I spend quite an amount of time with reading and during the years, some books became favourits. On the other hand, my tv is not much used, but sometimes I enjoy a night out to the cinema...

Here a list of my favourit films and books (I have to say that most books, especially the ones listed here, are at the same time great films too)...

FILMS

science fiction: The Matrix

Neo seeks the truth about the Matrix. Only one man has the answer, an
elusive dangerous man who is known as Morpheus. A stranger called Trinity
invites Neo to follow a white rabbit which guides him into a parallel world.
Reality is a world run by artificially intelligent machines who control the
human slaves in a simulated 20th Century....


true story: Seven years in Tibet

Heinrich Harrer sets out with friend Peter Aufschnaiter to climb one of the
highest peaks in the Himalayas. He experiences an emotional awakening on his
journey but then is interned in a British prisoner-of-war camp. A two year
trek follows his escape and he then enters a land few westerners have
visited. A true story based on the best selling book by Heinrich Harrer.


love story: The Bridges of Madison County

A photographer arrives in Madison County to do a shoot. There he meets a
bored housewife on her own for a few days. From that moment their lives
changed forever.


comedy: Forrest Gump

The story of Forrest Gump, an innocent and childlike man, who found himself
present for many of the most memorable events in American history from the
1950s through to the 1970s. Forrest, however, was for the most part, totally
oblivious to the significance of his actions... Based on the novel by
Winston Groom.



BOOKS


Sleepers - by Lorenzo Carcaterra

The true story of a group of four boys brought up in New York's notorious
Mafia-run "Hell's Kitchen" during the 1960s. After nearly causing a man's
death, they were sent to a reformatory where guards routinely brutalized
them, leaving them with nothing but an undying loyalty to one another.


The Horse Whisperer - by Nicholas Evans

Nicholas Evans's best-selling Horse Whisperer is a story of tragedy,
soul-searching and unabashed romance. When the Graves family--13-year-old
daughter Grace, high-powered, highly charged Annie, and her lawyer husband
Robert--is struck by tragedy, each searches for their own way to come to
terms with it. Annie thinks if she can fix Grace's physically and
spiritually battered horse, she'll mend her daughter's maimed soul in the
process. And so the search for the mythical horse whisperer begins. He
appears in the form of Tom Booker--a handsome, rugged, sensitive Montana
cowboy. The story travels from Upstate New York to Manhattan, then makes an
eventful detour through the glorious foothills of the Rocky Mountains.
--Colleen Preston


Memoirs of a Geisha - by Arthur Golden

Summoning up more than 20 years of Japan's most dramatic history, the
geisha's story uncovers a hidden world of eroticism and enchantment,
exploitation and degradation. It moves from a small fishing village in 1929
to the glamorous and decadent Kyoto of the 30s and on to postwar New York.


Not withouth my daughter - by Betty Mahmoody

'You are here for the rest of your life. Do you understand? You are not
leaving Iran. You are here until you die.'
Betty Mahmoody and her husband, Dr Sayyed Bozorg Mahmoody ('Moody'), came to
Iran from the USA to meet Moody's family. With them was their four-year-old
daughter, Mahtob. Appalled by the squalor of their living conditions,
horrified by what she saw of a country where women are merely chattels and
Westerners are despised, Betty soon became desperate to return to the
States. But Moody, and his often vicious family, had other plans. Mother and
daughter became prisoners of an alien culture, hostages of an increasingly
tyrannical and violent man.
Betty began to try to arrange an escape. Evading Moody's sinister spy
network, she secretly met sympathisers opposed to Khomeini's savage regime.
But every scheme that was suggested to her meant leaving Mahtob behind for
ever...
Eventually, Betty was given the name of a man who would plan their perilous
route out of Iran, a journey that few women or children had ever made. Their
nightmare attempt to return home began in a bewildering snowstorm...


The Whale Rider - by Witi Ihimaera

Eight-year-old Kahu, a member of the Maori tribe of Whangara,New Zealand, fights to prove her love, her leadership, and her destiny. Her people claim descent from Kahutia Te Rangi, the legendary "whale rider." In every generation since Kahutia, a male heir has inherited the title of chief. But now there is no male heir, and the aging chief is desperate to find a successor. Kahu is his only great-grandchild--and Maori tradition has no use for a girl. But when hundreds of whales beach themselves and threaten the future of the Maori tribe, it is Kahu who saves the tribe when she reveals that she has the whale rider's ancient gift of communicating with whales.