NARRATIVE SELECTION   |  JANUARY 2022

Sea Light (2021)

Director: John Doe

Country: Spain

Duration: 14:46

Synopsis: An elder lighthouse keeper takes care of what has been his home for years. Old and secluded from society, he’s disturbed by mysterious bottled letters. These and an unexpected malfunction make him doubt his job, his life and his existence.

Tashi’s Sheep (2021)  

Director: YU YIN

Country: China

Duration: 26:33

Synopsis: A special bellwether is killed by a shotgun, So, around the searching for sheep and gun, there’s a story about hegemony in a remote mountain village. The hero  returns home to visit his family but is wrongly accused of being the killer of the  bellwether. So, illegal gun-holding, illegal poaching, and other charges are all on  his head. All became actors, trying to act exaggeratively to set him up. While  fighting with those people, the hero also gradually excavated about the brutal  growth of power and interests in this barren and desolate land.

Parents (2021)

Director: Coline Béal

Country: France

Duration: 16:26

Synopsis: Parents questions their past in order to try to understand the day that changed their lives and their daughter’s forever.     

Zero Gravity (2021)

Director: Ivan Sosnin

Country: Russian Federation

Duration: 24:35

Synopsis: Sasha is an ordinary boy whose life is not much different from the everyday life of an average schoolboy. Sasha’s parents are divorced, they put their personal ambitions above the interests of their son. Due to lack of attention, Sasha becomes introverted. Everything changes when Sasha meets a new friend after school, a strange janitor in a pilot’s jumpsuit.

All Night Long (2021)

Director: Eric Scabar

Country: Italy

Duration: 19:00

Synopsis: All Night Long tells of the night in which Ferdinando and Maicol, two twenty-year-old friends, implement the plan to kill Lucrezia, Ferdinando’s mother, a woman who has never been able to fulfill the role of mother. Ferdinand, relying on Maicol’s weaknesses and precarious economic situation, convinces him to make the atrocious gesture by promising him a large sum of money.

The Swap (2021)

Director: Chloé Dumond, Ananda Henry-Biabaud

Country: France

Duration: 10:47

Synopsis: Sonia, 40 years old, single, decides to exchange sperme for a thesis correction in order to have a child.

Stains (2020)  

Director: Roger Villarroya

Country: Spain

Duration: 05:00

Synopsis: A man washes his hands.        

The Vespertine (2021)

Director: YU YIN

Country: China

Duration: 09:07

Synopsis: A story from the elder about the Fifth Company.  A story from the elder about defending a river. A story from the elder about a signaller who spent half his lifetime making firm commitments and carrying out assignments.  The Fifth Company, 108 people sternly defended a river to the last minute, in order to make sure that the millions of soldiers cross the river successfully. In three days, only 29 of the 108 were still alive and the annihilation of the entire company brought the victory of the battle. The company commander’s last order to the signaller was to survive. And the names and last word of the 29 soldiers were recorded. In the next fifty years, with a lifetime of dedication and respect, the signaller traveled all over the country and finally stepped on the last journey to complete his mission.

A new perspective (2020)

Director: Emanuela Ponzano

Country: Italy

Duration: 18:26

Synopsis: In a dense forest, in the early morning of an unidentifiable remote era, a 12-year-old boy is concentrated in his hunt for precious objects together with his companions. Attracted by strange sounds, the boy decides to move on to an abandoned wooden hut. Through the window, the boy discovers a crying child. She seems lost. The boy decides to open the window, but once it is open, he discovers bodies piled up in a row, soldiers and a tall barbed wire. Called back by his friends to go home, the boy crosses the fence trying to find the girl. Where are we? … and when?

In the nick of lime (2021)

Director: Hadrien Krasker, Mathieu Bouckenhove

Country: France

Duration: 15:00

Synopsis: To seduce Alizée whom he has just met, Sébastien sets his mind to cooking the perfect dish. Not just good: per-fect. And for that, he needs a lime. His search for the ideal citrus is going to obsess him to the point of making him unbearable to his best buddy Manu, and his buddy’s buddies, but that’s less of a problem. What if a simple lime could teach him to let go?

Our own land (2021)

Director: Simon Helloco

Country: France

Duration: 22:48

Synopsis: Summer is ending, it’s silaging time in the peaceful britanny countryside. As farmers are cultivating corn, two brothers (8 and 12 years old) are alone in their big house. Left on their own, they’re in charge of this vast kingdom and live in complete freedom. They only forbid themselves to enter the first floor of the house.

Strawberry Shake (2020)

Director: Dianne Bellino

Country: United States

Duration: 16:00

Synopsis: A troubled young mother tries to win back her two kids with a pet rabbit and pink dessert.  

3000 (2021)

Director: Chin Hsiang Chang

Country: United States

Duration: 17:03

Synopsis: In the future, a female synthetic(android) wakes up without any memory finding herself accompanied by another male synthetic(android) in a cabin deep in the woods and tries to figure out what happened.

STUDENT SELECTION   |   JANUARY 2022

Eva Wakes Up (2021)

Director: Daria Verevkina

Country: Russian Federation

Duration: 12:19

Synopsis: The little girl Eva, who was left alone in the city during the War, tries to escape from reality in the world of dreams and fantasies, where her deceased father looking like a vampire tries to protect her mind from the horrors of war.

Behind The Scenes (2021)

Director: Elizaveta(LIZZA) Prigozhina

Country: United States

Duration: 08:16

Synopsis: An intimate look into seemingly perfect lives viewed as the ultimate ‘goals’ in the realm of social media that turn out to hide loneliness and abuse.    

Out of Play (2021)

Director: Romi Menachem

Country: Israel

Duration: 19:59

Synopsis: Bar (12), a longtime member of the boys’ group and the class’s soccer team, dominates the field more than ever and scores the winning goal at her school’s semi-final soccer tournament. So when the team’s captain announces opening the fixed line-up for voting, she isn’t worried.  Following their first sex education class, Bar senses a change in the group and feels the need to ensure her getting enough votes until the end of the school day.   While going from one friend to another, having a hard time getting what she wishes for, she starts to realize that a deeper issue is at stake.

Child’s play (2021)

Director: Christopher Orzói

Country: Hungary

Duration: 23:38

Synopsis: Bogi is a young mother in her twenties, who – for a couple of days – wants to escape the reality of her life.

So It Goes (2021)

Director: Hudson J. Howes

Country: Australia

Duration: 13:02

Synopsis: In a rural town, the shock death of a teenage boy devastates his family. As the boy’s father Tom wrestles with grief and guilt in equal measure, he can find little solace in his family, and in throngs of mourners who only remind him of his failure. Ceremony, companionship, helping hands and shoulders to cry on all pale to his devastation. As his sense of home and belonging is eroded, Tom seeks a way to come to terms with his son’s death – one which can only come from true acceptance of all that his son was.

Harassment.Prologue (2021)

Director: Ido Gotlib

Country: Russian Federation

Duration: 04:32

Synopsis: Behind the walls of one Russian university an incident occurred: one of the students was raped by the main professor. Nobody knows, except of victim’s classmate and close friend Andrey, who decides to take a revenge. 

Aquarium Story (2022)

Director: Pobmek Junlakarin

Country: Thailand

Duration: 28:22

Synopsis: Being asked to be in a documentary about her fear of fish, Beam decided to go on a trip to the aquarium with Pun in order to overcome her fear.

DOCUMENTARY SELECTION   |   JANUARY 2022

Captain Wakusch. The author Giwi Margwelaschwili. (2021)

Director: Kerstin Nickig

Country: Germany

Duration: 30:00

Synopsis: The short documentary film “Kapitän Wakusch” (Captain Wakusch) is a poetical portrait of the German-Georgian writer and philosopher Giwi Margwelashvili, born in 1927 in Berlin, a permanent stranger and migrant between Germany and Georgia, East and West, reality and literature. The themes most central in his work are “freedom” and “being foreign”. The film is based on interviews with the old author in the last years before his death in 2020 and extracts from his autobiographical novel “Captain Wakusch”. Memories and literature floating one into another. Margwelashvili’s alter ego and main hero of his novel Captain Wakusch as well as himself, is raised in Berlin in a family of political immigrants from Georgia – a broken family, he says. His efforts to be a real Berlin boy, end up without success when he is thrown out of the Hitler youth camp for playing his favourite jazz albums to his mates. Captain Wakush soon becomes part of the Berlin Swing Youth (Swingjugend) of the forties, dancing to the hot rhythms of his maestro Tullio Mobiglia in the Kakadu dance bar; feeling that this music, and jazz music on the whole, is a taste of the freedom found in the “dixielandish” world…  The film takes you into Captain Wakusch’s alias Giwi Margwelaschwili’s life’s journey which consists of many unexpected twists and turns. Captain Wakusch has to find his path between the two DEADLY TEXTS of the twentieth century – the Nazi ideology and the communist ideology. And finds islands of freedom and individuality between the lines – sometimes! Private and historical archive footage, new footage and a lot of good jazz music make you experience the life’s journey of the character (or is it the author – you never know). For Margwelaschwili, writing is his “refuge” as he calls it. His little known work creates a whole literary cosmos with its own playful rules and special relations between author, characters and reader.  A playful-literary portrait of a very free person.

Freedom (2021)

Director: Dur Ahmed Jamjoom

Country: Saudi Arabia

Duration: 05:17

Synopsis: Young saudi female studying product design while during her free time she goes free diving and explaining how much free-diving means to her.

Make it Wild (2021)

Director: George Pearton

Country: United Kingdom

Duration: 13:09

Synopsis: Make it Wild, based in North Yorkshire, UK, is a family business on a mission to help nature. They own land which they manage carefully to encourage biodiversity. They sell a range of eco-friendly products, tree dedications for special occasions or as a memorial and a range of animal habitat boxes. They have a carbon offsetting through tree planting scheme for businesses and individuals. They also offer yoga, reiki and other ‘wellness’ activities based in their ancient woodlands and their luxury eco-friendly on-site holiday cottage.  For more information see www.makeitwild.co.uk

Shrimp Tales (2022)

Director: Blake Scott

Country: United States

Duration: 03:54

Synopsis: The story of Captain Rocky Magwood and his love for shrimping in Mount Pleasant, South Carolina.

The Robot and The Butterfly (2021)

Director: Gaile Garnelyte

Country: Lithuania

Duration: 25:03

Synopsis: Young artist and mother Ieva follows her lover Vadim to a small Lithuanian town and together they create musical performance “The Robot and the Butterfly”. While her daughter stays with grandparents, young artists meet creative challenges that sour their relationship. And Ieva starts questioning if her passion and art is worth sacrificing relationship with her daughter.

ANIMATION SELECTION   |   JANUARY 2022

The Last FLoor (2021)

Director: Milo Bonnard

Country: United Kingdom

Duration: 05:15

Synopsis: A young man living in a mansard faces up to the uninteresting nature of his life.

Dinner (2021)

Director: Chenxin Yang

Country: China

Duration: 04:20

Synopsis: An animated short describes the remembrance of a beloved one. The story is about a man desperately trying to recreate his late wife’s dish.        

The awakening of the insects (2021)

Director: Stephanie Lansaque, Francois Leroy

Country: France

Duration: 14:09

Synopsis: Hong Kong. Mr Lam is an old gentleman who loses his memory since the death of his wife. On March 5, the day of “the awakening of the hibernating insects”, he receives the unexpected visit of old Ms. Meng. This Taoist exorcist is determined to chase the demons lodging in the head of the old man.

Leo da Vinci (2021)

Director: Sergio Manfio

Country: Italy

Duration: 13:00

Synopsis: The series revolves around the exciting adventures of 15 year-old Leonardo da Vinci, during the thrilling phase of his life he spent in Florence under the rule of the Medici family. It’s a time where there is a great surge in the arts, in finance, and in creativity, and Leo can’t help but thrive in this environment. He pursues painting and sculpture at Andrea del Verrocchio’s workshop, and in the Maestro’s atelier he meets the young painters who will make Renaissance history.  Meanwhile, in his secret laboratory beneath the city, Leo manages to work on creating his “fantastic inventions”, which will always be tested quite reluctantly by his friend Lollo.  The young genius also experiences his first crush while trying to win the heart of Lisa, who often ends up being cleverer than he is.  In Florence, Leo becomes friends with Lorenzo de’ Medici who will later be known as “the Magnificent”. It’s up to our hero and his friends to save Lorenzo and family from the dangerous endeavors of a mysterious conspirator, who wants to gain control of the city. The conspirator is helped by a motley crew of hapless pirates, who are about as fierce as they are incompetent.  The series is based on the award-winning feature film “Leo da Vinci – Mission Mona Lisa” released worldwide in 2018/2019.  LEO DA VINCI, a must-see series full of adventure, with a pinch of comedy and a splash of romance!     

Vlady & Mirò (2021)

Director: Sergio Manfio

Country: Italy

Duration: 05:00

Synopsis: Vlady & Miró is a fun and entertaining series for kids and grown-ups alike.  Vlady the raccoon and his best friend Miró the bear, are getting ready to go into hibernation. Everything is going just fine, until Miró starts….. SNORING! So, if Vlady wants to sleep too, he’s got a single, most important, indispensable and necessary mission: make the snoring stop immediately!  Each episode is a series of ideas and strategies where Vlady attempts to stop Miró’s snoring: some are crazy and brilliant, some stupid and dangerous, and some unpredictable and impossible – but all nevertheless hysterically funny!  After exactly four minutes, Vlady succeeds in his objective and is finally able to fall asleep. That is when he begins to have such a beautiful dream, along with the hopes that this dream will last all Winter. Vlady dreams (for a minute) of becoming a superhero, a secret agent, a race car driver, an outstanding athlete, a famous actor, and so much more… Until he wakes up with a start. OH NO! Mirò is snoring louder and louder!

EXPERIMENTAL SELECTION   |   JANUARY 2022

“All Work, All Play” (2020)

Director: Dan Libman

Country: Canada

Duration: 04:18

Synopsis: Two brothers cook-off against each other for bragging rights, and the better knife.       

A Girl Called Johnny (2022)

Director: Mika Bar-On Nesher

Country: United States

Duration: 11:27

Synopsis: Set in Hell’s Kitchen, two girls go on a quest to discover the source of a supersonic sound that’s driving them mad.

The Same Vision (2021)

Director: Hannah Rybchinska

Country: Russian Federation

Duration: 09:20

Synopsis: When we are born, we know how to create and how to love. We know how to breathe deeply. But then, as we grow, we replace these primal understandings with fear, shame, and self-doubt. Who is in charge? Three different Russian men know who.

A quiet man (2021)

Director: Nyima Cartier

Country: France

Duration: 14:30

Synopsis: Paris-La Défense, the business district.  From the 17th floor of an office building, Pierre is staring out the window: down below, a colleague who was dismissed that morning has been sitting on a bench for hours, alone in the cold. Why won’t he go home?  From the heights of his office, Pierre wonders what to do.

Charging the Canopy (2021)

Director: Olivia Csiky Trnka, Noé Cauderay

Country: Switzerland

Duration: 05:10

Synopsis: The thoughts of a passenger before her plane crashes in the jungle.

MUSIC VIDEO SELECTION  |   JANUARY 2022

Marloe – Remember Me (2021)

Director: Michael S.U. Hudson

Country: United Kingdom

Duration: 03:39

Synopsis: A young boy dreams of travelling to a faraway place only to realise his dreams.

3+1 – Alive (Feat. TonyB.) (2021)

Director: Margarita Mironova

Country: Russian Federation

Duration: 04:03

Synopsis: Music video for a track called “Alive” by music project 3+1.  It tells a story of the human being making a way from darkness to light.

KARTECH – Speed Dating (2021)

Director: Svyat Brusnikin

Country: Russian Federation

Duration: 03:23

Synopsis: When you hear “domestic violence”,  reflexively imagine the rude man and woman on the floor. Even men don’t wanna discuss men’s psycological injuries, cause masculine culture of proud silence is win. Our story is borning here, on the ground of endless surrender. Our hero almost have no chance to resist inspiring women abuse. And even less to save his “face”, to save his reputation.  In this video we’ve got no winners. And all matches aren’t random. Cause the problem not as clear as was discussed.

Be That Movie (2020)

Director: Roger Villarroya

Country: Spain

Duration: 04:54