Getting Stronger Every Day (2001)

2001-01-017m

"There are two movies I saw on TV about boys who were taken from their families and then returned to them years later. One boy was on a fun spaceship for years and the other boy was kidnapped and molested. These boys were never the same again and they just couldn't re-integrate into the family. I saw these movies when I was little. I've often described them to people, always paired together. They are sort of the comedy and tragedy version of the same story and it is a mundanely spiritual story. Getting Stronger Every Day includes these boys' tales, but they are like mystical objects placed on the living reality of the man storyteller. In other parts of the movie actual mystical objects hover in peoples lives without a myth or story attached. I like to think about how these dimensions interact simply and can be enacted: real life / story / worldly / spirit / video / flat drawing."

Related Movies

255174-thumbnail

Daughters (2014)

Agnes, a teacher from the Hessian provinces, has come to Berlin to identify a dead girl who might be Lydia, her runaway daughter. It turns out not to be Lydia, but Agnes stays in the city anyway. Still frantically looking, she comes a young stray called Ines who no longer leaves her side...

977770-thumbnail

The Lesson (2023)

Liam, an aspiring and ambitious young writer, eagerly accepts a tutoring position at the family estate of his idol, renowned author J.M. Sinclair. But soon, Liam realizes that he is ensnared in a web of family secrets, resentment, and retribution. Sinclair, his wife Hélène, and their son Bertie all guard a dark past, one that threatens Liam’s future as well as their own.

1022310-thumbnail

Home (2012)

A reunion between a mother and her pregnant daughter, who need a moment to recognize themselves and to understand that they will live together again in a new situation for both of them. An exercise made by the author during her second trimester at the London Film School, inspired by the painting "La Coiffure" by Edgar Degas.

843416-thumbnail

Daddio (2024)

A woman taking a cab ride from JFK airport engages in a conversation with the driver about the important relationships in their lives.

843427-thumbnail

Valiant Hearts (2022)

In August 1942, during the Second World War, Six Jewish children are trying to escape the Nazis. They are hidden by the resistance in the Chambord Castle, where paintings from Le Louvre are being stored as well. The Nazis are looking for paintings from private collections that would be hidden there as well.

49635-thumbnail

The Rosa Parks Story (2002)

A seamstress recalls events leading to her act of peaceful defiance that prompted the 1955 bus boycott in Montgomery, Alabama.

51279-thumbnail

Compensation (2010)

Two sisters arrive to Moscow trying to find their father who left the family 15 years ago.

51321-thumbnail

Permanent Record (1988)

David Sinclair seems to have everything going for him: he's smart, musically talented, and very successful. To top off his senior year in high school, his band is trying to get a recording session. Therefore, David's suicide leaves everyone, especially his best friend and bandmate, Chris, with a lot of questions.

307093-thumbnail

Perpetual Motion (2005)

Niuniu, a wealthy middle aged woman living in Beijing, discovers that her husband is having an affair after coming upon a romantic e-mail. She knows only that it is one of her close friends but not which one. Determined to discover the truth, she invites her friends Qinqin, a ditsy actress, Lala, a successful artist, and Madam Ye, a property developer over to her lavish siheyuan home. There the four women share stories of their sexual past over food and mahjong. Niuniu, however, still has her plan to execute...

51409-thumbnail

The Tree (2010)

The O'Neills lived happily in their house in the Australian countryside. That was until one day fate struck blindly, taking the life of Peter, the father, leaving his grief-stricken wife Dawn alone with their four children. Among them, eight-year-old Simone denies this reality. She is persuaded that her father still lives in the giant fig tree growing near their house and speaks to her through its leaves. But the tree becomes more and more invasive and threatens the house. It must be felled. Of course, Simone won't allow it.

51423-thumbnail

Beyond (2010)

One morning just before Christmas, Leena receives a phone call from a hospital in her childhood hometown telling her that her mother is dying. This news takes her on a journey to face her mother for the first time in her adult life. Leena has fought all her life to let go of her grief over her lost and dark childhood. She is now forced to deal with her past to be able to move on.

51443-thumbnail

Moonlight & Mistletoe (2008)

After three years, Nick's estranged daughter Holly returns home to find the spirit of Christmas in Santaville has dwindled, taking the family business with it. What starts out as an attempt to bail out her dad, ends up rekindling Holly's belief in Christmas all over again.

51484-thumbnail

July Rhapsody (2002)

High school teacher Lam Yiu-Kwok is in the midst of a midlife crisis. His wife, Man-Ching, has been unfaithful; his friends are reaping the rewards of successful business careers while he earns a comparatively meager salary at an unglamorous job; and one of his young students, Choy-Lam, has fallen for him. When Man-Ching leaves for a month to help her former lover, a jealous Yiu-Kwok is tempted to retaliate by pursuing an affair with Choy-Lam.

307154-thumbnail

The Red Suit (1998)

Modern-day urban problems like unemployment and teenage depression come under the microscope. Husband and wife lose their jobs, and their daughter is under considerable stress studying for her college exams. Meanwhile, grandmother is having an unexpected romantic liaison. Will the family be able to pull together to solve their problems?

307155-thumbnail

Family Portrait (1992)

After laying bare backward village mentalities in Bloody Morning, Li Shaohong turns her attention to China’s urban middle class. Cao is a photographer, married to an opera singer and with an infant son, caught in the usual professional morass of political compromise. His life starts to fall apart when he learns that his ex-wife also bore him a son some months after their divorce – and when the boy turns up looking for his father. Nothing wildly dramatic, just believable people in believable situations. If the ending seems a touch forced, this is nevertheless a sign that ‘Fifth Generation’ cinema is changing and coming to terms with up-to-date realities.

486763-thumbnail

HMAS Unicorn (2001)

In the summer of 1964 three unusual incidents took place on Lake Grace. The first two were totally unexplainable. The third, and most disturbing one, provided one clue... Based on the journal of sixteen-year-old Gwendolin Howard.

51534-thumbnail

My Effortless Brilliance (2008)

Lynn Shelton's "My Effortless Brilliance" is a study in the relationship between cocky, fussy, thoroughly-city-mouse author Eric (Sean Nelson) and his ex-best-friend, the tersely powerful journalist and wood-chopper Dylan (Basil Harris). Dylan, fed up with Eric's self-involved antics, dumps him and disappears to live in a log cabin in the woods of Eastern Washington; two years later, Eric arrives (sporting a Prius, white sneakers, and a fear of spiders) to mend the friendship.

51505-thumbnail

The Christmas Hope (2009)

After the recent loss of her son Sean, Patty Addison devotes herself to finding homes for needy children. The loss of their son has strained Patty's relationship with her husband Mark, but they reconnect emotionally when they take in Emily, a 9-year-old orphaned in a car accident similar to the one that killed Sean. At the same time Dr. Nathan Andrews is trying to find the parents of a boy who died in the ER, and Mark is trying to help one of his son's friends.

47392-thumbnail

Little Girl Blue (2007)

Julie is a woman who seemingly has everything. A handsome husband, teenage daughter and a thriving, undemanding job as a translator and now even a new dream house ... But she also has a secret that is slowly changing her idyllic life...

47429-thumbnail

Kung-Fu Master! (1988)

A lonely 40-year old woman finds herself shattering taboos by falling in love with the 14-year old Julien – but is it romance, or a desperate attempt to turn back time in the face of middle age?