A hymn to life and rebellion, dedicated to whole generations of factory workers in who have, waves upon waves of new immigrants, built Europe’s wealth. The film brushes the portraits of people coming from all over Europe, literally travelling from one to other, who are meeting in the most polluted city in Italy to organize the biggest firework you’d imagine. (Karim Shimsal)
In a pharmacy, everyday is always the same ‚ giving methadone to those in need, but especially to those who have the right recipe. Between bureaucracy and compassion, the pharmacist tries to survive this situation, not the most fun. With restraint and rigor, Bourges talks to us again about the routine of the unprotected, never daring to judge. (Miguel Valverde)
A bunch of post Hungarian punks face the camera and speak about the communism and post-communism era in Hungary. The punk era in Hungary emerged in the early 80s when the economic and cultural depression affected the country severely. It was the time when angry musicians played punk rock with anti-communist lyrics. It was a different time, the colors were different, the smells were different, the people’s faces were different, it was like an another planet comparing to Hungary now. Super-8 images of themselves when they were 20 years old stating this different planet. An exploration of life and politics in Hungary before and after the fall of Berlin Wall. The high hopes for a better world and the reality that followed where the poor became even poorer and the rich even richer. (Nina Veligradi)
In a small rural town in the U.S., the construction of a large shopping center and its environmental impact are subject to a public hearing where actors and non-actors star as the people involved in the debate. Filmed in 16 mm, with a great black and white photography, this James N. Kienitz Wilkins’ film fascinates us by the great shots of gestures, glances and expressions of the participants, while we hear the pros and cons of each side. Wilkins explores thus a new way of looking and listening, a film that chronicles and documents at the same time. (C. C.)
18th February 2010, Niger, President Mamadou Tanja is ousted by a military coup. The film takes place during the event and the following days. Sticking to the people mining for gold in the open air, to the persons receiving alimentary aid, the film evolves around the idea that nothing actually changed that day. The Harmattan is as strong an ever, covering the land with the desert dust. (Karim Shimsal)
With a pixel-minimalistic style of animation comes the story of an American soldier who provided thousands of confidential documents to Wikileaks. The tone of the film is satiric, the animation basic but effective and the narrative off screen shows us the true meaning of globalization. (Miguel Valverde)
Beginning in a very funny way, this sarcastic animation turns out to be gradually more and more cruel. It describes the long journey from Sahel to Europe through deserts, overcrowded trucks and small traffickers’ boats. And awaits the winners of this absurd lottery. (Karim Shimsal)
The river Narmada was born out of a trance of the god Shiva. The construction of a gigantic damp complex on the river is destabilizing entire communities , displacing them, impeding them to feed, cultivate or destroying their villages. Technology turns out to be a repression tool to impose the new gods of modernity at all costs. (K. S.)
On camera interviews from various people with one common denominator, plastical surgery. Their reasons and motives to be beautiful vary and each person is trying to describe their way of thinking in relation to their decision to impose on their natural looks. A constant quest for beauty through a manufactured and comescialized perception of outer beauty, especially the way it is being handled by the westernize world. Breast enlargement with silicone implants or breast reduction, face lift, liposuction, rhinoplasty, cheek augmentation, bottox are only some of the body restorations mentioned to this highly investigative documentary presenting both the addiction in becoming more and more beautiful with all the superficiality that surrounds the issue and the need for medical treatment. (Nina Veligradi)
A fair like any other. Children seem to play harmlessly with theirfavorite toys. But peace can snap at any moment, if just one of them presses the trigger. Slijepcevic takes the premise of a place among wars to a different level, through an observational documentary about contemporary society. One could almost say, in time of war, weapons are cleaned up. (M. V.)
In southern Russia, there is a not so well-known region affected by radiation resulting from accidents at Mayak nuclear station: in September 1957, a tank containing highly radioactive waste exploded at Mayak, spreading a high quantity of radioactivity over 400 km. The accident was kept secret for over thirty years until Perestroika, and was compared, by experts and scientists, to the Chernobyl disaster in 1986. Adopting an aesthetic recording, with contemplative shots and careful photography in black and white, Sebastien Mez’s film introduces us to this place, considered one of the most contaminated in the planet, and to the people who live in it. A work that leaves in our memory the big shots of the faces of these people, whose places, life and stories have the wound of the nuclear age. (C. C.)
A day in the life of 8 people living in Alexandria gives us a glimpse of contemporary Egypt. The austere composition of the different shots forces us to look at the characters and yet still allows us, by its depth, to experience lifes and hopes in a megacity in transformation. (K. S.)
“I was wondering, where will we end up if we start drilling on one side of the earth and coming out from the other. Since most of the globe is covered with water the answer is most likely in the middle of the ocean.” However, this film comes to prove this theory is wrong and discovers four diametrically opposite spots of land or antipodas. In the first pair, two brothers are crossing Entre Ríos in Argentina to Shanghai and from strickigly beautiful sunset we move to the busy chinese metropolis. The second antipodas takes us from Russia and lake Baikal to Chile. The third from Hawaii and volcano Kilauea to Kubu in Botswana. The final pair is in Maraflores of Spain to Castle Point of New Zealand. A trip around the world in 104 minutes and Kossakovsky as Jules Vernes offers a magnificent kaleidoscope of our world. (Nina Veligradi)
If there was one word to describe this day it would be alone. And Alina Rudnitskaya is approaching this loneliness by leaving her camera on the waiting room of this painful procedure. Maybe her filming is not as courageous as those women are but its extre
Childhood memories can be whatever we want them to be, but for the director there is an unavoidable obsession behind her birth and childhood. Through a bureaucratic monotone voice we hear the details of Pujol’s behavior and development. The landscape which illustrates the text is dense and dry, but it is also the revisiting of a time at the same time objective and clinical. (MV)
Sir Arthur Brandão was mad! The creator of the gigantic Hotel built in Beira, Mozambique, went beyond megalomania. Built in 1955, it provided a small paradise of mammoth dimensions to its residents. It didn’t took much time till the clock turned 12 and th
Roberto and Felice survived the Aquila earthquake in April 2000. They are the last inhabitants of the abandoned village of Camarga. A double portray of deeply human and distorted minds who have to face the trauma of having lost everything, fearing closed
Moullet is one of the most effective whistle blowers of contemporary cinema. “Less and Less” addresses the issue of the inexorable automation of our society and hence the consecutive dehumanisation of human relationships. In his typical surrealistic manne