
Being mother is the most natural thing in the world. Or so it seems. Yet the demands on women with children have rarely been as overloaded and contradictory as they are in today’s Western world. Promises of happiness are often followed by disadvantages, excessive demands and feelings of guilt. The mother has become an artificially glorified ideal, which nevertheless is often legitimized by the „nature of the woman“. We live in a time when three people could claim to be the same child’s mother: egg donors give their genes to beget children, surrogate mothers deliver babies which they give away immediately after birth, and men raise children by themselves – without a woman at their side. Hence the question arises: What makes a human being a real mother?

8.0The documentary Schwarze Adler (Black Eagles) lets black players of the German national football team tell their personal stories for the first time. What road did they take before they got to where we cheer for them? What hurdles did they have to overcome? What prejudices and racist hostility were they exposed to – and what was it like in the past, what is it like today?
7.4The story of a precocious six year-old and her ragtag group of friends whose summer break is filled with childhood wonder, possibility and a sense of adventure while the adults around them struggle with hard times.
8.6The defense and the prosecution have rested and the jury is filing into the jury room to decide if a young Spanish-American is guilty or innocent of murdering his father. What begins as an open and shut case soon becomes a mini-drama of each of the jurors' prejudices and preconceptions about the trial, the accused, and each other.
7.4The tender, heartbreaking story of a young man’s struggle to find himself, told across three defining chapters in his life as he experiences the ecstasy, pain, and beauty of falling in love, while grappling with his own sexuality.
8.21930s Korea, in the period of Japanese occupation, a new girl, Sookee, is hired as a handmaiden to a Japanese heiress, Hideko, who lives a secluded life on a large countryside estate with her domineering Uncle Kouzuki. But the maid has a secret. She is a pickpocket recruited by a swindler posing as a Japanese Count to help him seduce the Lady to steal her fortune.
6.9Imprisoned for practicing black magic, writer and adventurer Giacomo Casanova escapes and wanders Europe, using his fluid sexuality to find his place in life amid a variety of eccentric and strange characters.
6.8When the Emperor of China issues a decree that one man per family must serve in the Imperial Chinese Army to defend the country from Huns, Hua Mulan, the eldest daughter of an honored warrior, steps in to take the place of her ailing father. She is spirited, determined and quick on her feet. Disguised as a man by the name of Hua Jun, she is tested every step of the way and must harness her innermost strength and embrace her true potential.
8.0The story of J. Robert Oppenheimer's role in the development of the atomic bomb during World War II.
7.0The film spans 30 years in Julieta’s life from a nostalgic 1985 where everything seems hopeful, to 2015 where her life appears to be beyond repair and she is on the verge of madness.
7.5England, early 18th century. The close relationship between Queen Anne and Sarah Churchill is threatened by the arrival of Sarah's cousin, Abigail Hill, resulting in a bitter rivalry between the two cousins to be the Queen's favourite.
7.6Caleb, a coder at the world's largest internet company, wins a competition to spend a week at a private mountain retreat belonging to Nathan, the reclusive CEO of the company. But when Caleb arrives at the remote location he finds that he will have to participate in a strange and fascinating experiment in which he must interact with the world's first true artificial intelligence, housed in the body of a beautiful robot girl.
8.5A burger-loving hit man, his philosophical partner, a drug-addled gangster's moll and a washed-up boxer converge in this sprawling, comedic crime caper. Their adventures unfurl in three stories that ingeniously trip back and forth in time.
6.5After fighting his demons for decades, John Rambo now lives in peace on his family ranch in Arizona, but his rest is interrupted when Gabriela, the granddaughter of his housekeeper María, disappears after crossing the border into Mexico to meet her biological father. Rambo, who has become a true father figure for Gabriela over the years, undertakes a desperate and dangerous journey to find her.
7.3When all but one child from the same class mysteriously vanish on the same night at exactly the same time, a community is left questioning who or what is behind their disappearance.
6.7A Danish family visits a Dutch family they met on a holiday. What was supposed to be an idyllic weekend slowly starts unraveling as the Danes try to stay polite in the face of unpleasantness.
6.9A second trial begins in November 1975 against French left-wing revolutionary Pierre Goldman, accused of several armed robberies and the death of two chemists.
6.5Vlad Tepes is a great hero, but when he learns the Sultan is preparing for battle and needs to form an army of 1,000 boys, he vows to find a way to protect his family. Vlad turns to dark forces in order to get the power to destroy his enemies and agrees to go from hero to monster as he's turned into the mythological vampire, Dracula.
7.5In 1990s Los Angeles, a 13-year-old spends his summer navigating between a troubled home life and a crew of new friends he meets at a skate shop.
0.0A journey into the lives of the famed Vachon wrestling family through the eyes of Paul “The Butcher” Vachon, the last living member of the dynasty.
10.0The Chukchi reindeer breeders are peculiar people. They are nomads. Reindeers are their welfare, the purport of life. The mother-reindeer is the main divine being; it protects the Chukchi from misfortune and troubles. Nature is not friendly towards people here. Only Chukchi can survive in Tundra. A rush period for the Chukchi reindeer breeders comes in winter, when the temperature rises up to 50 degrees Celsius at night and in the sunlight of the day it doesn't exceed 40 degrees Celsius in tundra: they should separate young deers from the rest of the herd, the weak from the strong. And this, considering that the herds of the Chukchi reindeer breeders number some thousand heads...
0.0Sigrid Koetse, award-winning actor and grande dame of Dutch theater, lived most of her life in the public eye and was always surrounded by a crowd of admirers. With this short documentary, filmmaker Wytse Koetse shows how his aunt spends her days nowadays, lonely in her Amsterdam home.
0.0This film tells a story of ethnic Koreans from Russia and the post-Soviet territories making their new home in New York City. The history of the diaspora is told through conversations with Lidiya Kan’s mother, personal stories, fragmented memories, and her family photo archive. An important character of the film is Morkovcha, the Korean carrot salad, an invention of the Russian Korean diaspora; its essence is symbolic of their mixed identity.
6.7Arctic Tale is a 2007 documentary film from the National Geographic Society about the life cycle of a walrus and her calf, and a polar bear and her cubs, in a similar vein to the 2005 hit production March of the Penguins, also from National Geographic.
7.1An Oscar nominated documentary about a middle-class American family who is torn apart when the father Arnold and son Jesse are accused of sexually abusing numerous children. Director Jarecki interviews people from different sides of this tragic story and raises the question of whether they were rightfully tried when they claim they were innocent and there was never any evidence against them.
0.0Film capturing a family holiday on the North Antrim coast, with trips to the Giant's Causeway and the Carrick-a-Rede Rope Bridge.
0.0This short documentary is a tribute to the unknown father. Emerging filmmaker Danic Champoux poses the question "How many men still have to uproot themselves and leave their families to get work?" as he sets out to search for his own father. He wonders about these men who are labourers, itinerants, and mostly nameless, but who are all exemplary providers. But at what cost? This film was produced as part of the Libres Courts collection of first-time documentary shorts.
0.0In this documentary shot at Canadian Forces Base Petawawa during a troop deployment to Afghanistan, children and teens talk about the particular circumstances of having soldiers as parents. Directed by Claire Corriveau, Children of Soldiers lifts the veil on a reality shared by thousands of young Canadians, and on the difficulty of finding a balance between loyalty to the troops and staying true to themselves.
0.0Harrow’s extraordinary and opulent pageant, and seaside holidays on the south coast.
0.0Over the course of thirteen years, the filmmaker and protagonist shares the experience of his binational family, taking us to his wife's country. "Becoming family" requires a significant cultural sacrifice, as they navigate the challenges of uprooting and integrating into a new society. The film offers a transformative glimpse into the realities of migration.
0.0The family enjoys a sunny but windy day on the pier in Clacton-On-Sea.
0.0Yin Honqiang, a master carpenter from Jiangyin, has been working with wood for over 50 years. Along with his son and his grandson, they create handcrafted pieces of furniture of the highest level, what lead them to be one of the most important furniture makers in all of China. Take a seat is a close look at their way of working while keeping the tradition alive throughout generations.
10.0As a letter to her son, the filmmaker testifies her experience as a photographer aboard the Aquarius, a ship that rescued 29,523 people in the Mediterranean between 2016 and 2018.
7.0Miyamoto-cho is a community of Mom-and-Pop stores and family enterprises located near the center of Tokyo. Competition from supermarkets and shopping centers threatens the livelihoods of long-term residents. High land prices tempt owners to tear down old homes and replace them with apartment buildings; this in turn is changing the composition of the population. Against this backdrop, residents strive to maintain the close social ties, symbols of local identity, and community rituals that keep Miyamoto-cho from becoming just another mailing address. Theodore Bestor began his research here in 1979. His prize winning book of the same name is available through Stanford University Press. This documentary is one of a series depicting the variety of life in today's Japan in the context of human problems common to all industrial nations. A comprehensive study guide is available.
0.0A filmmaker follows her grandparents’ daily life after her chain-smoker and alcoholic grandmother is forced to stop drinking beer for a month.
0.0One summer, many years after his mother confided in him about her emotional difficulties with his father, a filmmaker questions his parents, curious about the state of their relationship. At first glance, their situation does not seem to have changed. Curious, he decides to inquire about it. Their activities and discussions both revive nostalgic and fearful emotions. He sees that his mother does not feel the same. From this moment that he realizes the magnitude of the subject and that some things are not accessible to him.
0.0Yannis is 22 years old. The restless soul, the heart that beats for music. In Marseille, surrounded by a group of passionate friends, his goal is that of thousands of others: to make a living from his art. We delve into his daily life, the creative process of his first EP and an encounter with a tumultuous youth. How to learn to live in uncertainty? What does it mean to want to be an artist? And above all, how can you be happy when you're a blue boy?
7.0NYC based photographer, Khalik Allah, travels to Jamaica to connect with family and document the streets. This is his synopsis.
