Spiritual Exercises: 10 Films by Olivier Smolders(2007)

The Face Behind the Mask(en)

A kindly, enthusiastic, newly-arrived American immigrant from Hungary is forced to turn to a life of crime after his face is badly disfigured in a hotel fire.

The Locket(en)

A dark personal secret drives a young woman to use every man she encounters.

Nightfall(en)

An innocent man turns fugitive as he reconstructs events that implicate him for a murder and robbery he did not commit.

M(en)

Remake of the 1931 Fritz Lang original. In the city, someone is murdering children. The Police search is so intense, it is disturbing the 'normal' criminals, and the local hoods decide to help find the murderer as quickly as possible.

Sleep, My Love(en)

A woman wakes up in the middle of the night on board a train, but she can't remember how she got there. Danger and suspense ensue.

The Truth About Emanuel(en)

A troubled young woman becomes obsessed with her mysterious new neighbor, who bears a striking resemblance to the girl's dead mother.

Framed(en)

Truck driver Mike Lambert is a down-and-out mining engineer searching for a job. When his rig breaks down in a small town, he happens upon a venomous seductress. When her boyfriend robs a bank, they intend to frame Lambert.

The Damned Don't Cry(en)

Fed up with her small-town marriage, a woman goes after the big time and gets mixed up with the mob.

Maniac(en)

When a stranger enters a quiet, country town and is seduced by a sensuous married woman he unwittingly finds himself at the centre of a storm of sexual guilt and murder.

The Glass Key(en)

A crooked politician finds himself being accused of murder by a gangster from whom he refused help during a re-election campaign.

The Blue Gardenia(en)

Upon waking up to the news that the man she’d gone on a date with the previous night has been murdered, a young woman with only a faint memory of the night’s events begins to suspect that she murdered him while attempting to resist his advances.

The Reckless Moment(en)

After discovering the dead body of her teenage daughter's lover, a housewife takes desperate measures to protect her family from scandal.

The Naked City(en)

After a former model is drowned in her bathtub, Detective James Halloran and Lieutenant Dan Muldoon attempt to piece together her murder.

Cornered(en)

A World War II veteran hunts down the Nazi collaborators who killed his wife.

Conflict(en)

Unhappily married Richard Mason concocts a meticulous scheme to kill his shrewish wife so that he'll be free to marry her sister.

The File on Thelma Jordon(en)

Cleve Marshall, an assistant district attorney, falls for Thelma Jordon, a mysterious woman with a troubled past. When Thelma becomes a suspect in her aunt's murder, Cleve tries to clear her name.

Outrage(en)

A young woman who has just become engaged has her life completely shattered when she is raped while on her way home from work.

The Dark Mirror(en)

A sister and her disturbed twin are implicated in a murder and a police detective must figure out which one's the killer.

Black Widow(en)

Federal agent Alexandra Barnes believes that Catherine Petersen is a serial killer who marries rich men and then murders them for their money. But since Catherine is seemingly a master of disguise and has multiple identities, Alexandra can't prove anything with conventional detective work. With no other option, she goes undercover, pursuing the same man as Catherine, and hoping that Catherine will slip up and reveal her true identity.

Quicksand(en)

Young auto mechanic Dan Brady takes $20 from a cash register at work to go on a date with blonde femme fatale Vera Novak. Brady intends to put the money back before it is missed, but the garage's bookkeeper shows up earlier than scheduled. As Brady scrambles to cover evidence of his petty theft, he fast finds himself drawn into an ever worsening "quicksand" of crime.

High and Low(ja)

A Yokohama shoe executive faces a wrenching choice when kidnappers mistakenly seize his chauffeur’s son but demand the ransom anyway.

Belly(en)

Erotic Tales(fr)

Three women are secretly plush prostitutes. They are successively called by a mysterious person to have sex with three different men and assuage their weird fantasies.

Angels with Dirty Faces(en)

Childhood chums Rocky Sullivan and Jerry Connelly grow up on opposite sides of the fence: Rocky matures into a prominent gangster, while Jerry becomes a priest, tending to the needs of his old tenement neighborhood.

Lie with Me(en)

Happily unattached, the sexually voracious Leila satisfies her desires with a host of rapidly changing bed partners, unconcerned about the emotional consequences. But that all changes when she meets an artist looking for a deeper commitment.

The April Chill(ka)

The story of a Soviet military serviceman and a male Georgian dancer. An anti-violence film about the awakening of human instinct in an invader

Young People Fucking(en)

On a Tuesday night, five couples have separate sexual adventures. Matt and Kris, friends for years, want to have an only-once, no-strings good time. Abby and Andrew, married, celebrate his birthday, but it's marred by angst and miscommunication. Mia and Eric are exes, making sure they are over each other. Jaime and Ken work together and this is a first date. Inez and Gord invite his roommate, Dave, to join them. By the time each couple has gone through a prelude, foreplay, sex, an interlude, orgasm, and afterglow, they've answered basic questions: can sex be anonymous, are we bored, is our marriage really finished, does anyone tell the truth, and how do we make someone happy?

Brighton Rock(en)

Centring on the activities of a gang of assorted criminals and, in particular, their leader – a vicious young hoodlum known as "Pinkie" – the film's main thematic concern is the criminal underbelly evident in inter-war Brighton.

The Belt(it)

Vittorio, an American novelist teaching in Rome, meets the beautiful but damaged Bianca and they rapidly fall into an urgent, tempestuous affair. He's hesitant over their relationship since she seems to thrive on conflict and is constantly baiting him into physical altercation. Bianca gives Vittorio an exquisite leather belt as a gift; he knows immediately that she wants him to whip her with it. Driven by his craving for her, Vittorio complies to Bianca's desire. Their relationship escalates into a dark realm of S&M which becomes more and more self-destructive.

Scandalous Gilda(it)

A woman catches her husband in bed with a much younger lady. Shocked and distraught, the woman leaves her husband. She decides to embark on a road trip of erotic self discovery. The woman meets a cartoonist during her sensual pilgrimage and gets involved in a torrid sexual affair with him.

Dark Secrets(en)

A woman convinces her boyfriend to go to couple therapy with her friend's and things go downhill from there.

Curiosity(en)

On a quiet night, a young couple find themselves caught up in a nightmarish ordeal after they witness a murderer disposing of a body in this claustrophobic thriller.

Bad Day at Black Rock(en)

One-armed war veteran John J. Macreedy steps off a train at the sleepy little town of Black Rock. Once there, he begins to unravel a web of lies, secrecy, and murder.

Fury(en)

Joe, who owns a gas station along with his brothers and is about to marry Katherine, travels to the small town where she lives to visit her, but is wrongly mistaken for a wanted kidnapper and arrested.

The Game Is Set(en)

Two very different sisters have sexual relations with the same man.

The Undercover Man(en)

Frank Warren is a treasury agent assigned to put an end to the activities of a powerful mob crime boss. Frank works undercover, posing as a criminal to seek information, but is frustrated when all he finds are terrified witnesses and corrupt police officers.

Port of New York(en)

Two narcotics agents go after a gang of murderous drug dealers who use ships docking at the New York harbor to smuggle in their contraband.

Black Angel(en)

A knight returns home from the Crusades to find his village devastated by disease and his family gone. He roams the forest searching for them, until he finds a mysterious maiden who is being held prisoner by a black knight. In order to free her, he must confront her captor.

Over-Exposed(en)

This titillating bit of pulp sensationalism was the last in a string of "B" films that Cleo Moore starred in at Columbia. Moore plays Lila Crane, an ambitious clip-joint floozie turned photographer with flexible morals and a penchant for fast money.

Walk a Crooked Mile(en)

A security leak is found at a Southern California atomic plant. The authorities stand in fear that the information leaked would go to a hostile nation. To investigate the case more efficiently, Dan O'Hara, an FBI agent, and Philip Grayson, a Scotland Yard sleuth, join forces. Will they manage to stop the spy ring from achieving their aim?