Make Up

Claire Oakley : 2019

19-year-old Ruth travels alone to a seaside holiday park in Cornwall to be with her boyfriend Tom. It's off-season, so the resort is mostly deserted, except for a few residents and a handful of staff who are getting the mobile homes ready for the winter. Ruth gradually settles into her new environment, finding work and making a new friend in the form of make-up enthusiast Jade. But one afternoon, while giving Tom's caravan a spring clean, Ruth finds evidence that he might be cheating on her. In the emptiness of this life, there is plenty of space for new emotions and her imagination, fed by inexplicable events. As her desire to uncover the truth turns into an obsession, while also struggling with her feelings for Jade, Ruth begins to realise she might be looking for something else entirely. Claire Oakley's feature debut premiered at BFI London Film Festival 2019, and screened in the Bright Future section at International Film Festival Rotterdam 2020.

Emilia

César Sodero : 2020

Following a bust-up with her girlfriend, Emilia returns from the city to her mother's village, somewhere in Patagonia. Her mother isn't overjoyed about Emilia's return, as this disrupts her peaceful existence. Emilia tries to decide how she wants to carry on with her life, but is confronted with people and feelings from her past. Bored and frustrated, or just looking for intimacy, she seduces a number of men, including her childhood sweetheart, but also falls in love with a girl at the school where she teaches gym – an obsession that distracts her from her broken heart and musings about the future. César Sodero's feature debut premiered in the Voices section at International Film Festival Rotterdam 2020.

Psychosis in Stockholm

Maria Bäck : 2020
Psykos i Stockholm

A surreal, stylistically on point, and deeply moving film about a girl seeking life as a teen, but who has to grow up very fast. Twenty years ago Maria Bäck went on vacation to Stockholm with her mother. It ended with her mother having a mental breakdown and the 14-year-old Maria wandering around in the capital city alone. With the help of actors, she has now processed the experience in this feature film. Through off-colour blonde jokes, poetic doubles, and a street choir singing bob hund songs, the director creates a powerful and engaging film about human yearning and the diffuse borders of existence. Maria Bäck's feature debut premiered in the Nordic Competition section at Göteborg Film Festival 2020.

By the Name of Tania

Bénédicte Liénard & Mary Jiménez : 2019

There is a place where rich men live. They are so rich that they sprinkle the girls they particularly like with gold dust. These tales of wonder are so tempting to a young Peruvian girl that she leaves her village and sets out on the river's currents for the country's gold mines. However, what she finds there is neither luxury nor fairy tale princes, but violence and forced prostitution. Step by step, she is robbed of her moral and physical integrity. Interweaving documental and fictional elements, this hybrid-form assembles a story which – despite the mesmerising and poetic imagery – cannot hide the horror which the protagonist experiences for long. A drastic and moving film which reconstitutes a space of dignity and gives a voice and an identity to one who has lost her name. Bénédicte Liénard and Mary Jiménez's documentary, their third collaboration, premiered in the Generation 14plus section at Berlin International Film Festival 2019, and screened in competition at Tromsø International Film Festival 2020.

Giraffe

Anna Sofie Hartmann : 2019

A tunnel will be built to connect Denmark and Germany, the present sets in motion towards the future, change hangs in the air. Dara, an ethnologist, arrives to document the houses tagged for demolition. The young Pole, Lucek, and his colleagues prepare the future construction site. Käthe works on the ferry, steadily moving people, their stories, and goods to and fro. Birte and Leif leave their house that has been passed down for generations. Agnes's life resounds in her diaries, collectibles and the walls of her home, which will soon be demolished. A Danish summer: long days turn into blue nights. People meet and part ways again. Anna Sofie Hartmann's second feature premiered in competition at Locarno Film Festival 2019, and was winner of the FIPRESCI Prize at Vienna International Film Festival 2019.

Death Inhabits at Night

Eduardo Morotó : 2020
A morte habita à noite

Greasy hair; grooved and unshaven face; emanating alcohol fumes. Raúl just doesn't care anymore. The unemployed writer pours himself another glass of cheap wine as an upstairs neighbour leaps to his death. His girlfriend is clearly more upset by the incident. A little later, she finds a letter by the door reminding them to pay the rent or be evicted. Raúl shrugs and suggests going back to bed. But all of this dismissiveness changes following a meeting with a troubled young girl. Based on the writings of Charles Bukowski, the story takes place in society's grungy underbelly. The characters hang around dilapidated hotel rooms and shabby bars. Brimming with melancholy, but also recognition; a cautious search for soulmates in a world full of self-destruction. Eduardo Morotó's feature debut premiered in the Bright Future section at International Film Festival Rotterdam 2020.