【Saturday Cinema】"To the Wonder" – A sweeping, poetic love story
Last updated 2026-09-25 — Free-spirited writer Neil (played by Ben Affleck) meets the beautiful French single mother Marina (Olga Kurylenko) while traveling in Europe, and falls in love with her. Neil takes her and her daughter to live in America...
Free-spirited writer Neil (played by Ben Affleck) meets the beautiful French single mother Marina (Olga Kurylenko) while traveling in Europe, and falls in love with her. Neil takes her and her daughter to live in America, but unfortunately, the daughter struggles to adapt due to the language barrier, so Marina has to take her back to Paris. Shortly after her departure, Neil reunites with his childhood sweetheart Jane (Rachel McAdams) and reignites a romance with her.
Ben Affleck and Rachel McAdams will spark a fresh and captivating love story in this film. (Image provided by CaiChang International Multimedia)
Soon after, Neil discovers that a nearby nuclear power plant is leaking toxic substances, with the impoverished neighborhood bearing the brunt. The local priest (Javier Bardem), who daily interacts with the affected working-class community, feels just as helpless as Neil. The priest begins to question the existence of God, while Neil is torn between two women. The priest, likewise, wrestles with his faith, forcing both men to contemplate two different kinds of love. Can they save their relationships? Or will they find true redemption on their spiritual journeys in search of genuine love?
To the Wonder
To The Wonder
Release Date: 2014-01-17
Duration: 1 hour 52 minutes
Director: Ben Affleck, Olga Kurylenko, Rachel McAdams, Javier Bardem
Youth, Half-Baked
Tamako in Moratorium
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The Light Shines Only There
The Bling Ring
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Release Date: 2014-01-17
Duration: 1 hour 17 minutes
Director: Katsuhito Ishii
Cast: Atsuko Maeda
Autumn
After graduating from university in Tokyo, Tamako (played by Atsuko Maeda) doesn’t look for a job but instead returns to her father Zenji’s (played by Yasuhiko Kang) old, solitary home in Kofu. However, she doesn’t help much at her father’s sporting goods store “Kofu Sports,” often sleeping through business hours. When she finally gets up, she gobbles down leftover cabbage rolls, eats pudding, reads manga, and before she knows it, it’s dinner time again. Complaining while watching TV, Tamako says, “Japan is hopeless.” Zenji snaps back, “All you do is eat, sleep, and read manga — it’s not Japan that’s hopeless, it’s you!” Tamako retorts angrily, “I’ll take action when the time is right!” “When is that?” “Anyway… not now!”
Winter
Kofu Sports is busy preparing for New Year’s Eve and the upcoming year. Tamako even helps out with chores for once. In the evening, while hiding under the kotatsu, Aunt Kankichi (Nobuko Nakamura) brings over New Year’s dishes. Tamako’s older sister is also coming home with her husband for the holidays. Watching Tamako play with her phone while eating New Year’s soba noodles, Zenji scolds her, “If you’re going to eat the noodles, stop playing with your phone.” Tamako replies, “Mom hasn’t texted me yet.” It turns out that even after the divorce, Tamako’s mother still keeps in touch, and Tamako shares her mother’s recent news with Zenji. As her older sister, who moved out after getting married, returns home, the night of New Year’s Eve deepens…
Spring
Tamako gets a haircut at the salon and seems finally ready to send out her resume. She playfully asks Zenji to buy her interview clothes, and he agrees with a mix of emotion, remarking that the time has finally come. Wearing her newly bought outfit, Tamako asks a junior high school boy named Jin to take her resume photo. “You absolutely must not tell anyone about this!” she says before hurrying out of the photo studio. So, which company is Tamako planning to send her resume to?
Summer
The living room air conditioner blasts cold air as Tamako lounges under a blanket reading manga. As she watches a high school baseball game, she mutters sarcastically, “Who plays baseball in this heat?” Zenji tells her that there are all kinds of people. He seems a little happier, as if something good might be coming soon. It turns out that through Aunt Kankichi’s introduction, Tamako’s father has met a craft teacher. Tamako musters the courage to sign up for a craft class and meets her father’s rumored new partner, the legendary teacher Ms. Yoko (Yasuko Tomita). The thought that her father might remarry makes Tamako’s heart waver — what is she planning…? |
Release Date: 2014-01-17
Duration: 1 hour 30 minutes
Director: Sofia Coppola
Cast: Emma Watson ("Harry Potter"), Katie Chang ("Lovely Girls"), Israel Broussard ("The Bling Ring"), Claire Julien ("The Dark Knight Rises"), Taissa Farmiga ("Higher Ground"), Leslie Mann ("40-Year-Old Virgin")
Rebecca (Katie Chang), Mark (Israel Broussard), Nicki (Emma Watson), Chloe (Claire Julien), and Sam (Taissa Farmiga) are a group of wealthy teenagers living in an upscale Los Angeles neighborhood. They idolize luxury brands, party at nightclubs after school, and have no life goals — only caring about instant gratification.
Rebecca, the most obsessed with fashion, suddenly comes up with an idea: “Why don’t we rob the homes of Hollywood stars?” She asks Mark to look up information online, and they easily find the address of Paris Hilton’s mansion. Using gossip sites, they learn when she’s out of town, and plan a heist. One late night, upon entering the materialistic heiress’s lavish home, they’re stunned — the place is filled with designer clothes, luxury bags, high heels, and dazzling jewelry, making them feel like they’ve entered heaven. They help themselves to whatever they want, shut the door, and leave without anyone noticing.
Having found it so easy, they get greedy and soon pull off a second robbery. They then target other Hollywood celebrities, such as Lindsay Lohan, Orlando Bloom, and Rachel Bilson, even bragging shamelessly about it at clubs. At Orlando Bloom’s house, they steal several Rolex watches worth over $500,000, which they later sell on the black market and use the illegal proceeds to buy drugs.
So will these notorious "celebrity thieves" ever face justice after rampaging for 10 months?
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Her
her
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The Song of Names
Grand Piano
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Release Date: 2014-01-17
Duration: 2 hours 06 minutes
Director: Spike Jonze of Where the Wild Things Are
Cast: Joaquin Phoenix (Gladiator), Scarlett Johansson (The Avengers), Amy Adams (Man of Steel), Rooney Mara (The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo), Samantha Morton (John Carter), Olivia Wilde (Tron: Legacy)
Her is set in a near-future Los Angeles and centers around Theodore Twombly (Joaquin Phoenix), a thoughtful and emotionally rich man who writes deeply personal and touching letters for others. One day, he buys a newly developed AI operating system and installs it on his computer. He soon discovers that the OS far exceeds his expectations. But what surprises him even more is the ambiguous relationship that begins to develop between him and the software. Before long, he realizes he’s fallen in love with “her.” Through this unusual romance blending futuristic sci-fi and classic romance, we see how cold technology, which isolates people, can once again bring us together in warmth.
Oscar-nominated director Spike Jonze crafts an original love story from a unique perspective, exploring the magic and perils of intimacy in the modern world.
Written and directed by Spike Jonze, the film stars three Oscar-nominated actors: Joaquin Phoenix (The Master, Her, Gladiator), Amy Adams (The Master, Man of Steel), and Rooney Mara (The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo), along with Olivia Wilde (Rush) and Scarlett Johansson (The Avengers).
Producers are Megan Ellison, Spike Jonze, and Vincent Landay; executive producers are Daniel Lupi, Natalie Farrey, and Chelsea Barnard.
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Release Date: 2014-01-17
Duration: 1 hour 30 minutes
Director: Egidio Coccimiglio
Cast: Elijah Wood (The Lord of the Rings), John Cusack (1408)
Tom Selznick (played by Elijah Wood), a piano prodigy hailed as one of the most promising talents of his generation, has been haunted by a crippling stage fright ever since a major performance mishap. Five years later, having rebuilt his confidence, he returns to the stage for a comeback concert before a thousand people. But just as he's about to perform the same piece that caused his downfall, threatening words appear on the sheet music: “Play one wrong note, and you die.” Tom soon realizes he's being targeted — the gunman forces him to play the entire piece flawlessly or both he and his wife, a vocalist, will be killed on stage. Faced with deep-seated fears and a life-threatening crisis, how will Tom focus to deliver a flawless performance? What is the true motive of the blackmailer? And how will he outwit his captor to survive?
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God Is a Bullet
Jesus Loves Me
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Sweet Alibis
Sweet Alibis
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Release Date: 2014-01-24
Duration: 1 hour 40 minutes
Director: Florian David Fitz
Cast: Florian David Fitz, Jessica Schwarz, Henry Hubchen
Their love determines the fate of all humanity
Loserville Mary always falls for the wrong guys, yet she still believes in true love and hopes that one day Mr. Right will come along. Just when she's about to give up on love, a charmingly laid-back Palestinian guy named Joshua enters her life. Thoughtful, intuitive, gentle, kind, and loving, this seemingly perfect man is also 100% straight — a gift from the heavens. As fate would have it, Joshua is actually the real Messiah — Jesus — who has returned because the end of the world is near. Can Mary, who’s now deeply in love with Jesus, use her true love to move heaven and stop the apocalypse?
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Release Date: 2014-01-17
Duration: 1 hour 52 minutes
Director: Yi-Chi Lien
Cast: Alec Su, Ariel Lin, Lei Hong, Lung Chu-Yen, Matt Wu, Ma Nian-Xian, Ko Meng-Chieh, A-Ken, Chelsea Chiu, Bolin Lin
Veteran cop Wang Zhiyi is notoriously bad at his job, takes matchmaking photos more seriously than suspect mugshots, and has an uncanny knack for predicting danger — usually using it as an excuse to run to the bathroom. But this time, the underachieving Zhiyi is suddenly assigned a top-secret mission: to keep tabs on his newly graduated police academy junior colleague Gao Yiping. Turns out Gao is the daughter of the police commissioner, who, unable to talk her out of becoming a cop, carefully hand-picks her partner. After consideration, the commissioner concludes that Zhiyi — who’s great at dodging danger and playing it safe — is the perfect choice.
From the very first day as partners, their boss deliberately assigned them to trivial tasks. Zhiyi was delighted, but Yiping’s enthusiasm was met with a bucket of cold water. Yiping’s fiery passion clashed with Zhiyi’s carefree attitude, and the two bickered all day, becoming mortal enemies as partners. However, while investigating the mysterious death of a community dog, they accidentally uncovered the whereabouts of a fugitive drug dealer named Caozhi, which led them straight into a series of murders.
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