A most intriguing work from Germany is Denis Gansel's feature film "The Wave," in which a high-school teacher's attempt to make his students understand — and experience — what autocracy is, leads to chilling results. And A German/Azerbaijani film on a considerable lighter side is the charming "Absurdistan," directed by Viet Helmer. Making up in outrageous creativity for what it might lack in flawless professionalism, it's a delightful over-the-top romp through the daily happenings in a made-up country where the women finally retaliate against their lazy husbands by splitting the village into the men's side and the women's side.

The very droll and snail-paced "I Always Wanted to Be a Gangster" from France is not likely to hold the interest of most American viewers. With its four deliberately slow, black-and-white, and basically non-eventful-but-remotely-linked happenings at the same out-of-the-way cafeteria, it's a sort of black humor film that is actually far more gray than black.

The Italian "Riprendimi (Good Morning Heartache)," on the other hand, is well worth your while. It not only deals with a couple breaking up, but it is made more interesting by the fact that the two of them are also being filmed as a study of the lives of part-time theater/entertainment peope by two filmmakers who, along with having their own problems, inadvertently become involved in the situation between the two subjects of their documentary.

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