Films :: 9th Chennai International Film Festival

AMNESTY / (2011)/Dir: Buyar Alimani/83'mins
For the first time in Albania, a new law is passed that allows sexual intercourse for married couples inside Tirana prison. Elsa travels once a month, from distant Pogradec, to meet her husband at the prison. Spetim also visits the same prison to meet with his wife. A love story between the two visitors will start to grow out of the prison walls until the new Amnesty ruling for the prisoners will make it very difficult for them both

LAS ACACIAS / (2011)/Dir: Pablo Giorgelli/85'mins
Rub�n is a lonely truck driver who has been covering for years the motorway from Asunci�n del Paraguay to Buenos Aires, carrying wood. However, today\'s journey will be different. This morning, in a motorway stop near Asunci�n, Jacinta shows up an hour later to begin a journey by track which is going to take her to Buenos Aires. Wath\'s more, Rub�n finds out at that very moment that little Anah�, who\'s 8 months old, will travel with them- It is not the best beginning. As kilometres go by, th relationship between Rub�n and Jacinta will grow. they will slowly meet and sip into each other\'s soul. None of them talks much about their lives. None asks much either. It\'s a few word journey but it is not a silent one.

NO RETURN / (2010)/Dir: MIGUEL COHAN/106'mins
A young boy is killed in a hit and run accident. The driver leaves no trail but the victim�s father, helped by the media, won�t rest until he is found and brought to justice. However, a series of unfortunate events and a justice system contaminated by public opinion, lead an innocent man to be accused.Caught in a web spun by fate and desperate decisions, these men must face guilt, responsibility and a deep need for redemption, in a spiral with no return

OPEKKHA (WAITING) / (2011)/Dir: Abu Sayeed/121'mins
Rabiul and Ranju are two young men of two different districts of Bangladesh. Rabiul stays in Dhaka for his passion for singing. He was brought up by his grandmother who is his only relative living in village. Grandma writes letters regularly to him. Rabiul�s grandmother has problems with her memory.

MISS MOUCHE- MISS FLY / (2010)/Dir: Bernard Halut/82'mins
Following a car crash, Sophie (Val�rie Bauchau) lies in a coma. Her husband, C�dric (Bernard Cogniaux), tries to bring her back to consciousness by playing a slew of videos shot on a cell phone over the months preceding the accident by their daughter Nina (Mona Jab�). That is how he discovers, among other facts, that his wife has a lover. From the kids perspective, the familys fabric comes undone. Nina hates her mother's lover, Arnaud (Thierry de Coster), a wealthy businessman and find (reluctantly) shelter with her grandmother, Annie (Chantal Pirotte), an old hippie who tries to mind her own life but find herself involved (reluctantly as well) with the life of her son, her daughter-in-law and the grand-daughter she, initially, didn't want to take care of. Nina's parents are so entangled in a mad race for wealth and status that they fail to see their own daughters growing pains, or their own life slipping away from them

MAN WITHOUT A CELL PHONE / (2010)/Dir: Sameh Zoabi/83'mins
Twenty-something Palestinian-Israeli slacker Jawdat just wants to have fun with his friends, talk on his cell phone and find love. Instead, he navigates unconvincing dates with Muslim, Christian, and even Jewish girls, and wrestles with the Hebrew college entrance exam. Meanwhile, his curmudgeonly olive-farming father, Salem, is determined to drag Jawdat and his whole community into a fight against a nearby Israeli cell phone tower that he fears is poisoning the villagers with radiation. As Salem�s efforts to remove the tower disrupt Jawdat�s precious cell phone reception, preventing any further communication with his potential girlfriends, Jawdat is forced to face the battle and grow up to be a man.

HIST�RIAS QUE S� EXISTEM QUANDO S�O LEMBRADAS / (2011)/Dir: Julia Murat/98'mins
Each citizen of Jotuomba plays an integral role in village life. Madalena is responsible for baking bread; each morning she stacks her rolls as Antonio prepares the coffee. The two share a morning ritual of arguments and insults, followed by an amicable cup of coffee on the bench outside Antonio's shop. At midday the church bells ring, summoning the villagers to mass. In the early evening, they all share a meal together. And so life proceeds in Jotuomba, the days languidly drifting into one another. The only variations seem to be in the weather. One day Rita arrives looking for a place to stay. She came upon the village while traveling through the valley, following the unused railroad tracks. She is a photographer, intent on capturing the village's special allure. Initially reticent, the townsfolk gradually open up to her, sharing their stories and allowing themselves to be photographed. Rita is comfortable with technologies old and new, and Madalena teaches her to knead dough by the light of an oil lamp. Only the village priest continues to find Rita's presence worrisome, especially when she begins asking about the locked cemetery.

HDSP(Hunting Down Small Predator) / (2010)/Dir: Cvetodar Markov/100'mins
A young man has trouble communicating with people and is seeing a shrink. He falls in love at first sight, then meets three friends and joins their small community. The four youngsters naively decide to make some easy money by blackmailing an elderly woman. Little do they know that a stranger with a shady past and problematic present will turn their lives upside down. A story about love and despair, hope and disillusionment, revenge and revelation.

LORA FROM MORNING TILL EVENING / (2011)/Dir: Dimitar Kotzev/93'mins
Lora from Morning till Evening gathers in a nice urban adventure with fair portions of laughter and mystical dice a few wonderful young people who don't even suspect how many problems there could appear from wishes come true. The answer is enough to fill a whole day.

JO FOR JONATHAN / (2010)/Dir: Maxime Giroux/81'mins
Jo lives in the shadow of his older brother. Amidst a world of delinquency, they become interested in illegal car racing. One night they participate in of them, never reaching the finish line. Jo will become Jonathan.

Wet LandS / (2011)/Dir: Guy �doin/111'mins
On a dairy farm in the Eastern Townships, in the middle of a drought and while the land is parching, a drama will disrupt the life of the Santerre family. Confronted to each other they will have to learn to forgive.

PAINTING LESSONS / (2011)/Dir: Pablo Perelman/85'mins
During the 60s in Chile, a country boy, son, unmarried teenage mother, shows a prodigious talent for painting. Its discoverer, the owner of a drugstore located on the outskirts of a small provincial town, is, in turn, an amateur painter. Tried to make as small an artist of his picture books.

CASE SENSITIVE / (2011)/Dir: Gil Kofman/94'mins
CASE SENSITIVE is a psychological thriller about an internet star � MissTullips22 � who contrives her own abduction to get more subscribers to her video blog channel. Unfortunately, one of her fans � Li Bao Bao � takes her plight seriously, and upon trying to rescue her, ends up killing her �captor� � who turns out to be her boyfriend. Rather than reporting the death, a frightened and angry Lee decides to continue entertaining viewers with scenes from an abduction that has taken a sharp turn from fiction to fact. But having recently been exposed as an internet fraud, no one believes MissTullips� online pleas for help. And like the girl who cried wolf, her appearances on the video blogs only serve as ironic counterpoint to the reality of her imprisonment.

BLACK BLOOD / (2011)/Dir: Miaoyan Zhang/123'mins
Miaoyan Zhang�s beautifully shot bitter drama Black Blood is a simple, but grippingly absorbing, story of an impoverished Chinese family in remote northwestern China who resort to selling their blood as the only way to try and survive. The film, which premiered at the Rotterdam Film Festival, is Zhang�s second film and received post-production support from the festival�s Hubert Bals Fund

The Colours of the Mountains/Los colores de la montana / (2010)/Dir: Carlos Cesar Arbelaez/90'mins
Manuel, 9, has an old ball with which he plays football every day in the countryside. He dreams of becoming a great goalkeeper. His wishes seem set to come true when Ernest, his father, gives him a new ball. But an unexpected accident sends the ball flying into a minefield. Despite the danger, Manuel refuses to abandon his treasure... He convinces Juli�n and Poca Luz, his two friends, to rescue it with him. Amid the adventures and kids' games, the signs of armed conflict start to appear in the lives of the inhabitants of 'La Pradera'.

THE ABANDONED / (2010)/Dir: Adis Bakrach/88'mins
In a post-war Sarajevo, we are introduced to the �Days of New Meetings� home for abandoned and delinquent children. The children are given basic schooling, taught domestic skills, and are even exposed to art and culture by the sympathetic manager and loving head mistress. Alen (Tony Grga), a kind-hearted thirteen-year-old boy, dreams of being reunited with his mother, who he believes is a journalist traveling through Europe. Sento, the home�s devious benefactor, plays on Alen�s hopes, promising to reveal his mother�s location in exchange for errands of petty theft and drug deals. When one such errand ends in violence, Alen is forced to leave his home and is left on his own. In a turn of events Alen is taken in by a caring family, but will he be able to escape the betrayal he has experienced in his past?

HABANA EVA / (2010)/Dir: Fina Torres/106'mins
In a Havana shaken by Fidel�s retirement, a young seamstress,stifled working in a clothing factory, dreams of becoming a fashion designer. She has no support from her Cuban boyfriend, who is adorable but lazy. Her life changes when she meets a dazzling and very capitalistic ex-patriot, who fans her hopes but is on a greedy personal mission. After many twists, deceptions, and surprises, Eva has to choose between these two men she loves. Hers is an unexpected decision. A humorous metaphor of Cuba�s future options

NOTHING's ALL BAD / (2010)/Dir: Mikkel Munch-Fals/93'mins
Follows the lives of four longing souls. Ingeborg who feels unattractive and young Jonas who is so attractive that he can literally sell some of what he's got. Anna, a young beautiful woman with a physical disability, and Anders, a tender man with a psychological disability. Four people yearning for love, four people, each hoping for a better tomorr

SKY SKRABER / (2010)/Dir: Rune Schj�tt/90'mins
A poetic coming of age love story with a touch of black comedy. 17-year-old Jon is more than surprised when Edith, the beautiful shopkeeper's daughter, asks for help with a very private sexual matter. Jon agrees to help � maybe because she's blind and just as much an outsider as he is. You see, Jon is blamed for everything that goes wrong in this sleepy little town, be it a sick animal or even the bus driver's hiccups. Everybody says it was Jon's fault that the town's very first traffic light was ruined eight years ago and just like that, the wheels of progress came grinding to a halt here. Jon's father is the first to remind him of this in an attempt to keep Jon from growing up. But there's no stopping puberty and Jon is determined to help Edith on her way, even if it's helping her lose her virginity.

OUT OF BOUNDS / (2011)/Dir: Frederikke Asp�ck/90'mins
A desolate, windswept island. Stella and Oskar, a young couple, visit her father Nathan, who lives a lone life in the company of his labrador dog. Stella is pregnant and looking forward to the birth of her baby, but Oskar appears to be in doubt. When Oskar falls prey to Nathan's provocations and feels bewildered by the relationship between father and daughter, a clash between the two men is inevitable and Stella is caught in between.

HAWY / (2010)/Dir: Ibrahim El-Batout/112'mins
Youssef (40 years old ) gets out of 5 years solitary imprisonment. It seems that they let him out just to hand in the documents that he kept hiding for a long time. In Alexandria, he meets Ibrahim and Fady, with whom he shared the same prison 20 years ago. What unites all the 3 characters is their despair that resembles the eternal sea of Alexandria in its vastness, but Alexandria with all her charm couldn't convince Youssef to stay alive for more than ten days

MESSAGES FROM THE SEA / (2010)/Dir: Daoud Abdel Sayed/133'mins
A man with a speech problem (Assin) goes back to visit the city of his youth after living at sea. He befriends a bodyguard and reunites with his old childhood lover. He falls in love with a stripper (Basma) and encounters a youth (Mounier).

THE TRAVELLER / (2009)/Dir: Ahmed Maher/125'mins
Three days in a man's life, three crucial days in his long existence. Day one. Autumn 1948, Port Said. It is Hassan's first day at work but a telegram arrives and he has to set sail across the Atlantic. On the ship he meets the beautiful Nura: It is love at first sight for them both and it will be consummated that very day, also because of the arrival of the man Nura has already promised to marry. Day two. Autumn 1973. Alexandria of Egypt. Hassan is in the city to meet Nadia, Nura's daughter, at the deathbed of her twin brother. From what the children say, Hassan is led to believe he is Nadia's father. Day three. Autumn 2001, Cairo. Hassan is in the city to meet Al�, Nadia's son. They begin seeing one another and Hassan observes numerous similarities with the boy...

I HIRED A CONTRACT KILLER / (1990)/Dir: Aki Kaurismaki/79'mins
After fifteen years' service, Henri Boulanger is made redundant from his job. Shocked, he attempts suicide, but can't go through with it, so he hires a contract killer in a seedy bar to murder him at some unspecified time in the future. But almost immediately he meets and falls in love with argaret, a flower-seller, which makes Henri realise that his life has some meaning after all. But when he goes back to the bar to cancel the contract, he finds it has been demolished - and there's no way he can get in touch with the killer...

LENINGRAD COWBOYS GO AMRICA / (1994)/Dir: Aki Kaurismaki/94'mins
Picking up where Leningrad Cowboys Go America left off, the band has settled in Mexico after charting a top ten hit there. However, many band members become alcoholics spending most of their day drinking tequila. Before long, more than half of the band members have died from excessive drinking. The surviving members have, in the mean time, become naturalized Mexicans.Down on their luck, the band is contacted by their manager Vladimir (Matti Pellonp��) who, after going through an experience of being born again, now calls himself Moses. Moses has secured a gig for the band at Coney Island which must now cross the Mexico�United States border illegally as a CIA agent (Andr� Wilms) is on their tail. Afterwards, Moses helps the remaining members return to the Promised Land (Siberia) so that they can rebuild the band.

SHADOWS IN PARADISE / (1986)/Dir: Aki Kaurismaki/76'mins
Only connect. In gray, class-conscious Helsinki, Nikander is a stoic, solitary garbage man. Cigarettes, coffee, bingo games, and English lessons border his circumscribed life. There are few words, no smiles, and no laughter. Violence and the threat of violence seem close at hand. Ilona, a supermarket clerk who frequently loses her job, bandages Nikander's hand one evening; later he gets her out of a jam, and they begin an on-again off-again relationship. "Why do I keep losing?," Nikander asks his co-worker, Melartin, a man Nikander met in jail and helped get a job. Can he break his losing streak?

CALAMARI UNION / (1985)/Dir: Aki Kaurismaki/80'mins
Fourteen desperate men named Frank, band together to escape from a repressive section of Helsinki. An English-speaking non-Frank named Pekka joins the barroom conspirators, whose avoidance of last names, and any affect, help them outsmart overwhelming forces as they sneak through dark subway tunnels and alleys, hoping against despair to reach magical seaside Eira. The Calamari Unionists take advantage of unending night to venture their intrepid journey.

TOP FLOOR LEFT WING / (2010)/Dir: Angelo Cianci/110'mins
Fran�ois, a forty-something bailiff, is about to execute his daily eviction. But fate takes an unexpected turn: as he enters the apartment, he is mistakenly taken hostage by an amateur drug dealer and his father. Keen to resolve this situation quickly and quietly, the local deputy calls in the Special Police Force. Television crews immediately rush to the scene to make the scoop. Now under crossfire from a dozen snipers, hungry cameramen, a curious crowd, and Fran�ois' exasperated wife, the three trapped men prepare their escape. Their only option: use the neighborhood's discontentment and start a riot from the 7th floor...

MY LITTLE PRINCESS / (2011)/Dir: Eva Ionesco/105'mins
Violetta, 10 years old, lives in a small apartment with her grandmother. Her mother, Hannah is an unpredictable photographer who lives off the patronage of her friend Ernst, a famous painter. One day, Hannah forces Violetta to pose as a model. The pictures quickly get hyped up among the Parisian crowd of the 70�s and Violetta gets into the game. In between the frontier of her sudden rise as a new provocative star and her dull childhood, her fairy tale turns into sufferings. A portrait of the 70's and a reflection on the limits of artistic creation.

THE PRIZE / (2011)/Dir: Paula Markovitch/99'mins
Ceci, a seven year old girl, has to keep a huge secret, but she doesn�t completely understand what the secret is about. The life of her family depends on her silence. But what exactly must she keep silent about? Ceci and her mom live hidden from military repression in Argentina. Ceci asks herself: what must she say? What should she really believe and do in order to deserve the love of her mother and others?

FLESH MEMORIES / (2011)/Dir: Dominique Maillet/104'mins
After a fifteen-year exile, Thomas come back home to bury his father, a Republican fitghter thrown in jail by Franco's regime who just died without ever regaining his freedom. The story of Thomas is the story of a man alone, back in a country he barely knows: his country... A country where antic hates and revenges brew endlessly...

AMERICAN TRANSLATION / (2011)/Dir: Pascal Arnold - Jean-Marc Barr/109'mins
A love grows from a chance encounter between Chris and Aurore. They are twenty years old and their passion is exclusive. It's a beautiful love story like you see in the movies... But then Aurore discovers that Chris is a killer. Will she continue to live passionately, an accomplice in spite of herself, or denounce the one she loves in spite of everthing?

HEAT WAVE / (2011)/Dir: Jean-Jacques Jauffret/92'mins
A modern drama freely based on real events. One sweltering afternoon in the south of France, four lives intersect: those of St�phane and Luigi, two cousins barely out of adolescence, Georges, a retired worker, Amelie, Luigi's girlfriend, and Anne, Amelie's mother. Four mundane lives full of hurts, humiliations, fears and fatigue which converge on a tragedy.

SERVICE ENTRANCE ((The Woman on the Sixth Floor) / (2010)/Dir: Philippe Le Guay/104'mins
Paris, in the early 1960s. Jean-Louis Joubert is a serious but uptight stockbroker, married to Suzanne, a starchy class-conscious woman and father of two arrogant teenage boys, currently in a boarding school. The affluent man lives a steady yet boring life. At least until, due to fortuitous circumstances, Maria, the charming new maid at the service of Jean-Louis' family, makes him discover the servants' quarter on the sixth floor of the luxury building he owns and lives in. There live a crowd of lively Spanish maids who will help Jean-Louis to open to a new civilization and a new approach of life. In their company - and more precisely in the company of beautiful Maria - Jean-Louis will gradually become another man, a better man.

THE SNOWS OF KILIMANJARO / (2011)/Dir: Robert Gu�diguian/107'mins
Despite losing his job, Michel lives happily with Marie-Claire his wife and their loving children and grandchildren, surrounded by their friends. In love for more than thirty years, they are proud of their union and political struggles, for their conscience is as clear as their view of life.This happiness will be shattered when two young armed and masked men beat them up, tie them up, and snatch their wedding rings and their lifetime savings. The shock will be even more violent when they discover that this brutal attack was organized by one of the young workers laid off at the same time as Michel, by one of their own people.

HOUSE OF TOLERANCE / (2011)/Dir: Bertrand Bonello/122'mins
At the dawn of the 20th century, in a house of tolerance in Paris, a prostitute's face bears a scar that sketches a tragic smile. Around the woman who laughs, the lives of the other women unfold, with their rivalries, fears, joys and pain. The outside world never enters into this house, where the women remain locked in.

17 GIRLS / (2011)/Dir: Delphine Coulin, Muriel Coulin/90'mins
In a small, seaside town, seventeen teenage girls from the same high school together decide to do something completely unexpected and incomprehensible as far as the boys and adults around them are concerned: To get pregnant at the same time. This film is based on a true story that happened in 2008

A BURNING DESIRE / (2011)/Dir: Bernard Jeanjean/81'mins
Yann and Rose are young and in love and want to have a baby. Nine months later... there is still no baby on the horizon. They show much imagination and try everything... and anything. In fact, anything most of all. Except, wanting so much to be three, do they not risk ending up being alone?

ENSEMBLE C'EST TROP / (2010)/Dir: L�a Fazer/96'mins
Cl�mentine and S�bastien, young, overwhelmed parents, stretched between their work and children, find themselves further burdened with Marie-France, S�bastien's mother, who comes to stay with them after she discovers that her husband Henri has been cheating on her and is now expecting a baby with his mistress. Distraught, Marie-France behaves like a teenager in a crisis, undermining the young couple's authority and morale. The birth of S�bastien's little brother and the blissful euphoria this later-life paternity provokes in his father is the final straw: everyone is left reeling and the order of generations is turned upside down.

HADEWIJCH / (2009)/Dir: Bruno Dumont/120'mins
Shocked by the ecstatic and blind faith of Hadewijch, a novice, the Mother Superior casts her out from the convent. Hadewijch becomes C�line again, a young Parisian and diplomat's daughter. Her loving passion for God, her anger, and her encounter with Yassine and Nassir lead her, between grace and madness, to dangerous territory.

UN POISON VOILENT / (2010)/Dir: Katell Quill�v�r�/92'mins
Anna a young teenager comes home from her Catholic boarding school for the holidays and discovers her father has left. Her mother is devastated and confined in the company of the local priest, who is also a childhood friend. Anna clings to her beloved grandfather. She also grows close to Pierre, a free-spirited teenager who cares little about God. Anna is preparing for her confirmation, but her budding desire for Pierre shakes her faith. She longs to give herself over, body and soul... but doesn't know if it is to God, or something else?

UNE EX�CUTION ORDINAIRE / (2010)/Dir: Marc Dugain/105'mins
A young urologist and healer, who practices in a hospital in the Moscow suburbs, desperately tries to become pregnant to her husband, a disillusioned physician who only survives thanks to the love he feels for his wife. To her horror, she must treat Stalin, who is ill and has recently got rid of his personal doctor. The dictator worms his way into the couple's existence and establishes a relationship,combining confessions and manipulative behavior, with the young woman. Now amiable, now perverse, the monster delivers his art of terror in ways that it has never been seen before.

BELOVED / (2011)/Dir: Christophe Honor�/139'mins
From Paris in the sixties to 21st-century London, Madeleine and her daughter Vera waltz in and out of the lives of the men they love. But not every era allows us to love blithely and lightheartedly. How are we to resist the sands of time that attack our deepest feelings?

TOMBOY / (2011)/Dir: C�line Sciamma/81'mins
Laure is 10 years old. Laure is a tomboy. On her arrival in a new neighborhood, she lets Lisa and her crowd believe that she is a boy. Truth or dare ? Dare.Summer becomes a big playground and Laure pretends to be Michael, a boy like the others... different enough to get the attention of Lisa who falls in love with him. Laure takes advantage of her new identity as if the end of the summer would never reveal her unsettling secret.

LATE BLOOMERS / (2011)/Dir: Julie Gavras/90'mins
In this romantic comedy a man and a woman love each other but everything conspires to drive them apart. Despite their feelings, they separate so they can be together later. But Mary and Adam aren�t your typical 20- or 30-year-old couple; they�re nearing 60. Like many 60-year-old couples of the 21st century, they�re active and gung-ho. They deftly juggle children, grandchildren, work and friends, with all the joys and disappointments which come with married life. Until one day when they realise that to they�ve entered the senior citizen category. Adam now desperately looks for a fountain of youth. Mary deals with the situation by doing what she does best: taking care of her husband and family. Separation becomes inevitable.

THE TRUTH OF THE LIE / (2011)/Dir: Roland Reber/98'mins
Two women are held hostage in a deep basement of an abandoned industrial site. They're chained to the wall, sharing a moldy mattress, some food and a bucket. From time to time their captor drops by in order to torture them, to drive them to the point of breaking. Unfortunately, early into the kidnapping, the captor has made a mistake by letting them know when exactly he is going to release them. On one hand, this gives hope to the women, on the other hand this creates the necessity for maximum cruelty on the captor's side as he wants to break them for that little project of his. The whole situation threatens to escalate when the captor's partner in crime suddenly shows up and makes new demands.

ABOVE US ONLY SKY / (2011)/Dir: Jan Schomburg/88'mins
Who was the man Martha loved and lived with for years? And can he simply be replaced by another? After her husband disappears, Martha begins to realize how little she knew him, and how his life with her was a charade. But instead of coming to terms with her loss, she meets another man who unwittingly keeps her bound to the past...

PINA / (2011)/Dir: Wim Wenders/100'mins
Pina is a film for Pina Bausch. Shot in 3D with the ensemble of the Tanz - theater Wuppertal Pina Bausch, this feature length dance film portrays the exhilarating and inimitable art of this great German choreographer who died in the summer of 2009

SLEEPING SICKNESS / (2011)/Dir: Ulrich K�hler/91'mins
Ebbo and Vera Velten have spent the better part of the past twenty years living in different African countries. Ebbo is the manager of a sleeping sickness programme. His work is fulfilling. Vera, however, feels increasingly lost in Yaounde�s ex-pat community. She can�t bear the separation from her 14-year-old daughter, Helen, who is attending boarding school in Germany. Ebbo must give up his life in Africa or he risks losing the woman he loves. But his fear of returning to a land now remote to him increases with each passing day. Years later. Alex Nzila, a young French doctor of Congolese origin, travels to Cameroon to evaluate a development project. It�s been a long time since he set foot on this continent, but, instead of finding new prospects, he encounters a destructive, lost man. Like a phantom, Ebbo slips away from his evaluator.

MAY BE BANGLADESH / (2010)/Dir: Jochen ,erich� Abel and Carolin Schattenkirchner/50'mins
MAYBE BANGLADESH ... these words, spoken by a Nepalese cook in Bavaria (Germany), set the ball rolling. What we get is a trip of imaginative dimensions. Erich, a musician with itchy feet, wants to track an unlabeled cassette back to where it originated. All because of a haunting voice singing of Govinda. A sound Erich just can�t get out of his head. Will Erich find the singer? Is there a divine plan at work in the background? And just who is Govinda? This simple but captivating tale was documented on video. But rather than a straightforward documentation, the film blends the story of Erich�s journey with fiction and embellishes it with cartoons and humour. MAYBE BANGLADESH is a trove of cinematic delights. It will appeal to anyone with a yearning for a wacky goings-on.

AUF DER SICHEREN SEITE / (2010)/Dir: Lukas Schmid & Corinna Wichmann/80'mins
Nowadays, the majority of people live in cities. Poverty, crime and chaos pose major problems for the often helpless administrations. Finding a secure, distinguished and independent neighborhood presents a growing challenge for the urban middle class. Surprisingly, the solution for all sorts of menaces appears to be the same worldwide: electric fences, high walls, armed security guards and CCTV. The higher income class draws back into private residential enclaves that evolve all over the world. If you belong to those who can afford it, Gated Communities seem to offer a life 'ON THE SAFE SIDE'. The gates of three secluded, high end Gated Communities swung open for this film. We meet Brenda, a real estate agent in Johannesburg, a city that's shaken by crime. R.K. takes us beyond the walls surrounding his home, on a tour through Indian politics, fighting for the improvement of Bangalore's chaotic infrastructure...

THE POLL DIARIES / (2010)/Dir: Chris Kraus/129'mins
On the eve of World War I, a 14-year-old German girl returns to her home on the Baltic coast, a place uneasily shared by Germans, Russians and Estonians. While her morbid scientist father controls the family with a cruel hand, the passionate young girl secretly nurses a wounded Estonian anarchist back to health � an act of curiosity and then of defiance that could set off an uncontrollable chain reaction

HARISMA / (2010)/Dir: Christina Ioakimidi/87'mins
Ismini is in her early 30s. She is cultivated, delicate, sensitive and... emotionally handicapped. She has developed a simplistic system of defense to protect her emotions: no one is to come near. It is exactly the moment when this collapses that unsophisticated, simple, impolite, aggressive and greatly passionate Haris appears in her life.

RED SKY / (2011)/Dir: Laya Yourgou/0mins
Two close friends, Aris and Stelios, have their minds on a mutual goal; they "immigrate" to the south of Greece and together they begin a banana greenhouse business in Crete. There they live secluded in a house by the countryside, with a magnificent view of the Libyan Sea having as their sole amusement Angeliki's nearby tavern. This is a place where mostly foreign tourists arrive; drown like magnets by the magic of the unknown, red African horizon. Determined to keep women out of their lives, they, and mostly Aris, are unfriendly towards the newly arrived Cordoba, a friend of Aris' sister who lives and works in Germany. Stelios, after going on a casual stroll with her in the island's market, will end up going to bed with her.

TUESDAY / (2010)/Dir: Nikos Kornilios/95'mins
the film narrates multiple stories set on a Tuesday in the heart of Athens. A supermarket checkout worker and her gambling boyfriend, a sexually frustrated paraplegic and her sister, two other sisters with a dying father, a drug addicted doctor, a religious girl in love with a wannabe burglar, an extramarital affair between a book-binder and a gallery director, a radio disc jockey with impotence problems. Character-driven stories intercut with telling detail.

THE LAS REPORT ON ANNA / (2009)/Dir: M�rta M�sz�ros/103'mins
This film is the first one since the political changes in Hungary to deal with the topic of informants. It vividly depicts the atmosphere of Hungarian society in the seventies. The protagonist is Peter, a literary critic, is tasked by the secret police to persuade Social Democratic politician, Anna Kethly, who has been living in exile for decades, to return home. Kethly, once a minister in the government of Imre Nagy, has been fighting since 1956 to preserve the memory of the revolution and to unmask the true nature of the Kadar government. The meeting between Anna and Peter is a duel of minds, summoning up old memories and historic eras, while bringing deeply buried emotions to the surface.

BIBLIOTHEQUE PASCAL / (2010)/Dir: Szabolcs Hajdu/105'mins
In order to regain custody of her daughter, whom she left in the care of her fortune-telling aunt, Mona must tell a social worker her story. The tale she spins---and the movie we watch---is a wild, surreal adventure in which people are able to project and enter each other's dreams, and our heroine is sold into slavery and lands in a swank, debauched Liverpool brothel where the patrons enact their literary/sexual fantasies with Lolita, St. Joan, and Desdemona. Rendered with dazzling tracking shots, striking CGI effects and a pulsing soundtrack, Hungarian director Szabolcs Hajdu's risk-taking fantasia has style to spare. But under the seductive surface lurks the very human story of a woman who uses fantasy to cushion the pain of life.

THE DAYS OF DESIRE / (2010)/Dir: J�zsef Pacskovszky/104'mins
Anna, a mute teenager, takes a job as housekeeper to a wealthy but unhappy couple, who quickly install her as the heart of their fractured household. All three glimpse the possibility of redemption - but when Anna falls in love, the idyll is threatened, and tensions invade.

LULL / (2010)/Dir: Tam�s Sas/91'mins
Film LULL is a chamber drama, a triangle of three women on a boat. The women intend to have fun on the sunny day, but it turns into a dark trip, revealing secrets and bursting out with emotions. The film was shot in early spring of 2009, a challenge for the actresses in creating a sense of summer heat.

THE MIRROR NEVER LIES / (2011)/Dir: Kamila Andini/100'mins
Tells of the wealth of marine life in Wakatobi and local policy of Bajo tribal recorded and visualized through drama film about a little girl named, Pakis (12)who tried to find her father are disappeared while in the ocean. Pakis do the ritual of Bajo tribe which they believe by using mirrors, Pakis hope and kept waiting to see the shadow of his father. However, what he expects never seen. Problems and conflicts with her mother's increasingly complicated when tudo, a researcher at the dolphin show into their lives. To four characters and then interact with each other every single day and they also have the interpretation of each of the sea. However, they agreed that the sea are helps them find their identity.

FAREWELL BAGHDAD / (2010)/Dir: Mehdi Naderi/97'mins
Daniel Dalka, after losing in a boxing game, just only for 50 thousand dollars; kills one of the persons who wagers. And for escaping the mafia nowhere is safer than the US army. But in this time the first balls of war are shot in Iraq, meanwhile "Saleh" is ready for his wedding party.

A SEPARATION / (2011)/Dir: Asghar Farhadi/120'mins
When his wife leaves him, Nader hires a young woman to take care of his suffering father. But he doesn't know his new maid is not only pregnant, but also working without her unstable husband's permission. Soon, Nader finds himself entangled in a web of lies, manipulation and public confrontations.

ADAM�S SON EVE�S DAUGHTER / (2010)/Dir: Rambod Javan/110'mins
With the help of two different real estate consultants, Mina and Farhoud, two fresh lawyers, choose the same office to start working. Mina believes Farhoud is a writer and he believes Mina is a photographer! A simple incident unfolds the truth. Supposing the other one a liar, they act as stubborn enemies toward each other.

LAST QUEEN OF EARTH / (2006)/Dir: Mohammed Reza Arab/89'mins
Leaving his family in Afghanistan to find work in Iran, Ali Bakhsh returns home to Afghanistan in search of his family in the wake of the 9/11 attacks and the following U.S. invasion.

SO CLOSE SO FAR / (2005)/Dir: Reza Mir-Karimi/121'mins
An arrogant neurologist must examine the meaning of his life when his son is diagnosed with an inoperable brain tumor. His trek through the desert to catch up with his son�s astronomy field trip leads him to encounter a number of seemingly ordinary people who challenge his views and values.

TEARS OF CHILL / (2003)/Dir: Azizollah Hamidnezad/100'mins
The tear of the cold pictures the story of a skilled mine-finder soldier and a Kurd shepherd girl, apparently just grazing her sheep in the war zone, but inside full of hatred with army forces in the chilly border zone of Kurdistan, where the soldier keeps finding mines and the girl keeps helping guerillas laying mines, who can ever imagine the day that they trust or even die for each other?

SONG OF BIRTH / (2005)/Dir: Ali Qawitan/90'mins
The film narrates the life of a young boy from a middle class family, who has completed his studies and is looking out for a job. He gets acquainted to an industrialist lady and his whole life takes a turn.

THE FATHER & THE FOREIGNER / (2010)/Dir: Ricky Tognazzi/110'mins
Diego, a Roman bureaucrat with a handicapped son, meets Walid (Amr Waked), a rich Syrian businessman, also the father of a severely handicapped boy. The two strike up an unusual friendship. They start meeting at Turkish baths, spending lavishly and hanging out with Walid's intriguing sister-in-law Zahira. Diego and Walid fly off to Syria to check out the parcel of land Walid's bought for his son. Back from the trip, Diego's relationship with his wife finds renewed passion, which had all but vanished as the couple had thrown all their energies into raising their disabled son. But then, Walid mysteriously disappears and it is said he is wanted by the authorities, suspected of terrorist activities. Diego tries to track him down, with the secret service hot on his trail, in a tumultuous chase through the crowded, sultry streets of Rome - only to make a shocking discovery. Based on the book by Giancarlo de Cataldo.

RISTABBANNA / (2010)/Dir: Gianni Cardillo & Daniele De Plano/90'mins
The old saltworker Natale Giacalone just has got a nephew, Rosina, who left many years before to United States to become an actress and never come back. To see her again, Natale decides to shoot little movies so that she can miss home. But he doesn't even finish first tape that a clumsy burglar, Salvo, steals the camera. Salvo's son, Nicol�, bring it back to the old man, who says: "This camera is yours if you help me shooting movies for my Rosina...". Here is how Nicol� and his family find a kind of grandfather, who change their life lending Salvo a boat so that he can start working honestly. To make these movies Nicol� won't ever stop the camera, not even at Natale's funeral when Rosina shows up. She's intended to attend ceremony, sell the old saltworker house and the boat and leave as quickly as possible. No need for her to stay longer in that country. But an intense earthquake shocks her when she finds out Natale knew the truth about her life in America. And may be many others knew... This is how her being a diva crack down and her uncertainties come up. This is how Nicol�'s family is shocked by jealousy and fear to loose the boat and that honest life just achieved. Rosina faces her past, her painful roots he roughly decided to cut. But as a fairy tale deserving respect... a happy ending is very close to be.

LIFE BACK THEN / (2011)/Dir: Takahisa Zeze/131'mins
Kyohei Nagashima (Masaki Okada) has shut away the world. During his high school days he was the target of bullying and experienced horrifying moments. Now as a young adult Kyohei takes a new job. He works for a company that specializes in cleaning out the homes of recently deceased individuals.With his new job Kyohei meets co-worker Yuki (Nana Eikura). Yuki has also experienced a traumatizing event as a teen and has also shut herself away from the world. These two young people form a bond as they go through the homes of the recently departed people. They gradually open up to each other and in the process to the world. Yet, their fragile psyches may or may not be ready for such changes ...

HIMIZU / (2011)/Dir: Sion Sono/129'mins
The story of a boy and a girl who are confronted with a horrific personal reality against the backdrop of the devastation caused by this year�s earthquake in Japan. An adaptation of Minoru Furuya�s successful manga of the same name, Himizu is the latest film by Sion Sono, the Japanese master of extreme filmmaking.

THE FRONT LINE / (2011)/Dir: Hun Jang/133'mins
Towards the end of the Korean War an uneasy ceasefire is ordered, but out on the Eastern front line of the Aerok Hills fierce fighting continues. A race to capture a strategic point to determine a new border between the two Koreas is the ultimate prize. A bullet is then found in the body of dead company commander of the South Korean army. The bullet that killed the company commander belongs to the South Korean army. Lieutenant of the Defense Security Command Kang Eun-Pyo is ordered to go out into the Eastern front line and investigate the murder. When Kang Eun-Pyo arrives in the Aerok Hills he is surprised to find his old friend Kim Soo-Hyeok commanding troops in the Aerok Hills. Kang Eun-Pyo believed Kim Soo-Hyeok was dead. In their younger years, Kim Soo-Hyeok was a meek student, but he eventually became the leader of Aerok company as a lieutenant. The situation in the Aerok company raises many flags in the eyes of Kang Eun-Pyo. Soldiers wear North Korean uniforms inside due to the cold weather, a 20-year-old leads troops as a captain and the reappearance of his old friend Kim Soo-Hyeok. The countdown to the ceasefire begins as the lives of countless soldiers fall to the wayside

PUNK'S NOT DEAD / (2011)/Dir: Vladimir Blazevski/104'mins
Punk's not dead is a remarkable black-comedy by Vladimir Blazevski. It is about a reunion of old punk band. Mirsa is a punk who is trying to put up with the struggles of everyday life in Skopje. One day he was offered to play for some multicultural-happening in Debar. Actually, all he ever wants is to play again with his punk band, so he accepts the offer. The next step is to find all former members of the band and make them play again... His ex-girlfriend is coming back to him and she is helping him to find the former members of the band. Punk's not dead gives good message - we should keep on trying to make our dreams come true

A STONE THROW AWAY / (2010)/Dir: Sebasti�n Hiriart -/97'mins
Jacinto Medina, a young 21 year old, is bored of its life like shepherd in the north of Mexico. He finds a keychain in the ground, seeing it like a signal and guiding itself by his dreams, it will undertake a trip that will make it cross hundreds of miles.

KING OF DEVIL�S ISLAND / (2010)/Dir: Marius Holst/120'mins
Norwegian winter, early 20th century. On the boys home Bastoy, a new inmate leads the boys to a violent uprising against a brutal regime. How far is he willing to go to attain freedom?

A SOMWHAT GENTELMAN / (2010)/Dir: Hans Petter Moland/105'mins
Ulrik is reluctantly let out of prison after serving 12 years for murder. He has to cope with his gang, his ex, a few women - and a snitch. His son has a fianc�. Her family doesn't approve of murder. They have a nursery, they have principles. Ulrik is a somewhat gentle man. But how gentle can you be? ..and he's losing his hair

UPPER DOG / (2009)/Dir: Sara Johnsen/100'mins
As young children, half-siblings Axel and Yanne are adopted to Norway. They are separated on arrival, he to material wealth on Oslo's west side, she to an average family on the east side. In contrast to her younger brother, Yanne remembers their journey to Norway, but she has no idea where he might be now. All this is about to change, however, as Yanne's Polish friend Maria starts working as a maid for Axel's parents, there discovering a photograph of a young boy. Maria has seen the same picture on the wall of Yanne's flat. She deci des to reunite them. But before having time to realize the consequences, she sets in motion a chain of events which throws many people into emotional turmoil.

THE ORANGE GIRL / (2009)/Dir: Eva Dahr/84'mins
THE ORANGE GIRL is about two young men's different paths to finding love. Jan Olav is struck as if by lightning the first time he sees the Orange Girl, and is sure he has found the love of his life. His infatuation is like nothing else: the sky turns round and round, the earth disappears beneath his feet. Nothing else matters. Georg has love served on a silver platter under a magic Easter sky in the Norwegian mountains, but he has difficulties understanding his own feelings, grasping what is happening to him. There are 20 years between these two love stories. Georg hears the story of his father Jan Olav's quest for the Orange Girl through a letter he receives on his 16th birthday. The letter helps him realize that he cannot let love slip through his fingers. Jan Olav's and Georg's stories are woven together through the letter. Both stories tell tales of chance encounters that change their lives. THE ORANGE GIRL is a love story that raises important questions about our human existence. How do you explain to your son that love is the most important thing in life - indeed, the only thing that gives life meaning? How do you explain that although life can be short and painful, love still makes it worth living? How do you explain that the moment is the only eternity there is?

THE MOUNTAIN / (2011)/Dir: Ole Gi�ver/73'mins
Nora and Solveig are hiking through a snow-covered, starkly beautiful landscape on a tour of several days that will take the two young women to the top of a mountain. Solveig, three months pregnant, seems incapable of doing anything the way Nora wants her to. Something is weighing upon Nora, an unspoken accusation that poisons the atmosphere between them. The further the women advance on their trip, the more erratic Nora becomes, sometimes disappearing from the campsite, leaving Solveig alone and frightened. Solveig is particularly terrified at the thought of losing Nora, and of what would become of her if she were on her own with their child. Finally, they reach their destination, the place where they suffered a traumatic experience two years earlier. As they arrive at the top of a windswept cliff, the two women are engulfed by emotions that shake them to their very roots�and that might show them the way to a better future. Director Ole Gl�ver delivers a universal and dramatic first feature about a young couple trying to find the way back to their love after their lives have been shattered, as mutual reproaches linger below the surface and find expression in poignant dialo

PALAWAN FATE / BUSONG / (2011)/Dir: Auraeus Solito/93'mins
In Busong, Alessandra de Rossi plays Punay, who is born with wounds on her feet and cannot step on the earth.Her brother, Angkarang, carries her through a hammock, as he searches the changing landscape of Palawan in hopes of finding a healer who can cure unay. Different people help him carry his sister along the way � a woman looking for her husband, a fisherman who lost his boat, and a young man who is searching for himself � and each one meets their fate.

THE CHRISTENING / (2010)/Dir: Marcin Wrona/86'mins
Seven days left to life, one friend left to trust - and life is the least he can lose. Michał has everything one could dream of: a young family, his own business and a luxurious apartment in Warsaw. His idyllic life starts to fall apart when his old friend Janek appears who is to become the godfather of Michał�s new born son. The men not only share a common past, but also a dark secret that soon forces Janek to take a decision. A decision between good and evil. A decision between life and death.

MY OWN POLE / (2011)/Dir: Marcin Glowacki/93'mins
My Pole s a film about the youngest conqueror of the Earth's both Poles - Johnny Mela. The boy who experienced his younger brother's death and a few years later had his arm amputated in result of a severe electric shock lived through a total nervous breakdown. A broken family with a toxic father left the boy with no hope for a brighter future. It all changed when the father-son relationship eventually lead to what first seemed impossible: an amazing physical achievement by a disabled person - reaching the Pole.

DANCE MARATHON / (2011)/Dir: Magdalena Lazarkiewicz/97'mins
An event, which main attraction is the dance marathon, has gathered crowds at the market square of the provincial Polish town. Impressive prizes compete with another attraction: the concert of the star singer Jessica. A local outsider Christian falls for the singer. Soon he discovers that her life is far from being a dream and decides to win her heart. In the crowd of marathon contestants we will meet many individuals who dream of winning the main prize for various motivations. Who will turn out to be the winner? Will there be a prize at all? Because two small-time crooks, Simon and Silvio, are lurking around. And why this persistent notion that our life is so often influenced by miracles.

FLYING PIG / (2010)/Dir: Anna Kazejak-Dawid/99'mins
Flying Pigs� is a movie about passion, honor and living life to it's fullest. The stake of the real game is love... When one day, a local football club ceases to exist, the life of four main heroes is turned upside down. Oskar is forced to put on a suit and accept a job offer from the Boss of a local company, which has decided to launch a new football club. Oskar's new job will get him into a lot of trouble. This includes getting naked in the middle of a town square, breaking up with his fianc�, developing a relationship with his brother's girlfriend, and, to a total surprise... becoming a superhero.

MADE IN POLAND / (2010)/Dir: Przemyslaw Wojcieszek/90'mins
Bogus altar seventeen Smith woke up one day and decided that the message that would send the world is contained in the phrase "fuck off" that tattooing yourself on the forehead. When demolish telephone booths and cars on the block of flats does not reduce the rage, asks for help to the "authorities": the priest, teacher and mother Polish, Krzysztof Krawczyk devotee. But they are not able to reduce his frustration. On the road also becomes Bogus siblings: Monika and Emil, moving in a wheelchair. Fascinated by the radicalism of his brother. Emil, trying to overcome their own limitations, joins the Bogus. For the first time, thanks to Monica's Bogus begins to feel something other than rage.

MORGEN / (2011)/Dir: Marian Crisan/100'mins
NELU, a man in his forties, works as a security guard at a supermarket in Salonta, a small town on the Romanian-Hungarian border. This is the place where many illegal emigrants try to cross, by any means possible, to Hungary and then further to Western Europe. For NELU, days go by the same. Fishing at dawn, then work, and finally home with his wife-FLORICA. They live alone at an isolated farmhouse on the fields outside Salonta. Their problem these days is repairing the old roof of the farmhouse. One morning, NELU will fish something different out of the river: a Turkish man trying to cross the border. Not able to communicate verbally, the two men will somehow understand each other. NELU takes the stranger to the farmhouse, gives him some dry clothes, food and shelter. He doesnt really know how to help this stranger. The Turkish man gives NELU all the money he has on him so he will help him cross the border. Eventually, NELU takes the money and promises he will help him cross the border tomorrow, MORGEN

ELENA / (2011)/Dir: Andrey Zvyagintsev/109'mins
Elena and Vladimir are an older couple, they come from different backgrounds. Vladimir is a wealthy and cold man, Elena comes from a modest milieu and is a docile wife. They have met late in life and each one has children from previous marriages. Elena's son is unemployed, unable to support his own family and he is constantly asking Elena for money. Vladimir's daughter is a careless young woman who has a distant relationship with her father. A heart attack puts Vladimir in hospital, where he realizes that his remaining time is limited. A brief but somehow tender reunion with his daughter leads him to make an important decision: she will be the only heiress of his wealth. Back home he announces it to Elena. Her hopes to financially help her son suddenly vanish. The shy and submissive housewife then comes up with a plan to give her son and grandchildren a real chance in life.

PECHORIN / (2010)/Dir: Roman Khrushch/95'mins
Based on the Russian classic novel. While maintaining all the main plot-lines of the novel, it follows the events not as they happen but as they are reflected in the mind of the dying hero. Thus make a chain of recollections about the life he had lived through, now seen as a series of irrevocable mistakes and interpreted a new: it is either reconsideration or repentance. Recollections make main hero torment himself over his own past pretenses that seem ridicules now agonize and despair over his perfect indifference to everything except himself, see the horrible aspect of killing his friend, a greenhorn and a show-off. The final action of an intelligent and outstanding man is judging oneself without mercy

INNOCENT SATURDAY / (2011)/Dir: Alexander Mindadze/99'mins
Saturday, 26 April 1986. A reactor tower has exploded in the Chernobyl nuclear power plant. The Communist Party leadership remains silent. But Valery Kabysh, a one-time percussionist and now a young, loyal Party official, observes the panic of those in charge and realizes that every second counts. This is the true story of his failed escape.

OTELO BURNING / (2011)/Dir: Sara Blecher/72'mins
When 16 year old Otelo Buthelezi, his best friend, New Year, and his 12 year old brother, Ntwe, are invited to the beach-house of their new friend, Tau Modise, they step into a world previously closed to them. It is exactly the opposite of their township- a place under a constant and growing threat from political violence, driven by Inkatha hostel dwellers on one side and township United Democratic Front comrades on the other. Soon, everyone recognizes that Otelo is gifted on the water, a god in waiting for his purpose. An older white man, Kurt Struely, approaches the boys, certain of their potential and invites them to his home to watch some professional surfers on video. He paints them an enticing picture of the life to be had, if they can master every kind of break - money for nothing and the chicks for free. The boys practice and, under Struely's watchful eye, become really good. Otelo outshines his teacher, Tau, who begins to resent the obvious natural talent of his friend..

BEAUTY / (2011)/Dir: Oliver Hermanus/98'mins
Tells the story of Francois van Heerden, a mid-40s, white, Afrikaans-speaking family man living in Bloemfontein, who has become devoid of any care or concern for his own measure of happiness, and so convinced of his ill-fated existence, that he is wholly unprepared when a chance encounter unravels his clean, controlled life.

HAPPY NEW YEAR GRANDAMA / (2011)/Dir: Telmo Esnal/105'mins
URTE BERRI ON, AMONA! is a black comedy that follows the conflicts Mari's family goes through while trying to looking after this peculiar grandmother. Grandma Mari is draining the life out of her daughter Maritxu so her husband Joxemari decides to put her in a nursing home. Joxemari must take her in without his wife getting wind of the situation and to do so enlists the help of his son-in �law Kintxo. This may seem a simple task but the grandmother's character causes a duel of unexpected consequences.

A THOUSAND FOOLS / (2010)/Dir: VENTURA PONS/90'mins
Fifteen stories, some contemporary and some historical, based on short works by Quim Monz� and directed by Ventura Pons, where through humour, sarcasm and bravery accounts pain, old age, death and love but above all the human stupidity, without concessions, looking straight in the eyes of the difficult balance between life and human misery.

THE MONK / (2011)/Dir: Dominik Moll/101'mins
A well respected monk , Capucino Ambrosio compromises himself with his carnal lust for a pupil, a woman disguised as a monk (Matilda),she tempts the monk to transgress and he is soon found desiring another, the innocent Antonia. Matilda uses magic spells to help the monk in his pursuit of Antonia, whom he later rapes and kills. It later emerges that Matilda is an instrument of Satan in female form. Focus also is also shone on Antonia's previous relationship with Lorenzo, whose sister is tortured by hyprocritical nuns for her own relationship. Returning to Ambrosio, he is delivered to the Inquisition; escaping only by selling his soul to the devil. The devil prevents Ambrosio's final repentance, and informs Ambrosio that Antonia is the monk's sister.

PURE / (2010)/Dir: Lisa Langseth/97'mins
Katarina is 20 and lives in a grim suburb of Gothenburg. She did not finish his schooling and fear end up like her mother. One day she stumbles across a YouTube video with music by Mozart and immediately falls in love with this piece. She manages to get hired as a receptionist at the concert hall of the city ...

THE MILL & THE CROSS / (2011)/Dir: Lech Majewski/92'mins
The film focuses on a dozen of the 500 characters depicted in Bruegel's painting. Set in 1564, the themes of Christ's suffering and religious persecution in Flanders are examined.[3]

I MISS YOU / (2011)/Dir: Anders Gr�nros/125'mins
Tina and Cilla are 15 and live in Pite� in north Sweden. They are twin sisters and look identical, but are very much different as personalities. On their Mothers birthday, they hurry to catch the school-bus. Cilla is run over by a car and killed. Left behind is Tina, who now has to find her balance in life without her sister.

GOODBYE SOUTH GOODBYE / (1996)/Dir: Hsiao-hsien Hou/116'mins
Gao (Jack Kao) is riding the train to Pinghsi to set up a 10 day gambling den with his friend Hsi (Hsi Hsiang). He taking his acolyte - Flatty (Lim Giong), and Pletzel (Annie Shizuka Inoh), Flatty's girl friend, who works part time in a night club. Gao's girl friend Ying (Hsu Kuei-Ying), who works in the same night club as Pletzel, doesn't like the people around Gao, finding them dangerous. But Gao has already made a deal with Hsi to invest in a nightclub in Shanghai. Ying doesn't want him to go. She wants him to stay in Taiwan to open a restaurant. A succession of get-rich-quick schemes leads them only to the brink of disaster. In the course of the film the unsavory alliance between the underworld and the political elite emerges.

GOOD MEN,, GOOD WOMEN / (1995)/Dir: Hsiao-hsien Hou/108'mins
The film depicts the real life story of Chiang Bi-Yu (Annie Shizuka Inoh). In the 1940s, she and her newlywed husband, Chung Hao-Tung (Giong Lim), head to mainland China to join the anti-Japanese resistance. During the war, she is forced to give her baby for adoption. After the war they return to Taiwan, as Chung is to distribute a communist paper called "The Enlightenment". However, as the Korean War deepens, Chiang Kai-Shek's Kuomintang regime intensifies the White Terror and Chung is eventually executed.

A SUMMER AT GRANDPA�S / (1986)/Dir: Hsiao-hsien Hou/93'mins
A young boy, Dong-Dong and his sister spend a summer vacation at their grandparents' house in the country while their mother recuperates from an illness; they while away the hours climbing trees, swimming in a stream, searching for missing cattle, and coming uneasily to grips with the enigmatic and sometimes threatening realities of adult life

DAUGHTER OF THE NILE / (1987)/Dir: Hsiao-hsien Hou/91'mins
The film consists of three intermingling storylines and scattered throughout the film are interludes of an actress (also played by Inoh) who prepares for the role of Chiang Bi-Yu, and also confronts her deceased boyfriend's past.

CAF� LUMIERE / (2003)/Dir: Hsiao-hsien Hou/103'mins
The story revolves around a young Japanese woman (played by Hitoto Yo) doing research on Taiwanese composer Jiang Wen-Ye, whose work is featured on the soundtrack. The late composer's Japanese wife and daughter also make appearances as themselves.

THE SON / (2011)/Dir: Atilla Cengiz/97'mins
The Son is the tragic story of two fathers whose lives intersect with the death of their sons. 18 years old Soner leaves his homeland and family in Black Sea region to find the girl he loves in Tunceli, the East of Turkey.Everyone he meets during his journey does not understand his otivation. They believe that he is going there to do his military service. He has no idea about what is expecting him in Tunceli

SLEEPING PRINCESS / (2010)/Dir: �ağan Irmak/110'mins
It is a fairy tale for the waking hour. Aziz works as a clerk in a library and lives in his own quiet and peaceful little world. Then one day he discovers that he has new neighbours: Se�il, the owner of the new opened local beauty shop and her 10 year-old daughter Gizem. Life for Aziz becomes much brighter and livelier but then something unexpected happens and darkness descends once again. A whole new set of events is set in motion as a bunch of memorable characters join together to try to change the course of fate

GHOSTED / (2011)/Dir: Craig Viverios/102'mins
GHOSTED' tells a story of survival inside a British Prison. Jack a model prisoner, has kept his head down and done his time. After his wife confirms that she is leaving him, on the anniversary of their son's death, the only thing that keeps him from going under is the new prisoner, Paul. Jack's cell mate Ahmed, attempts to guide him on a path of salvation, a path that involves saving Paul from the clutches of the wing beast, Clay. Jack struggles between the curiosity of the head prison officer Donner, and the violent determination of clay, eventually saving Paul. As Jack and Paul finally accept each other, it soon becomes clear that Paul is not all he seems and may have a closer connection to Jack than he could ever imagine.

TREE OF LIFE / (2011)/Dir: Terrence Malick/139'mins
The impressionistic story of a Texas family in the 1950s. The film follows the life journey of the eldest son, Jack, through the innocence of childhood to his disillusioned adult years as he tries to reconcile a complicated relationship with his father (Brad Pitt). Jack (played as an adult by Sean Penn) finds himself a lost soul in the modern world, seeking answers to the origins and meaning of life while questioning the existence of faith.

THE LINCOLN LAWYER / (2011)/Dir: Brad Furman/118'mins
Mick Haller is a defense lawyer who works out of his Lincoln. When a wealthy Realtor is accused of raping a prostitute, Haller is asked to defend him. The man claims that the woman is trying to get some money out of him. But when Haller looks at the evidence against him, he learns that this case might be linked to an old case of his.

THE WHISTLEBLOWER / (2011)/Dir: Larysa Kondracki/112'mins
Inspired by actual events, the film revolves around Kathy, an American police officer who takes on the job of working as a peacekeeper in post-war Bosnia. Her expectations of helping to rebuild a devastated country are dashed when she uncovers a dangerous grid of corruption, cover-up and intrigue amid a world of private contractors and multi-national diplomatic double talk.

WRECKED / (2010)/Dir: Michael Greenspan/89"mins
A man awakens in a mangled car-wreck at the foot of a steep cliff. Injured and trapped inside, with no memory of how he got there or who he is, he must rely on his most primal instincts to survive. As he attempts to free himself from carnage and escape an impossible situation, a darker side is revealed. Even if he manages to survive, the man may have to face the consequences of an earlier, forgotten life.

HELIOPOLIS / (2009)/Dir: Aahmad Abdalla./100�mins
in Heliopolis, a unique neighborhood in Cairo, where different kinds of churches, mosques, synagogues and ethnic restaurants sit quietly side by side on the same street. Each is trying to resolve a conundrum, mundane or serious, none succeeds, they will have to try again when the sun rises again. As their paths cross, they are oblivious to one another, but we discover the neighborhood�s beauty, its glamorous past fading day after day, as the weight of Cairo�s quotidian becomes more heavy.

MICROPHONE / (2010)/Dir: Aahmad Abdalla./120�mins
When Khaled returns to Alexandria after years of travel he discovers that it is too late to rekindle a relationship with his old love because she is about to immigrate and that his relationship with his aging father is broken beyond repair.

678 / (2010)/Dir: Mohamed Diab/103�mins
The film is based on three parallel plots of three true stories of three Egyptian women. It sheds light on a very sensitive issue in Egypt and exposes the implications and circumstances of sexual harassment in the lives of the main characters. The film paints an uncompromising picture of Egyptian society from the points of view of three women from different social classes united by their decision to no longer remain silent victims of sexual harassment.

COME AS YOU ARE / (2011)/Dir: Geoffrey Enthoven/115'mins
Three guys in their early twenties love wine and women but they are still virgins. Under the guise of a wine tour they embark on a journey to Spain hoping to have their first sexual experience. Nothing will stop them. Not even their handicaps: one is blind, the other is confined to a wheelchair and the third one is completely paralyzed.

BASTARD / (2011)/Dir: Unger, Carsten/126�mins
Nine-year-old Nikolas has been missing for days. The criminal psychologist Claudia Meinert discovers contradictions in her dealings with the child�s parents. Particularly, Nikolas� mother seems to be hiding something.