My boyfriend and I are both film buffs. He wants to be a movie director one day, and I just really love watching old movies. One thing we both agree on is that we adore foreign films. I always want to watch “something French,” and both he and my also-a-movie-lover brother are always pushing me to watch things that aren't French. (I guess they get tired of French. C'est la vie.) Because I have seen hundreds of French films, and dozens of other foreign films, I have compiled a list of some of my top foreign movies I believe everyone should see. So throw a bag of popcorn in the microwave, grab some of your best buds, and get ready for the most invigorating foreign film night ever!

4.Seven Samurai [Shichinin No Samurai] (1954)

I'm not going to lie: I didn't love this movie. But my older brother sure did! And he's getting his Ph.D. right now, so his opinion on movies has to count for something, right? Even though it isn't in my top 10 favorite movies of all time, Seven Samurai is a classic film everyone should see at least once. It is action-packed, full of funny good-for-their-time-period special effects, and has a fascinating story line. I'll admit (but not to my brother) I liked it.

Originally released in Japan in 1954, Seven Samurai made it to the big screens in the U.S. in 1956. It is a story of a small and poor village in the mountains that has been raided by a group of thieves. In the hope of keeping their town safe from future attacks, a group of farmers set out to find a samurai who will protect them for little money. They find an experienced samurai and his apprentice, and ask the two for help to protect their village. The two samurai accept the offer, and gather five other samurai to help them. The movie follows their battles against the outlaws trying to plunder the village, and the rocky relationships between the samurai and the villagers, who all have different views on how the town should be defended and how the criminals should be dealt with.

Seven Samurai has won the Silver Lion in the 1954 Venice Film Festival, Best Supporting Actor for Seiji Miyaguchi at the Mainichi Film Awards in 1955, Best Foreign Director and Best Foreign Actor for Akira Kurosawa and Takashi Shimura at the Jussi Awards in 1959, and was nominated for three British Academy Film Awards and two Academy Awards in 1956 and 1957. Seven Samurai is considered one of the most influential and innovative movies of all time, using telephoto lenses (high-tech and rare for the time). It is an interesting must-see classic for all!

3.The Illusionist [L'illusionniste](2010)

This is a French/Scottish animated movie that came out in 2010, and I adore it. While I am a bit biased, because I love almost all French movies, this one is unlike any I've ever seen before. I watched it for the first time a couple of weeks ago, and I am hooked.

This story is about a magician from Paris, France in the late 1950s who cannot get anyone to come see his shows. The beginning of the film is heartbreaking, as we watch him perform for empty rooms and people who ignore him. One day, he is invited to perform his magic act in a small bar in rural Scotland, and having nothing better to do, he goes. There, he meets a young girl who works at the pub where he is staying. She believes he truly has magical powers, and when he leaves Scotland for Edinborough a few days later, she secretly follows him there, which he finds out when she asks him for a ferry ticket. Determined to let her believe that magic is real, he works odd jobs in order to buy her beautiful gifts and let her think he made them appear. The rest of the movie is both heartbreaking and lovely, and has been on my mind since I saw it weeks ago.

The film utilizes very little speaking, and is almost all mimed, as the magician and the young girl do not speak the same languages. The portrayal of the language barrier is brilliant, and the actual movie itself is also beautiful, both in message and in illustration. The Illusionist won the European Film Awards in 2010, the César Award for Best Animated Feature, and was nominated for wins at both the Golden Globe Awards and the Academy Awards. This movie should be on everyone's watch lists, and is available for rent on Amazon Video!

2.City of God [Cidade de Deus] (2002)

City of God is a Brazilian movie (so it's in Portuguese) about a slum town near the Rio de Janeiro called “Cidade de Deus” in the 1960s, 70s, and early 80s. The film is action-packed, infuriating, and will keep any watchers on the edges of their seats.

The movie is based on the novel by Paulo Lins, and follows the life of a boy named Rocket and the lives of his young friends in his village. The city does not have access to electricity, clean water is hard to come by, and guns and weapons are replacements for expensive toys: all the children seem to have guns. The group of young boys are forced to steal anything they can to get money for their poor families, and end up getting tangled in with three older and more-experienced thieves: Clipper, Goose, and Shaggy. One night, the gang decides to loot a nearby hotel in the middle of the night, when all the patrons should be asleep. They leave the youngest and smallest boy outside to keep watch, and vow to not kill anyone during their robbery. After a few minutes, the thieves hear bullets and know the police must be behind them. They all run out and hide back home, and the look-out boy is nowhere to be found...yet. The rest of the movie follows Rocket and his journey through gang life and drug-pushing in Brazil and his dream to become a photographer and journalist.

This film is captivating all the way through. It is full of anger and confusion: I never expected the turn-outs of any of the major plot points. The cinematography of City of God is incredible, and the movie won the Golden Trailer Award for Best Independent Foreign Film, the Chicago Film Critics Association Award for Best Foreign Language Film, the British Independent Film Award for Best Foreign Independent Film, and the AFI Fest Audience Award. In the Grande Prêmio do Cinema Brasileiro, it won Best Film, Best Director, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Cinematography, Best Editing, and Best Sound. City of God has won eight more awards at different festivals, and was nominated for another 18 awards. Clearly, City of God is one of the best foreign films made in a long time, and can be watched on Netflix

1. Life is Beautiful [La Vita è Bella ] (1997)

Life is Beautiful is one of my all-time favorite foreign films. I watched it for the first time in a high school history class, and fell in love with the romance of it all. I've probably watched it 10 times in the past four years, and it always amazes me the same way each time I see it.

Life is Beautiful starts out as a love story between a Jewish man named Guido and the beautiful girl Dora in 1930. He meets her once briefly, and it is love at first sight. But he doesn't get to see her again until a few years later, when she is engaged to a rich but boring man. He declares his love for her, and terrified of being stuck with her fiancé for life, she runs away with him in the middle of her engagement party. The film shows the viewers how they fall in love, and coined the quote “buongiorno principessa,” as that's how Guido always greets his beloved Dora. They have a son together, and live in a beautiful city in Italy. Guido owns a bookstore and Dora is a school teacher. Their son is smart, and can watch the bookstore all by himself from a young age. They have a perfect life together. One day, however, Guido, his son, and his uncle Elesio are stolen from their store by Nazis and blindly forced onto a strange train. When Dora sees the store has been broken into, she runs to the train station and begs to be put on the same train as her family. They put her in the women's car, and the train takes them all to a concentration camp. From there, the family is split, Guido and his son together, and Dora and Elesio are separated. The film follows Guido's struggle to reunite his family, and to keep his young son sheltered from the horrors of the camp and from the guards who will kill the boy.

This film was shown at the 1998 Cannes Film Festival, and won the Grand Prix and the Academy Awards for Best Foreign Language Film, Best Actor, Best Music: Original Dramatic Score, and was nominated for four other awards. Life is Beautiful is truly an incredible movie, and should be watched by all movie-lovers ASAP!

If you finished all of those films, here's a short list of some more fantastic foreign movies! S'amuser!

• The 400 Blows [Les Quatre Cent Coups] (1959)
• Pan's Labyrinth [El Laberinto del Fauno] (2006)
• Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon [Wo Hu Cang Long] (2000)
• Stalker (1979)
• Amélie [Le Fabuleux Destin d'Amélie Poulain ] (2001)