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For this Sunday Kino Night, first up is Teddy Bear (1981), a Polish comedy about a sports club owner finds that a few pages have been torn out of his passport, apparently by his vengeful ex-wife; consequently, he is unable to travel to London for a tournament. He hatches a scheme to shoot a film that contains a double role, intending to use the lookalike actor to obtain a new passport. Hilarity ensues, with a whole bunch of bureaucratic satire along the way. This is considered a boomer comedy classic in Poland, in a similar fashion to, say, Caddyshack (1980) or The Blues Brothers (1980) in the US. This is the best-known and best-regarded work of director Stanislaw Bareja, who specialized in absurdist satire like this. Apparently, this is also set at Christmastime. We’ll see soon enough.

After that is It’s a Wonderful Life (1946), arguably the most famous Christmas film of them all, and the magnum opus of the master of feel-good schmaltz, Frank Capra. Jimmy Stewart stars as George Bailey, whose idyllic life as a middle-class bank manager is threatened one Christmas season by the theft of some money by an evil business tycoon. An angel appears and shows the suicidal George what the world would be like without him. Will he be brought back from the edge? If you have seen this before, and there is a good chance you have, you know the answer already. Currently ranked #51 on the Letterboxd Top 250.

We’ll start at 8PM EST on Blorptube, right here:

https://blorp.bot.nu/o/visual_cuisine

Be there, comrades!

Letterboxd:

• Teddy Bear: https://letterboxd.com/film/teddy-bear-1981/
• It’s a Wonderful Life: https://letterboxd.com/film/its-a-wonderful-life/

Doesthedogdie.com links:

• Teddy Bear: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0082755/parentalguide/
• It’s a Wonderful Life: https://www.doesthedogdie.com/media/10129

CWs for Teddy Bear:

• Nudity.
• Objectification of female characters.
• Implied sex.
• Alcoholism.
• Smoking.

CWs for It’s a Wonderful Life:

• Someone leaves without saying goodbye.
• Child abuse.
• Alcoholism.
• Death of child.
• Destruction of child’s toy.
• Death of parent.
• Natural bodies of water.
• Spitting.
• Suicidal ideation.
• Suicide attempt.
• Unstable reality.
• Mental illness.
• Nervous breakdown.
• Crying baby.
• Jump scares.
• Screaming.
• Someone is watched without their knowledge.
• Discussion of existentialism.
• Babies.
• Homophobic slurs.
• Misrepresentation of minority.
• Discussion of religion.
• Stroke.
• Car crash.
• Honking horns.
• Screeching tires.
• Gun violence.

Links to movies:

• Teddy Bear: https://tankie.tube/w/i58KWL2npMuZ6oveCMBnbS
• It’s a Wonderful Life: https://tankie.tube/w/wFBH3aE9Zf94KCmPXTCQM3