Children

A rough, atmospheric drama about the construction of masculinity in South Africa's Bible Belt. South Africa, Free State region, isolated stronghold to the Afrikaans white ethnic minority culture. In this conservative farming territory obsessed with strength and masculinity, Janno is different, secretive, emotionally frail. One day his mother, fiercely religious, brings home Pieter, a hardened street orphan she wants to save, and asks Janno to make this stranger into his brother. The two boys start a fight for power, heritage and parental love. More

Marcela has just lost her sister Rina, it was sudden. Rina’s apartment must now be cleared of her possessions, the plants, furniture and clothing: succulents, dark wood, patterned scarves, a pair of old sunglasses. The curtains are closed and the light is soft and diffuse, like it must be on the floor of the sea, like it is at home, where Marcela lives with her husband and three teenage children. Family life is chaotic, as there are constant interruptions, the broken washing machine, the telephone calls and unexpected guests, the tears that arrive unannounced, the impromptu songs. More

What if the only evidence of a crime is the testimony of a parent translating the words of her child? Rubens is a carefree, charismatic swimming instructor who finds himself accused of displaying inappropriate affection toward one of his students by the boy’s mother. Other parents and colleagues are only too eager to condemn him. Jabor’s incisive, unsettling debut maintains an intriguing, tension-filled air of mystery even as it exposes our own propensity to pass judgment. More

Isidora and Enrique are about 80 years old and live with their equally aged cats in an elegant apartment in Santiago. But it is on the eighth floor and will quickly make Isidora a prisoner if the lift fails again. On such a day, of all days, the daughter announces her visit. That can't bode well. Soon the fidgety Rosario sweeps through the apartment like a hurricane. She's allergic to cats, but that's not all. After her girlfriend "Hugo" has joined her, the real reasons for the visit shine through: They're going after the apartment. More

En el Nombre de la Hija tells the story of a nine-year old girl whose name is in dispute. Manuela has been named alter her socialist-atheist father, but her catholic-conservative grandmother insists she should carry the name the first daughters of the family have carried for generations: Dolores. The story takes place in a Valley in the Ecuadorian Andes, during the summer of 1976. Manuela and her little brother, Camilo, are spending vacations with their cousins and grandparents at the family's farmhouse. More

After having spent many years in Germany, Ahmad returns to his native Iran for a holiday. His friends from his student days organise a three-day breakon the Caspian Sea. One of the party, a fun-loving woman named Sepideh takes the matter in hand. Unbeknown to the rest of the group, she has alsoinvited a young woman named Elly, who is a nursery school teacher at her daughter’s kindergarten. Ahmad has just emerged from an unhappy marriage and is now divorced from his German wife. He would very much like to begin a new life with an Iranian woman. More

Two sisters and a brother live in the center of İstanbul today. They are in their thirties and forties, and lead very different lives, self centered on their upper-middle class preoccupations. One day, a phone call brings them together on a voyage through Turkey’s suburbs and villages to the small town in the Black Sea mountains where they were born. Their aged mother, Nusret, has dissappered. More

A visual poem of incomparable beauty, this masterpiece from director Nacer Khemir (Wanderers of the Desert) begins with the story of a blind dervish named Bab’Aziz and his spirited granddaughter, Ishtar. Together they wander the desert in search of a great reunion of dervishes that takes place just once every thirty years. With faith as their only guide, the two journey for days through the expansive, barren landscape. More

Seibei Iguchi (Hiroyuki Sanada), a low-ranking samurai and family man, leads a life without glory as a bureaucrat in the mid-XIX century Japan. A widower, he has charge of two daughters (whom he adores) and a senile mother; he must therefore work in the fields and accept piecework to make both ends meet. New prospects seem to open up when Tomoe (Rie Miyazama), his long-time love, divorces a brutal husband. However, even as the Japanese feudal system is unraveling, Seibei remains bound by the code of honour of the samurai and by his own sense of social precedences. The consequences are cruel. More

Peaceful living and dying are a central theme in this masterpiece by the Japanese Shohei Imamura, a literary film adaptation in the mountain region of Narayama. In a small mountain village on the edge of a valley, all who have turned seventy must leave the community and climb a certain mountain to die. Anyone who defies tradition brings misfortune to his own family. Orin is 69 years old and is about to climb the mountain this winter. But first she has to make sure that her eldest son Tatsuhei finally finds a wife. More

The Hirayamas travel from their hometown of Onomichi to Tokyo tovisit their adult children. But the younger generation make them feelmore in the way than welcome. It also emerges that their son’s career asa doctor and their daughter’s as a hairdresser are nowhere near as successfulas the couple were led to believe from afar. The only one whoreally makes an effort to spend time with them is their daughter-in-law,Noriko, the widow of the Hirayama’s son who went missing in the war. More

Twenty-seven-year-old Noriko lives with her widowed father, a university professor, in a small house in the tranquil surroundings of northern Kamakura. He is completing a scientific manuscript, aided by his assistant, Hattori. Professor Sonomiya is concerned for his daughter s welfare, and one day suggests she marry Hattori. Noriko only laughs at his suggestion because she is quite happy with her life and knows that Hattori is already engaged. Her aunt Masa, the professor s sister, is the next person to try out her matchmaking skills, and she talks Noriko into meeting Mr Satake. More