Reflections in a surrealist tone about the art of cinema.
Social & External
The people behind it
A Social Life is a short film about a career driven woman named Meredith who's living the life she's always dreamed of... online. Meredith strives to live a balanced life: staying fit, working hard and connecting with her friends; she is creating her "image" within her broader social media friend base. But she awakes one day and realizes that her reflection is merely the collection of photos that she has shared with others. Is this her life? Or just a carefully curated brand?
Bahbah, Shiha, and Sanqur are three colleagues working in a newspaper whose editor-in-chief, Amer, stipulates that he should not be married to work there. Each of them was married and concealed his marriage. The three go to a hotel in Helwan to recuperate. There they meet Hosnia, who is searching with her uncle for a wealthy groom, and begins to set her nets on them, and events escalate.
Fadel and his colleagues Aziz and Hamdi are trying to make their way in life, and they hold advanced degrees, but luck does not crown their endeavor with success. Fadel visits his aunt Alawiya, who runs a private institute for girls in a traditional way, and asks to work in the institute, but she refuses. The three decide to establish a modern institute, similar to the aunt’s institute. To compete with her, to teach girls to be modern.
Two guys coming up together for an idea for a short films
Bruno, a young Frenchman, is frustrated by his girlfriend's constant lack of punctuality. He decides to end their relationship the next time she is late again.
At dawn, in a great classical dance conservatory, a boy falls while rehearsing some movements. Something breaks in his foot, causing sharp pain. But it's exams day and the boy refuses to quit: he tries to face his dance partner and classmates, convincing himself his body has no limits.
In late 19th century France, the Countess Louise, wife of a wealthy general, sells the earrings her husband gave her on their wedding day to pay off her secret debts, then claims to have lost them. Her husband quickly learns of the deceit, which is the beginning of many tragic misunderstandings, all involving the earrings, the general, the countess, and her new lover, the Italian Baron Donati.
Three childhood friends, Martha, Walter and Sam, share a terrible secret. Over time, the ambitious Martha and the pusillanimous Walter have married. She is a cold businesswoman; he is the district attorney: a perfect combination to dominate the corrupt city of Iverstown at will. But the unexpected return of Sam, after years of absence, deeply disturbs the life of the odd couple.
A jazz bassist who surveys a beautiful girl at a gig decides to try to get her home. But the devil is getting into the game too.
A man wrestles with the nature of life after death and the purpose of his soul over the shadowy presence of his lost love, Lenore.
After a fight with her mother, six year old Clara decides to run off to be with her father. But she falls asleep on the way on the bus and somehow ends up with the Wagner family. When Julia Wagner discovers bruises on Clara's body, she feels compelled to act.
When land surveyor K arrives at a small village that houses a castle, local authorities refuse to allow him to enter. As he tries to convince the officials that they sent for him, they clamp down with increasingly complicated bureaucratic obstacles.
For some women to gain freedom, they must forget to remember.
Esther, a highly anxious 23-year-old, has accepted a second date with Romeo, her colleague at the Temple de la Gaufre.
King Henry VIII smitten with Anne Boleyn wishes to displace his estimable Queen Catherine for her. He appeals to Cardinal Wolsey to set aside the tenets of the Church and consent to his divorce from the Queen. The cardinal absolutely refuses to do anything so inimical to his office, as representative of the Holy See. Angered King Henry induces the Archbishop of Canterbury to call a special council through which he divorces himself from Queen Catherine. In punishment for his refusal to accede to the king's wishes, the cardinal is exiled to Leicester Abbey where he dies three days afterward, conscious that he had sustained the sacredness of his office, a martyr to his faith and of service to his king.
On a journey from darkness into light, a man explores his failings as a human being.
Local boy, Peter, is trying to find the source of the metallic sound that haunts the village. When he shares his footage with an old woman it sparks memories of a bear that roamed the hills during her childhood.
Cameron, a Police Officer with psychic abilities, is called upon to interview an accused teen in hopes of finding the whereabouts of the teen's missing gay lover. His investigation immediately spirals into sordid tales of drug abuse, sexual obsessions, and a mysterious man living on a deserted mountain road.
Bruce Conner's landmark experimental film consisting entirely of found footage edited to a new score.
Charlotte Gainsbourg agrees to play a witch condemned to be burned at the stake in the first film directed by Béatrice Dalle. But the chaotic production, technical problems, and psychotic breakdowns gradually plunge the shoot into a chaos of pure light.
After a dreadful incident coupled with an ungovernable paroxysm of violence, a butcher will fall into a downward spiral that will burn to the ground whatever dignity still remained in him.
On a whim, a greedy tycoon decides to corner the world market in wheat. This doubles the price of bread, forcing grain producers into charity lines and others further into poverty. The film contrasts the differences between the lives of those who work to grow the wheat and the life of the man who dabbles in its sale for profit.
In a suburban landscape, the lives of several families interlace with loss, despair and personal crisis. Esther Gold has lost focus on all but caring for her comatose son, Paul, and neglects her daughter and husband. Lawyer Jim Train is devoted to his career, not his family. Helen Christianson wants to find a new spark in life, while Annette Jennings tries to rebuild hers.
94-year-old Eleanor Morgenstein tries to rebuild her life after the death of her best friend. As a result, she moves back to New York City after living in Florida for decades.
Aging painter Louis and his wife Michelle struggle to cope with Louis' advancing dementia.
The legendary Roberto Duran and his equally legendary trainer Ray Arcel change each other's lives.
Conman Robert Freegard poses as an undercover MI5 agent and kidnaps countless victims amidst a high-stakes manhunt, until the woman who fell for him brings him to justice.
A poor, struggling South Carolinian mother and daughter face painful choices with their resolve and pride. Bone, the eldest daughter, and Anney her tired mother, grow both closer and farther apart: Anney sees Glen as her last chance.
During the 1976 Soweto uprising, a white school teacher's life and values are threatened when he asks questions about the death of a young black boy who died in police custody.
At Léon Blum High School in Créteil, France, a history teacher decides to have her weakest 10th grade class participate in a national history competition.
Grégoire Canvel has everything a man could want. A wife he loves, three delightful children, and a stimulating job. He's a film producer. Discovering talented filmmakers and developing films that fit his conception of the cinema-free and true to life-is precisely his reason for living. Yet his prestigious production company, Moon Films, is on its last legs.
A psychotherapist helps a law student cope with schizophrenia in one of five interconnected tales dealing with mental illness.
Defiant young activists take the women's suffrage movement by storm, putting their lives at risk to help American women win the right to vote.
Short film made with the help of the Sundance Film Institute and serving as a proof-of-concept for the subsequent feature film.
A bourgeois couple, modern yet conventional. One night by accident, a young prostitute barges into their lives. Hounded down, beaten up, threatened, she will continue to struggle, with the help of a well off lady, first for her survival-her resurrection-then for her dignity and freedom. Stormy encounters for everyone involved.
An acclaimed stage performer, Dorothy still struggled with the challenge of her color, in a time that wouldn't let some stars in by the front door. Yet against the odds she beat out many more famous rivals for the role of "Carmen Jones", becoming the first black woman ever nominated for a Best Actress Academy Award. Marriages and affairs would break her heart, but her heart was strong. Seductive and easily seduced, she was born to be a star - with all the glory and all the pain of being loved, abused, cheated, glorified, undermined and undefeated. Here was a woman who wouldn't wait in the wings. Halle Berry stars as Dorothy Dandrige.
Thomas Montgomery, a married father of two young daughters, gets seduced by the world of online gambling and chat rooms where a virtual romance and sexual obsession ultimately leads to the murder of an innocent man.
Middle-aged widow Beatrice Hunsdorfer and her daughters Ruth and Matilda are struggling to survive in a society they barely understand. Beatrice dreams of opening an elegant tea room but does not have the wherewithal to achieve her lofty goal. Epileptic Ruth is a rebellious adolescent, while shy but highly intelligent and idealistic Matilda seeks solace in her pets and school projects, including one designed to show how small amounts of radium affect marigolds.
