Life is a complicated journey in which right and wrong are sometimes indistinct and where the things that really matter are often unclear. Bella is a powerful, leisurely-paced film in which Jose (Eduardo Verastegui) and Nina (Tammy Blanchard) struggle to do what's right while seeking meaning in their lives. A quiet, brooding man with a dark past, Jose works as a chef in his brother Manny's (Manny Perez) restaurant where he mostly keeps to himself until young waitress Nina is fired.
Woody Allen stars in Picking Up the Pieces, playing a butcher named Tex who cuts up his adulterous wife (played by Sharon Stone) in a jealous rage. On his way to bury the pieces, he loses her hand on the side of the road, where it's found by a blind woman--and miraculously gives her back her sight. Before long, the hand has become a religious relic, drawing huge crowds to the small town of El Nino, New Mexico, and testing the faithlessness of a straying priest (David Schwimmer), who's in love with the town's leading prostitute (Maria Gracia Cucinotta, from Il Postino).
