FILMS ABOUT THEATRE

By: Kenji

Les Enfants du Paradis

All the world’s a stage. Films in chronological order. See also my list of Shakespeare films.

Sadly, 2 films in Mizoguchi’s geidomono theatre triptych, A Woman of Osaka and The Life of an Actor (both apparently excellent) are lost. At least the marvellous Story of the Late Chrysanthemums, the first, is with us. Mizoguchi was a great lover of theatre, as was Renoir, while numerous directors, including Bergman, were also renowned stage directors.

• 01
  Upstream
  John Ford
• 02
  The Last Warning
  Paul Leni
• 03
  The Water Magician
  Kenji Mizoguchi
• 04
  A Story of Floating Weeds
  Yasujirô Ozu
• 05
  The Lion Dance
  Yasujirô Ozu
• 06
  The Straits of Love and Hate
  Kenji Mizoguchi
• 07
  The Great Garrick
  James Whale
• 08
  The Story of the Late Chrysanthemums
  Kenji Mizoguchi
• 09
  Traveling Actors
  Mikio Naruse
• 10
  Notes of an Itinerant Performer
  Hiroshi Shimizu
• 11
  To Be or Not to Be
  Ernst Lubitsch
• 12
  Henry V
  Laurence Olivier
• 13
  Children of Paradise
  Marcel Carné
• 14
  A Double Life
  George Cukor
• 15
  The Love of Sumako the Actress
  Kenji Mizoguchi
• 16
  All About Eve
  Joseph L. Mankiewicz
• 17
  A Dog's Life
  Mario Monicelli
• 18
  Moulin Rouge
  John Huston
• 19
  Limelight
  Charlie Chaplin
• 20
  Give a Girl a Break
  Stanley Donen
• 21
  The Golden Coach
  Jean Renoir
• 22
  The Band Wagon
  Vincente Minnelli
• 23
  French Cancan
  Jean Renoir
• 24
  The Seventh Seal
  Ingmar Bergman
• 25
  The Magician
  Ingmar Bergman
• 26
  Stolen Desire
  Shôhei Imamura
• 27
  Floating Weeds
  Yasujirô Ozu
• 28
  Paris Belongs to Us
  Jacques Rivette
• 29
  A Soft Note on a Sharp Scale
  Ritwik Ghatak
• 30
  An Actor's Revenge
  Kon Ichikawa
• 31
  Two Stage Sisters
  Xie Jin
• 32
  Shakespeare Wallah
  James Ivory
• 33
  Persona
  Ingmar Bergman
• 34
  Marat/Sade
  Peter Brook
• 35
  The Bridegroom, the Comedienne and the Pimp
  Jean-Marie Straub
• 36
  The Rite
  Ingmar Bergman
• 37
  Double Suicide
  Masahiro Shinoda
• 38
  Theater of Blood
  Douglas Hickox
• 39
  1789
  Ariane Mnouchkine
• 40
  Céline and Julie Go Boating
  Jacques Rivette
• 41
  That Most Important Thing: Love
  Andrzej Żuławski
• 42
  The Travelling Players
  Theodoros Angelopoulos
• 43
  The Goodbye Girl
  Herbert Ross
• 44
  Molière
  Ariane Mnouchkine
• 45
  All That Jazz
  Bob Fosse
• 46
  Opening Night
  John Cassavetes
• 47
  The Last Metro
  François Truffaut
• 48
  Lili Marleen
  Rainer Werner Fassbinder
• 49
  Mephisto
  István Szabó
• 50
  Fanny and Alexander — The Theatrical Version
  Ingmar Bergman
• 51
  The Dresser
  Peter Yates
• 52
  Love on the Ground
  Jacques Rivette
• 53
  Peking Opera Blues
  Tsui Hark
• 54
  Tangos, the Exile of Gardel
  Fernando E. Solanas
• 55
  The Cloud
  Fernando E. Solanas
• 56
  Gang of Four
  Jacques Rivette
• 57
  Jesus of Montreal
  Denys Arcand
• 58
  ¡Ay, Carmela!
  Carlos Saura
• 59
  Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead
  Tom Stoppard
• 60
  Farewell My Concubine
  Chen Kaige
• 61
  The Puppetmaster
  Hou Hsiao-hsien
• 62
  Faust
  Jan Švankmajer
• 63
  Vanya on 42nd Street
  Louis Malle
• 64
  Bullets Over Broadway
  Woody Allen
• 65
  To Live
  Zhang Yimou
• 66
  La Comédie-Française
  Frederick Wiseman
• 67
  Looking for Richard
  Al Pacino
• 68
  Shakespeare in Love
  John Madden
• 69
  All About My Mother
  Pedro Almodóvar
• 70
  Topsy-Turvy
  Mike Leigh
• 71
  Platform
  Jia Zhangke
• 72
  Va savoir
  Jacques Rivette
• 73
  I'm Going Home
  Manoel de Oliveira
• 74
  Mrs Henderson Presents
  Stephen Frears
• 75
  Stage Beauty
  Richard Eyre
• 76
  The Burnt Theatre
  Rithy Panh
• 77
  Molière
  Laurent Tirard
• 78
  Synecdoche, New York
  Charlie Kaufman
• 79
  Il piccolo
  Maurizio Zaccaro
• 80
  Me and Orson Welles
  Richard Linklater
• 81
  Lope
  Andrucha Waddington
• 82
  Crimson Curtain
  André Barsacq
• 83
  Theatre Svoboda
  Jakub Hejna
• 84
  You Ain't Seen Nothin' Yet!
  Alain Resnais