Does the Duolingo owl haunt your dreams? Are you keen on practising your language skills, but travel as a first option seems out of reach? Or perhaps you're looking for gripping movies and TV shows in a language you've spoken all your life. Either way, SBS On Demand's Browse by Language collection hub makes finding great viewing from across the globe easier.
Featuring 16 languages, from Arabic to Vietnamese via Chinese, Danish, Hindi, Persian and more, this collection brings together a wide range of movies and TV series. Along with a chance to discover masterful storytelling in movies and drama series from around the world, you might also find intriguing documentaries or travel shows.
Here are just a few of the outstanding films, TV series and documentaries to be found in the Browse by Language collection.
Home In You (Arabic)
During the picture-perfect dinner scene in its opening minutes, you’d be forgiven for thinking that Home In You (Halva Halva in Swedish) is just a sitcom about a loving Lebanese family in suburban Stockholm. But then writer-creators Alexander Abdallah and Mustafa Al-Mashhadani pull the rug from under them: the Haddad family are about to either have their rent doubled or face eviction, and nobody has a clue what to do about it.
This dilemma is the lynchpin of this dramedy, which is a vivid tapestry of the trials of immigrant life. While Sweden is the series’ setting, Home In You makes astute observations about the broader dynamics of immigrants trying to carve out lives in any rich, Western country. And while it tackles serious topics, it’s careful to never take itself too seriously, pulling back the curtain on the Haddad family’s upbeat outlook with thoughtful touches of humour.
Home In You is streaming at SBS On Demand.
Last Train Home (Mandarin Chinese)
Every year, 130 million migrant workers in China travel back to their hometowns for Chinese New Year. This mass migration – the world’s largest human migration – is called Chunyun, and Last Train Home peeps into but a mere fragment of what this exodus can look like.
The multi-award-winning documentary follows the haunting story of the Zhang couple, who have worked in a garment factory in Guangzhou for almost two decades. Director Lixin Fan travels with the pair for years, documenting their tumultuous relationship with her daughter, who they have only seen once a year since she was born 16 years ago.
Last Train Home is streaming at SBS On Demand.
The Seed of the Sacred Fig (Persian)
Four weeks into shooting his latest film, Mohammad Rasoulof was sentenced to eight years in prison and lashings in Iran.
In Iran, making movies can be a dangerous business. Filmmaking laws are strict and regulated by the government. Filmmakers must get a production and screening permit from the Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance and cannot show anything that might go against the rules of the Islamic Republic.
For example, women must appear in the hijab; singing and dancing are not permitted; sexual and romantic contact — like a hug or a kiss — cannot be depicted; and the film cannot criticise the Iranian government or Islam.
The Seed of the Sacred Fig breaks all these rules.
The film is interlaced with social media footage of the Woman, Life, Freedom protests, including videos of people being arrested, beaten up and murdered on the streets of Tehran.
Rasoulof’s decision to include this real-world vision was both a consequence of filming logistics and because of their sheer power.
The Seed of the Sacred Fig is now streaming at SBS On Demand.
Drive My Car (Korean)
Beloved Japanese author Haruki Murakami, speaking to The New Yorker in 2014, relayed that the intention behind his short story collection "Men Without Women" – mischievously lifting its title from Ernest Hemingway – was to convey, “in a word, isolation, and what it means emotionally.”
It’s a theme expanded upon with tender, patient generosity in prolific director Ryûsuke Hamaguchi’s ravishing film about the aftermath of grief, Drive My Car. Adapted with co-writer Takamasa Oe from the short story of the same name in Men Without Women, it’s the sort of gently unfurled film that overwhelms you with quiet power over the course of three barely noticed hours.
Taking home three awards from the 2021 Cannes Film Festival, including Best Screenplay, it scored a brace of Oscar award nominations, and won Best International Feature Film.
Drive My Car is now streaming at SBS On Demand.
Babylon Berlin (German)
This tense neo-noir TV series set in Berlin during the 1920s – a time marked by political unrest, poverty, wealth disparities and decadent hedonism – follows a young detective, Gereon Rath (Volker Bruch), newly arrived in Berlin, who is investigating a series of blackmail cases which he believes are part of an extortion ring. Along the way he teams up with his partner, an old-school policeman, and also a female police clerk (with a secret life as a part-time sex worker in order to make ends meet) who dreams of becoming a detective. Across four seasons (with the final season set in the early 1930s) Babylon Berlin is visually stunning, politically intriguing and even romantic at times.
All four seasons of Babylon Berlin are now streaming at SBS On Demand.
Margrete: Queen of the North (Danish)
Margrete: Queen of the North was one of the largest productions in the history of Danish cinema, with the largest budget ever for a Danish-language feature film – so expect elaborate costumes and set designs that will transport you to a different time and place.
The year is 1402. Queen Margrete has successfully pulled Denmark, Norway and Sweden into a union which she rules, and has arranged for her adopted son Erik to marry English royalty Philippa to solidify an alliance. However, threads begin to unravel, and Margrete’s power is threatened when Olaf, her birth son, reappears (after supposedly dying 15 years ago) to claim the throne.
Margrete: Queen of the North is now streaming at SBS On Demand.
Apples (Greek)
Amidst a worldwide pandemic that causes sudden amnesia, middle-aged Aris (Aris Servetalis) finds himself enrolled in a recovery program designed to help unclaimed patients build new identities.
Prescribed daily tasks on cassette tapes so he can create new memories and document them on camera, Aris slides back into ordinary life, meeting Anna (Sofia Georgovasili), a woman who is also in recovery.
Through images deadpan, strange and surreal, Greek writer-director Christos Nikou posits a beguiling reflection on memory, identity, and loss, exploring how a society might handle an irreversible epidemic through one man’s story of self-discovery.
Are we the sum of the images we compile and display of ourselves, or are we something richer, and deeper?
Apples is streaming at SBS On Demand.
What’s Your Raashee? (Hindi)
Do not be fooled by IMDB’s 4.8-star rating, this Hindi rom-com played on repeat in Desi households in the early 2000s.
Yogesh is a university student at Chicago, who is set to inherit his grandfather’s wealth once he gets married. When his family gets wind of this, and find themselves desperate for cash, they blackmail him to find a girl and settle down. So, Yogesh sets out to meet 12 women (who all happen to be played by Priyanka Chopra in what is a record-breaking number of roles for one actor), one from each Rashee or sun sign.
Is it bonkers? Yes. Does the plot make any sense? No. But it was an icon of its time, and we’re going to put some respect on its name!
What’s Your Raashee? is streaming at SBS On Demand.
Mussolini: Son of the Century (Italian)
This critically acclaimed biographical historical drama series follows the ascent of infamous Italian dictator Mussolini, from his early career in 1919, through his seduction of an entire nation, and eventually to the assassination of socialist Giacomo Matteotti in 1924.
While certainly a meditation on the allure of fascism to the disenfranchised, Mussolini: Son of the Century also explores the way fascists weaponise toxic ideals of masculinity and scrutinises the banality of evil.
Mussolini: Son of the Century is now streaming at SBS On Demand.
Three Star Bar (Japanese)
Amamiya (Keita Machida), Nakauchi (Kisetsu Fujiwara), and Kobayashi (Morisaki Win) were once high school classmates. The former was class president and an honours student, Nakauchi was quiet and reserved with a penchant for cooking, and Kobayashi was a womanising charmer.
Ten years after they graduated, fate reunites them: Nakauchi has gone on to become a budding chef, but after he loses his sense of taste, he quits his job. He runs into Amamiya, who is working as a bartender in a quiet establishment called the Three Star Bar in Tokyo’s Nishi Ogikubo District.
The bar has been left to Kobayashi, who became an overnight sensation as a writer with his debut novel, but has been in a funk ever since. Kobayashi’s grandfather, the bar’s previous owner, left the bar to his grandson, who has agreed to keep the place running until he and Amamiya empty the pantry of the canned food that was left. He and Kobayashi convince Nakauchi to join them as their canned food “chef.” Together, they end up making a pretty formidable team: With the always accommodating Amamiya ready to lift the mood with a cocktail, the barfly-like Kobayashi on hand with sage words of advice, and Nakauchi cooking up a storm in the kitchen, the place becomes a hit with appreciative customers. The clients come here with problems, but usually leave with them solved, thanks to these remarkable men...but what will happen when the canned food begins to run out?
Three Star Bar is now streaming at SBS On Demand.
Like Water for Chocolate (Spanish)
Like Water for Chocolate is the first adaption of the beloved and iconic novel in more than 30 years, a successor to the iconic 1992 film by Alfonso Arau. Produced by Salma Hayek, the TV series is visually stunning and a perfect gateway into Mexican magical realism.
Set during the Mexican revolution, the series follows Tita De La Garza, the youngest of three daughters raised on a ranch by their cruel and domineering mother. Tita wants to marry the love of her life, but her mother forbids her so, wanting Tita to stay at home forever to look after her. Outraged and devastated, Tita’s emotions begin flowing into her cooking and influencing those around her.
Like Water for Chocolate is now streaming at SBS On Demand.
The movie is also streaming at SBS On Demand.
Faithless (Swedish)
"I remember being completely floored by this story; it struck me deep inside with a single blow," says acclaimed director Tomas Alfredson of his first encounter with Faithless, multi-award winning filmmaker Ingmar Bergman's tale of the tangled and torn relationship between three people, told across two time periods.
Said to be inspired by events that took place in Bergman's own live, Faithless in the original screenplay was the story of an old man who talks with an woman conjured by his imagination, harking back to events of the past. In the new version, the woman is real.
In 2000, Bergman's screenplay was made into a film directed by Liv Ullmann. It was seeing this film that inspired Alfredson to create his own version, a project that took two attempts before making it onto the screen as a gripping, stylish six-part drama series.
Faithless is streaming at SBS On Demand.
The Turkish Detective (Turkish)
Detective Mehmet Suleyman (Ethan Kai) is a stranger in a land he used to call home. He’s returned to Istanbul for reasons he’d rather not disclose – you’re right to raise a suspicious eyebrow at that – and now he’s trying to fit into a unit led by the larger-than-life Inspector Cetin Ikmen (Haluk Bilginer). The teenage fiancé of a wealthy businessman has been found murdered; he’s going to have to hit the ground running.
The Turkish Detective (based on the popular Inspector Ikmen novels by Barbara Nadel) is the kind of series that knows a good mystery requires three things: twisty plots, an interesting setting, and a lead detective we’re happy to follow through both the others. And why stop at one detective when you can have two?
The Turkish Detective is now streaming at SBS On Demand.
The Real Sister (Vietnamese)
A secretly ill sister-in-law gathers her four younger sisters for a family reunion under the pretence of repairing their ancestral house before a storm. However, what begins as a memorial gathering soon spirals into its own storm of chaos as shocking secrets and long-standing tensions put the sisters' fragile bond to the test.
The Real Sister is now streaming at SBS On Demand.
Black Daisies (Polish)
Darker than Dark, but not quite as strange as Stranger Things, Black Daisies is a Polish crime drama that does things a little differently. A standout at MIPCOM in 2023 and one of Variety’s top picks from the show, Black Daisies contains all the typical hallmarks of a European procedural, but it has an added genre-blending edge that makes for unpredictable viewing.
Amidst the echoes of a small town's past, Lena, a haunted geologist, faces her worst fear: her estranged teenage daughter vanishes alongside kindergarten children in her care.
Returning to her hometown, Lena partners with Rafal, a childhood friend now a policeman. Together, they uncover a chilling link to a local businesswoman with a dark facade of philanthropy.
As they navigate an eerie underworld of abandoned tunnels and lurking dangers, a question emerges: Could the town's history hold the key? Lena and Rafal's journey intertwines present and past, unveiling a truth that could reshape the town's destiny.
Black Daisies is now streaming at SBS On Demand.
Escort Boys (French)
In Camargue, France, four boys in dire straits find themselves selling their bodies for money. Unexperienced but helped by their mischievous little sister Charly, they start an Escort Boys business, a unique business in the area.
Every encounter they have becomes a life lesson for them and for their female clients. Through family, lies and surprising demands, they’ll have to learn how to navigate to get their family business back. Will they make it?
Escort Boys is now streaming at SBS On Demand.
Explore more in the BROWSE BY LANGUAGE COLLECTION at SBS On Demand.
