A couple of decent films to track down if you're in Washington this week - or collect on DVD if you're not.

Firstly, the Goethe Institut is showing The Second Track (Das Zweite Gleis) (1962), an East German movie from 1962. Doesn't sound too promising does it, but this is a tight little thriller with an excellent twist that complicates the relationships in the movie in surprising ways. It starts with an amiable railway inspector stumbling across some looters at his station. The looters are arrested and the inspector is asked to identify one of the looters in a line-up. At the last moment, to everyone's surprise, he refuses to do so - thus beginning a remarkable tale........



The second movie to watch out for is an excellent new giallo called The Double Hour (2009) which focuses on the relationship between an Italian cop and a legal Slovenian immigrant. Showing at the AFI Silver as part of the European Union Film Showcase, it is described as Lynchian in character and has echoes of Lost Highway but with a more robust plot and a definite conclusion. Beginning with a speed-dating evening that has an almost operatic quality, it develops into what initially appears to be a love story. Then there's also a sub-plot about a burglary that goes wrong and which holds the whole movie together giving it a narrative focus that some gialli lack. And it has the charming Ksenia Rappaport, so it's well worth a look...............




Ksenia Rappaport