Western
Valeska Grisebach | Western
Germany/Bulgary/Austria | 2017 | DCP | 119min | MR: 14 years old
A group of German workers sets off to a construction site in the border region between Bulgaria and Greece. This foreign land and its breath-taking landscape awaken the men's sense of adventure, but they are also confronted with their own prejudice and mistrust due to the language barrier and cultural differences. The stage is quickly set for a showdown when men begin to compete for recognition and favor from the local villagers.
Spell Reel
Filipa César | Spell Reel
Germany/Portugal/France/ Guinea-Bissau | 2017 | DCP | 96min | MR: 14 years old
In 2011, an archive of film and audio material re-emerged in Bissau. On the verge of complete ruination, the footage testifies to the birth of Guinean cinema as part of the decolonising vision of Amílcar Cabral, the liberation leader assassinated in 1973. In collaboration with the Guinean filmmakers Sana na N’Hada and Flora Gomes, and many allies, Filipa César imagines a journey where the fragile matter from the past operates as a visionary prism of shrapnel to look through. Digitised in Berlin, in superbly vivid tableaux, the film juxtaposes the black-and-white 16mm footage with contemporary digital images, subtly manipulating scale, orientation, and text to alternatively create distance or achieve proximity between past and present.Image and sound (1967-80): José Bolama, Cobumba, Julinh Camará, Djalma Fettermann, Flora Gomes, Josefina Lopes Crato, Sana na N'Hada, Rudi Spee
Image and sound (2012-15): Suleimane Biai, Filipa César, Marta Leite, Nuno da Luz, Dídio Pestana, Benvindo dos Santos, Aissatu Seidi
Additional text and commentary: Anita Fernandez, Flora Gomes, Sana na N'Hada
The Wound
John Trengove | Inxeba
South Africa/Germany/Nederlands/France | 2017 | DCP | 88min | MR: 18 years old
Eastern Cape, South Africa. A lonely factory worker, Xolani, takes time off his job to assist during an annual Xhosa circumcision initiation into manhood. In a remote mountain camp, young men, recuperate as they learn the masculine codes of their culture. In this environment of machismo and aggression, Xolani cares for a defiant initiate from Johannesburg, Kwanda, who increasingly calls into question the patriarchal codes of the initiation, as well as the unbearable crisis building in Xolani as he must choose between the traditional world that he knows, and his own fulfillment.
Le Berceau de Cristal
Philippe Garrel | Le Berceau de Cristal
France | 1975 | 35mm | 80min | MR: 14 years old
In an almost completely dark room, a woman lying on a bed dressed in black smokes a cigarette, reads, writes something, gets up and walks, plays a few notes on a keyboard. A man, also alone, stands against a marble column. An artist works on his paintings. Garrel looks at the loneliness of these unrelated characters.
