Got to share this movie: Le Havre (in French with subtitles).
Lately, nearly all the movies we see are on Netflix. Our taste seems to run to animation, documentaries, and foreign films. Not exclusively, but in general.
Last night we watched an odd, wistful comedy about an old guy in Le Havre,
France, who makes up his mind to help a boy whose family is arrested after being discovered in a packing crate near the harbor, on route from Africa to London.
Every shot in the film was like a painting, every gesture true. The characters were good-hearted, down-and-out types in the roughneck port, where many undocumented immigrants come looking for work. There they find squatter camps, deportation, kindness, hostility, drugs, poverty, crime, and sometimes a living.
The dialogue in the bar scenes reminded me of Mike Leigh films, the ones where he has his actors ad-lib their lines. It was just so funny and believable. And the “trendy” charity fundraiser the old guy arranges with the graying rock band has to be seen to be believed.
The “2011 comedy-drama film written and directed by Aki Kaurismäki, starring André Wilms, Kati Outinen, Jean-Pierre Darroussin and Blondin Miguel. It tells the story of a shoeshiner who tries to save an immigrant child in the French port city Le Havre. The film was produced by Kaurismäki’s Finnish company Sputnik …
“The film premiered in competition at the 2011 Cannes Film Festival, where it received the FIPRESCI Prize. Kaurismäki envisions it as the first installment in a trilogy about life in port cities. His ambition is to make follow-ups set in Spain and Germany, shot in the local languages.”
More at Wikipedia, here.
Suzanne's Mom's Blog 
I am so happy to see this film again. I really loved it when I saw it for the first time in a small cinema in in Stockholm. Thanks for reminding me and giving other people the chance to see it.
I had read only a little about it, and when I saw that opening scene with the gangster being mowed down right after getting his shoes shined, I thought, uh-oh, what am I getting into? It was very quirky. And it soon became very wonderful.
Wow. Thanks for the suggestion. I’ll look for this one. We do most of our movie viewing at home, too. Maybe we can organize a Concord movie night!
Would love to hear your suggestions. We have watched some really quirky things, often because I read something a year ago and don’t remember what I read when Netflix finally has the movie available. Two weird delightful things that spring to mind are “Son of Rambow” and “Sita Sings the Blues.” Who knows how I ever heard about them! A blog reader recommended “The Singing Revolution,” which we also liked. We watch nearly everything we order even if it’s not what we expected. But I have to say Peter Jackson’s version of the Hobbit was too awful. We sent it back.