or
1930 | NR | 3.3 out of 5 StarsWhat begins as a documentary about scorpions evolves into a shocking examination of lust when a nameless man and woman attempt to consummate their sexual desire but are continually thwarted by the forces of righteousness.
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Never on Sunday
1960 | NR | 3.3 out of 5 StarsWhen Homer (Jules Dassin) -- a would-be philosopher from the States -- takes a trip to Greece, he meets free-spirited prostitute Ilya (Melina Mercouri) and arrogantly decides to become her Svengali in this internationally celebrated classic. But Homer may wind up learning a few lessons from his protégé. Dassin also wrote and directed the romantic comedy, which garnered several Oscar nominations, snagging a win for Best Song.
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Siegfried
1924 | NR | 3.2 out of 5 StarsThe first film in Fritz Lang's two-part Die Nibelungen series recounts the story of legendary Norse hero Siegfried, who embarks on a quest to win the hand of Kriemhild, the princess of Burgundy, and has a life-changing run-in with a dragon.
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Last Tango in Paris
1972 | NR | 3.1 out of 5 StarsAn American expatriate living in Paris is still reeling from his estranged wife's suicide. While searching for an apartment, he encounters an equally despondent Frenchwoman, and the couple embarks on an anonymous, no-strings-attached sexual liaison.
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Die Nibelungen: Kriemhild's Revenge
1924 | NR | 3.1 out of 5 StarsOne of the greatest artistic and technical achievements of the German silent cinema, Fritz Lang's monumental Die Nibelungen is a passionate retelling of Nordic legend, invested with all the resources of the colossal UFA Studios.
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Tristana
1970 | NR | 2.8 out of 5 StarsAfter her mother's death, young Tristana goes to live with her guardian, an older man who breaks through his facade of respectability and seduces her. She repays him a hundredfold, preying on his jealousy and taunting him with perverse whimsies.
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The Lion of Thebes
1964 | NR | 2.8 out of 5 StarsFleeing Troy in the wake of its destruction, fair-faced Helen and her faithful protector Arion run into the pharaoh Ramses, who sets his sights on Helen -- and is subsequently murdered. Now it's up to Arion to save Helen from those who wish her dead.
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The Doll
1919 | NR | 2.7 out of 5 StarsAn effete young man who must get married to inherit a fortune opts to marry a remarkably lifelike doll instead. But he doesn't realize that the "doll" is the doll-maker's daughter in disguise.
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A Throw of Dice
1929 | NR | 2.5 out of 5 StarsInspired by the ancient Sanskrit poem "The Mahabharata," this silent 1929 epic follows two royal cousins, King Sohan and King Ranjit, who share a passion for gambling -- and the winsome young Sunita.
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The Wildcat
1921 | NR | 2.5 out of 5 StarsThe leader of a band of mountain bandits falls in love with a lugubrious Bavarian officer in this early slapstick comedy that serves as a blunt satire of militarism in post-World War I Germany.
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