230 Films & TV Shows Set In Asia During The 19th Century
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The Jungle Book
🇮🇳 India The 1900s The 1880sRaised by wild animals since childhood, Mowgli is drawn away from the jungle by the beautiful Kitty. But Mowgli must eventually face corrupt Capt. Boone, who wants both Kitty's hand and the treasures of Monkey City – a place only Mowgli can find.
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A Chinese Torture Chamber Story
🇨🇳 China The 19th CenturyA Hong Kong "Category 3" (exploitation) classic set during the Sung Dynasty, as a corrupt magistrate subjects a lovely, innocent young bride to inconceivable physical punishments after "convicting" her of killing her husband (by causing his penis to explode, of course). Plenty of raunch and unintentional humor. Viewer discretion advised.
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Fist of the Red Dragon
🇨🇳 China The 19th CenturyExpert fighters must band together in an ultimate martial arts showdown when Southern China’s High Officers begin smuggling opium over the border and endangering the lives of the local villagers. With no one to protect them and an Emperor that does not honor them, the people turn to the Master Fighters Lin Shih Tsui and Hwang Fei Hung to battle the evil officers and bring justice to the land.
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Amor e Dedinhos de Pé
🇲🇴 Macao The 1900s The 1890sMacau 1897. Life is easy for Portuguese settlers. Young reveler Francisco Frontaria is deemed as irresponsible for all his partying and boozing. Shunned and exiled for crossing a line by insulting the daughter of a prominent family, he finds himself penniless and vagrant.
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Orlando
England 🇹🇷 Turkey The 1990s The 19th Century The 18th Century The 17th CenturyEngland, 1600. Queen Elizabeth I promises Orlando, a young nobleman obsessed with poetry, that she will grant him land and fortune if he agrees to satisfy a very particular request.
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Once Upon a Time in China
Guangdong Province The 19th CenturyNever was a Hero needed more... — Set in late 19th century Canton, this martial arts film depicts the stance taken by the legendary martial arts hero Wong Fei-Hung against foreign forces' plundering of China.
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Mother
🇷🇺 Russia The 1890sThe social ferment in late 19th century Russia which led to the 1917 Russian Revolution is movingly portrayed in this lengthy historical drama, which is very faithful to the 1907 novel The Mother by the celebrated Marxist writer Maxim Gorky (1868-1936). In the story, "the mother" (Inna Tchourikova) has no other recourse than to watch her decent, kindly husband turn into an animalistic, drunken brute as a result of working in the inhuman conditions of a steel mill in the town of Sormovo. When he begins to express his suppressed rage by beating her, she is defended by her teenaged son Pavel (depicted Viktor Rakov as an adult, Sacha Chichonok as a boy). After his father's death, Pavel is forced to go to work in the same factory. However, Pavel and his friends begin investigating Marxism and socialist thought, and work to organize their fellow workers.
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The Deceivers
🇮🇳 India The 1820sHow far can a man journey into darkness...and still find his way back? — India, 1825: the country lives in mortal fear of cult members known as the “Deceivers." They commit robbery and ritualistic murder. Appalled by their activities, an English military man, Captain William Savage, conceives a hazardous plot to stop them. In disguise, he plans to himself become a “Deceiver” and infiltrate their numbers. Ever present in Savage’s adventures is a sense of dread; he is in constant fear of betrayal and vengeance and also undergoes a disturbing psychological transformation as he experiences the cult’s blood lust firsthand.
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Around the World in 80 Days
California England 🇫🇷 France 🇪🇸 Spain 🇮🇳 India 🇭🇰 Hong Kong Kanagawa Prefecture The 1870sEnglish Lord Phileas Fogg has just become the main suspect in a daring bank robbery. Meanwhile, he has made a wager with several other lords that he will be able to travel around this world in a mere 80 days. Joined by his butler Passepartout, Fogg begins his journey. However, hot on his heels is Scotland Yard detective Mr. Fix.
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Robot Carnival
Tokyo Prefecture The 19th CenturyNine Animators. One Vision. — An anthology of various tales told in various styles with robots being the one common element among them.
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Assa
🇷🇺 Russia The 1980s The 1800sASSA is set in Crimea during the winter in the mid eighties. A young musician (Bananan) falls for mobster's (Krymov) young mistress (Alika). The parallel story line involves an 18th century assassination plot.
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Tai-Pan
🇭🇰 Hong Kong The 1840sSmuggler. Prince. Murderer. Father. Sinner. Saint. — The film begins following the British victory of the first Opium War and the seizure of Hong Kong. Although the island is largely uninhabited and the terrain unfriendly, it has a large port that both the British government and various trading companies believe will be useful for the import of merchandise to be traded on mainland China, a highly lucrative market.
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Adieu Bonaparte
🇪🇬 Egypt 🇫🇷 France The 1800sThis big-budget historical epic from acclaimed Egyptian director Youssef Chahine features a crazed turn by Patrice Chereau as Napoleon Bonaparte. The film, an Egyptian-French co-production, deals with Napoleon's occupation of Alexandria and its effect on a typical Egyptian family. Michel Piccoli leads the cast as a general in Napoleon's army who tentatively befriends a local poet.
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A Cruel Romance
🇷🇺 Russia The 1870sThe film is based on the play by Alexander Ostrovsky “Without a Dowry”. The action takes place on the banks of the Volga in the fictional provincial town of Bryakhimov in 1877-1878. Harita Ignatyevna Ogudalova, a noblewoman of a good and respected family, a widow with three adult daughters, became impoverished after her husband’s death, but she does everything to arrange her daughters' life and marry them to sufficiently rich and noble grooms. In the absence of funds, she keeps an open house, hoping that a society of beautiful and musical young ladies will attract single men rich enough to marry loveless women. Kharita’s only “at a loose end” daughter is the youngest - Larisa Dmitrievna Ogudalova, who is not indifferent to several wealthy gentlemen at once, among whom Sergey Sergeyevich Paratov is a handsome, charming, smarty, frivolous and rich gentleman.
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The Ballad of Narayama
🇯🇵 Japan The 1860sOnly Time Could Change the Cruelty of Tradition… Only Their Love Could Survive It… — In a small village in a valley everyone who reaches the age of 70 must leave the village and go to a certain mountain top to die. If anyone should refuse he/she would disgrace their family. Old Orin is 69. This winter it is her turn to go to the mountain. But first she must make sure that her eldest son Tatsuhei finds a wife.
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Burning of the Imperial Palace
Beijing The 1860sDramatization of events from the Second Opium War which culminated in the looting and destruction of imperial estate "Yuan Ming Yuan", AKA the Old Summer Palace by invading English and French troops.
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Qiu Jin
Beijing Zhejiang Province Tokyo Prefecture The 1890s The 1900sBiopic of Qiu Jin (1877-1907), early Chinese feminist and martyred revolutionary.
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Anna Pavlova
England 🇫🇷 France 🇷🇺 Russia The 1930s The 1900s The 19th CenturyThe young talented girl Anya, dreaming of a ballet, enters the choreographic school. Due to poor health, learning for her becomes unbearably difficult, but dreams of a ballerina career make her stubbornly deal with adversity. Anna’s performance and determination does not go unnoticed by the celebrated choreographer Marius Petipa, who helps to stage Pavlova's examination performance. Such a gift becomes a starting point for Ani in the world of big ballet, her fast-paced career, position in high society and world fame make her forget about close friends and especially her faithful Michel Fokine, who invested a lot of energy in the formation of a ballerina.
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Gandhi
England 🇮🇳 India 🇿🇦 South Africa The 1940s The 1930s The 1920s The 1910s The 1900s The 1890sHis triumph changed the world forever. — In the early years of the 20th century, Mohandas K. Gandhi, a British-trained lawyer, forsakes all worldly possessions to take up the cause of Indian independence. Faced with armed resistance from the British government, Gandhi adopts a policy of 'passive resistance', endeavouring to win freedom for his people without resorting to bloodshed.
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The Queen of Spades
🇷🇺 Russia The 1820sHermann is an officer of the engineers in the Imperial Russian Army. He constantly watches the other officers gamble, but never plays himself. One night, Tomsky tells a story about his grandmother, an elderly countess. Many years ago, in France, she lost a fortune at cards, and then won it back with the secret of the three winning cards, which she learned from the notorious Count of St. Germain. Hermann becomes obsessed with obtaining the secret.
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The House Where Evil Dwells
Kyoto Prefecture The 1980s The 1840sAn ancient curse has turned their lives into a nightmare of lust and revenge. — At the prompting of his diplomat friend, Alex, writer Ted Fletcher takes his wife, Laura, and daughter, Amy, on an extended working holiday. Alex finds a house for them in Kyoto, Japan, and the Fletchers move in, laughing off rumors that the place is haunted. But the ghost of 19th-century samurai Shigero turns out to be very real, and is intent on making the family re-enact an ancient murder-suicide.
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The Prodigal Son
Guangdong Province The 1850sThe fighting men in Chinese opera house — A rich man's son believes himself to be the best kung fu fighter in Canton. Unfortunately, his father, anxious for his son's safety, bribes all his opponents to lose. After a humiliating defeat at the hands of an actor in a traveling theatre company, the son resolves to find a better teacher.
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Umrao Jaan
🇮🇳 India The 1840sAmiran is sold to a brothel by a corrupt cop after her father testifies against him. Many years later, she grows up to be an accomplished poetess and a renowned courtesan, Umrao Jaan.
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