Si yo fuera el invierno mismo

Jazmín López : 2020
If I Were the Winter Itself

Four friends meet on a remote estate to create a cinematic re-enactment of three iconic works that embodied the social and artistic revolution of 50 years ago: La Chinoise (1967) by Jean-Luc Godard, Inextinguishable Fire (1969) by Harun Farocki and the performance Untitled (Facial Hair Transplants) (1972) by Ana Mendieta. The estate is a living backdrop for dreams and phantoms. In all its faded glory, it symbolises the privilege of these young artists who gather there to discuss the meaning of their activist examples. Carmen, the project's initiator, is overwhelmed by feelings and thoughts about her ex-lover, Valentin, whom she can't get off her mind. In long takes, the mobile camera explores the rooms of the estate, where the boundary between acting and being seems to dissolve. The spatial dimensions of the location are used to condense time and link Carmen's subjective and objective realities. During the artistic process the friends undergo and between the lines of their cerebral conversations, this gives rise to a mysterious, deep exploration of the complex mourning of lost love. Jazmín López's second feature premiered in competition in the Bright Future section at International Film Festival Rotterdam 2020.

Instinct

Halina Reijn : 2019

Nicoline, an experienced psychologist, starts a new job at a penal institution. She meets Idris, a sex offender who, after five years of treatment for a series of extremely violent sexual assaults, is about to go on his first unaccompanied probation. His team of practitioners are enthusiastic about his development but Nicoline is vehemently opposed, concluding after only a few short meetings that he still poses a great danger to society. Unable to sway her colleagues, she concedes, but also begins to notice her own inability to resist the rush of Idris's manipulation. As her intrigue quickly escalates to infatuation, Nicoline recognises in Idris something unsettled in herself. And where intent is both unimportant and unclear, the two then find themselves face to face in a grippingly quiet yet stomach-churning battle for power and control, in which there can be no true winner. Halina Reijn's feature, her directorial debut, was winner of the Variety Piazza Grande Award when it premiered at Locarno Film Festival 2019. The film received the Cineuropa Prize, Youth Jury Award and the award for Best Actress when it screened in competition at Les Arcs Film Festival 2019.

Nocturnal

Nathalie Biancheri : 2019

Newly arrived from Dublin, 16-year-old school running champion Laurie lives alone with her single mother in a Yorkshire coastal town. Something of an outsider, the aspiring athlete struggles to connect with the other girls on her track team, distancing herself with a quietly combative demeanour. But Laurie can't deflect the attention of Pete, a handyman in his thirties performing some odd jobs at her school. Frustrated and lonely, Laurie overcomes her initial fear of Pete. After a couple of curt interactions, she eventually agrees to hang out with her new admirer and almost immediately a connection is apparent. As they spend more time together, a unique bond grows, yet Pete's intentions remain ambiguous. Until one day when Pete's real predicament and intentions come to light and the truth emerges. Nathalie Biancheri's feature debut premiered at BFI London Film Festival 2019, and screened in competition in the Hauteur section at Les Arcs Film Festival 2019.

Daughter

Daria Kashcheeva : 2019
Dcera

An innovative and heart-wrenching puppet animation in which the bond between a father and a daughter is imperiled by matters that go unspoken and hurts that are slow to heal. The interruption of a small bird transports a woman back to memories of her father. Should you hide your pain? Withdraw yourself into your inner world, full of longing for your father's demonstrative love? Or, should you be understanding and forgive before it is too late? An expressionistic recollection of missed opportunities, the film depicts the relationship between a father and daughter as they overcome a mutual lack of understanding to find their way back to each other. Daria Kashcheeva's short was winner of the Cristal for a Graduation Film, and the Junior Jury Award for a Graduation Film when it premiered in competition at Annecy International Animation Film Festival 2019.

Daughter – official trailer (vimeo)

Psychobitch

Martin Lund : 2019

The coming-of-age story of two young people: an unexpected encounter between the best student in the class and a psychotic and rebellious girl. Frida is different – not because she is, but because she wants to be. The 15-year-old has no desire to be part of "Generation Perfect" where all kids end up alike – in stark contrast to Marius, the golden boy of the class, who wants to be the best at whatever he does. When the two are put together in class study tandem, Marius sees a good opportunity to prove how great he is again. Frida for her part has no intention of letting herself be helped or 'fixed'. Yet in his fights with Frida, Marius also experiences something exciting, challenging and completely new. Soon, learning becomes loving – and Frida and Marius, despite their differences, plunge into an unusual, turbulent relationship. Martin Lund's feature screened at Filmfest Hamburg 2019, and was winner of the Audience Award at ArteKino Festival 2019.

Dust and Ashes

Park Hee-kwon : 2019
축복의 집

Hae-su, a frail young girl who works at a factory, is always covered in dust. There seems to be a problem at home, and she seems to be taking care of it in a mysterious way. Her mother has died and the girl runs around anxiously in order to hold the funeral in secrecy. She is clearly in distress, but what is the truth behind Hae-su's suspicious behaviour? Unanswered questions trigger lingering, disquieting feelings about what really happened, how it happened and what lies in the future for her. Park Hee-kwon's feature debut premiered in competition at Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival 2019.

Isaac

Jurgis Matulevičius : 2019
Izaokas

The infamous Operation Barbarossa, the code-name for the Axis invasion of the Soviet Union, expanded to Kaunas in June of 1941. Between forty and sixty Jews were tortured and brutally killed in the incident known as the Lietūkis Garage Massacre. During the massacre a Lithuanian activist, Andrius Gluosnis, kills his Jewish neighbour, Isaac. Twenty-five years later in Soviet Lithuania, movie director Gediminas Gutauskas returns from the USA with a screenplay of a film that portrays, in details, the Lietūkis Garage Massacre and describes a particular situation where Isaac is killed. The screenplay is later brought to the attention and investigated by the KGB. Why does a director, who once relocated to the USA, return to Soviet Lithuania? Why is his scenario so unusually historically accurate to the massacre, as though he would have witnessed it himself? Perhaps he knows someone who attended the massacre themselves? The aftermath of the murder returns many years later to cripple life and love, triggering a chain of fateful coincidences. Jurgis Matulevičius's feature debut premiered in competition at Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival 2019.

Nour

Maurizio Zaccaro : 2019

As two women scroll through their holiday photos at dawn aboard a boat, they hear cries that sound like they're coming from people in the sea. Little by little, they make them out in the water. They're immigrants whose boat has sunk in the Lampedusa waters. Nour is ten years old and she crossed the Mediterranean by herself to reach Europe. What is she doing on her own in Lampedusa, among the survivors of a shipwreck? Pietro Bartolo, the doctor on the island, takes care of her and, step by step, he tries to reconstruct not only the girl's past, but also her present and a new future. Maurizio Zaccaro's feature premiered in the Festa Mobile section at Torino Film Festival 2019.

Cleo

Eva Cools : 2019

Cleo is a 17-year-old girl who survives a devastating car crash which kills her parents. After that fatal night she is raised by her caring grandmother who tries to offer Cleo and her little brother a loving home but finds herself faced with a rebellious teenager. Cleo's father was a renowned concert pianist and she too has been playing the piano since childhood. Although she often listens to contemporary music, the piano – and in particular Rachmaninov's work – plays a central role in Cleo's cathartic processing. Cleo begins to lose herself in Brussels and seeks refuge in the older, mysterious Leos whom she meets in a nightclub and who seems to understand the struggle she is in. Viewing him as a stranger with whom she can reinvent herself, unencumbered by her past and her trauma, she is unaware of the tragic circumstances linking him to herself and her family. Eva Cools's feature directorial debut premiered at Film Fest Gent 2019, and screened in competition in the Alice nella Città section at Rome Film Festival 2019.

Arracht

Tom Sullivan : 2019
Monster

Connemara, Ireland, 1845 on the eve of the Great Hunger. Colmán Sharkey, a fisherman, a father, a husband, takes in a stranger at the behest of a local priest. Patsy, a former soldier in the Napoleonic wars arrives just ahead of 'the blight', a disease that eventually wipes out the country's potato crop, contributing to the death and displacement of millions. As the crops rot in the fields, Colmán, his brother and Patsy travel to the English landlord's house to request a stay on rent increases that Colmán predicts will destroy his community. His request falls on deaf ears and Patsy's subsequent actions set Colmán on a path that will take him to the edge of survival, and sanity. Not only must he struggle with hunger and despair, but also with gnawing guilt because of all the people he couldn't save. It is only upon encountering an abandoned young girl that Colmán's resolve is lifted. Just in time for the darkness of his past to pay another visit. Tom Sullivan's feature debut premiered in competition at Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival 2019.

Les Perseides

Alberto Dexeus & Ànnia Gabarró : 2019
The Perseids

Legend has it that the town and the thermal power plant of Escatrón were built over the Spanish Civil War battlefield, leaving behind the dead bodies and burials of its victims. The ghosts and spirits still wander through its streets and buildings, semi-abandoned nowadays. Following her parents' divorce, Mar arrives in Escatrón to spend the strangest summer of her life. The relationship between Mar and her father has not been easy, so she takes refuge in these mysterious legends that float around the town and through a group of young people that seem to function according to some rules which are unknown to her. Mar will discover this to be a more fascinating place than it seemed at first, helping her to get closer to her father to try to make peace with him. Blurring the line between reality and fiction, the tale carefully captures familial and historical troubles, confusing the ghosts of the past and those of the present. Alberto Dexeus and Ànnia Gabarró's feature debut premiered in competition at Buenos Aires International Festival of Independent Cinema 2019, and screened in competition at Gijón International Film Festival 2019.

Antigone

Sophie Deraspe : 2019

Following the murder of their parents, Antigone, her sister Ismène, her brothers Étéocle and Polynice, and their grandmother Ménécée find refuge in Montréal. They live a quiet modest life in a tiny apartment in a working-class neighbourhood. A straight-A student seemingly destined for greatness, Antigone is the glue that holds the family together. Tragedy strikes when Étéocle is wrongfully gunned down by police during the arrest of Polynice, a small-time drug dealer. Motivated by her sense of duty towards her family and fuelled by the memory she cherishes of her dead parents, Antigone decides to jeopardise her own future to preserve that of her family. Feeling the grip of power tightening around her, the teenage girl rejects the law of man and follows her own sense of justice, dictated by love and loyalty. Acutely exploring familial sacrifice, the burden of responsibility, and the nature of justice, this provocative and timely adaptation of the classic Greek tragedy by Sophocles reimagines the story of a woman's quest for justice as a commentary on the immigrant experience in ostensibly welcoming contemporary Canada. Sophie Deraspe's film was winner of the award for Best Canadian Feature Film when it premiered at Toronto International Film Festival 2019.

Dead Volume

Kauê Telloli : 2019
Volume Morto

Without permission and support from the school, a young teacher seeks to understand the strange behaviour of Gustavo – a silent boy who is only 7 years old, nicknamed by the other children "Dead Volume". However, the boy's parents claim that Gustavo's behaviour at home is completely different from the one described by the teacher. The parents decide to conduct an investigation of their own, putting the teacher's job at risk. The young teacher tries to calm down the parents and prevent a scandal from spreading in school. Nevertheless she ends up increasing the distrust of the parents, turning her into the main suspect, and making the puzzle even more unsolvable. Kauê Telloli's feature premiered in competition at Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival 2019.

On the Quiet

Zoltán Nagy : 2019
Szép csendben

A coming-of-age story set in the contemporary Hungarian countryside. Dávid is the first violinist, the soloist of a youth orchestra. Nóra is a cellist who has just joined the orchestra, several years younger than Dávid. The boy finds out that the orchestra's 60-year-old conductor and music teacher is sexually harassing the insecure newcomer. Dávid wants to protect the girl, but it's not at all easy, because the conductor is his mentor, almost a stepfather. And there is no direct evidence of harassment. Indeed, such things generally happen quietly. Even if any bystanders notice anything, they prefer not to talk about it. While looking for the truth, Dávid's life soon starts to spiral out of control as he faces tough decisions and the adult society's negligence. Zoltán Nagy's feature debut had its international premiere in competition at Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival 2019.

Homecoming

Adriyanto Dewo : 2019
Mudik

Going back to their hometown for the holidays is a ritual that most urban Asians will undertake at least once a year. It is a journey to reunite with their family and their roots and to recharge themselves. Trying to find solutions for conflicts in her marriage, Aida goes on a road trip with her husband for homecoming. During the trip, they are involved in a fatal road accident in which a man – someone's husband – is killed, and they make a detour to his village to pay their respects to his widow. This accident will jolt them together but also painfully drive them further apart. The unexpected journey forces Aida to face a different future and find answers to the questions in her life. It leads to a metamorphosis through which she will become a better version of herself. Adriyanto Dewo's feature premiered in competition at Macao International Film Festival 2019.

Arima

Jaione Camborda : 2019

Arima is something you glimpse through the mist, something you can sense but still fail to see clearly. A dream, a memory, a desire. In a village of greenery and grey stone, Arima is the story of four women and a girl whose existence is disrupted by the sudden arrival of two strangers. One of them is fleeing from the other, sneaking around town like an elusive being, a ghostly presence of uncertain existence. The other character – an injured man carrying a gun – will disrupt the women's way of life in different ways. The whole plot takes place on the fine line between reality and imagination, between dreams and nightmares, fear and desire, discovering a tangle of echoes from the past, mysteries and mirror games. Jaione Camborda's feature debut premiered in competition at Mostra Internacional de Cinema 2019, and received the Award to the Direction at its Spanish premiere in competition in the New Waves section at Sevilla European Film Festival 2019.

The Gift

Giuliano Fratini : 2019
Il Dono

It is 1983. Andrei Tarkovsky's permit to work abroad has expired and he is legally required to return home. He is in Italy, shooting the film Nostalgia. He understands from the messages of some friends and colleagues that the Soviet Union is not awaiting him with open arms. His life there will be even tougher than before. So he decides to break with Soviet authorities and, a year before the Milan Conference during which he will publicly announce his decision, he leaves his friends who are hosting him in Rome and goes into hiding. The documentary traces the reasons why Tarkovsky decided to give up the life he had led until then and hide in an unknown location. Even there, he cannot feel safe. The Soviets with their apparatus do not let their citizens go that easily. The documentary features archival recordings and interviews with witnesses to those events, including Krzysztof Zanussi and Giuseppe Lanci. Giuliano Fratini's first full-length documentary premiered at Buenos Aires International Festival of Independent Cinema 2019, and had its European premiere in competition at Warsaw International Film Festival 2019.

Alice Júnior

Gil Baroni : 2019

Alice is a teenage transgender girl who is full of life and wants to give her first kiss, but first, she just wants to be who she really is. Alice is loved by her family, especially by her father, Jean, who is willing to do anything for his daughter. Jean, a perfumist, is transferred by his company to Araucárias do Sul, the place of the rare Imperial Flower. Alice reluctantly moves with her father. She leaves her crush and her friends in Recife, and now she needs to make new friends with the inhabitants of the small town. To make things worse, she has to study at the only school in town: the ancient and conservative Salesian college. Determined not to be discouraged, Alice is the personification of resistance, and little by little she is going to captivate her classmates and the people of Araucárias do Sul. With her charisma and her fertile imagination, everybody will fall in love with her. Gil Baroni's feature premiered at Mostra Internacional de Cinema 2019.

Obscure

Kunlin Wang : 2019

A lonely farmstead where an authoritarian father and his two teenage children live in seclusion. A coming-of-age journey of a teenage boy who sexually awakens after discovering the sexual relationship between his father and sister. The boy is trapped in his father's nightmare and tries to repeal the psychological repression by competing for his sister's sexual attention. The sibling love and pure childish joy of being together, which once served to counterbalance familial strangeness, is now disturbed and gradually develops into a sexual attraction and desire. With the ambiguous representation and non-binary nature of the two teenagers' gender and the surreal but naturalistic atmosphere, the film depicts physical desire and connection which changes something in a family dramatically and irreversibly. Kunlin Wang's feature debut premiered in competition at Taipei Film Festival 2019, and had its international premiere in competition at Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival 2019.

Marionette

Álvaro Curiel de Icaza : 2019
Marioneta

Ernesto is a Cuban actor desperately looking for an opportunity in Mexico City. In a fortuitous way he crosses paths with Belén, a street artist who is unaware of her real talent. The underground subway world is the place where fate has prepared an unexpected encounter for them, which will turn their lives upside down. She introduces him to David Torrico, a man without scruples who doesn't hesitate when it comes to manipulating the lives of people. The film takes us to the hidden world of Mexico City, where the beggars are dominated by a dark capo. While playing and flirting with the meaning of being an actor and being able to escape the daily routine, it introduces us to a curious catalogue of quirky characters which surround the complex relationship that Ernesto and Belén try to build. Álvaro Curiel de Icaza's feature premiered at FotoFilm Tijuana 2019, and had its international premiere in competition at Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival 2019.