

Internationally acclaimed ventriloquist Nina Conti takes the bereaved puppets of her mentor and erstwhile lover Ken Campbell on a pilgrimage to "Venthaven" the resting place for puppets of dead ventriloquists. She gets to know her latex and wooden travelling partners along the way, and with them deconstructs herself and her lost love in this ventriloquial docu-mockumentary requiem. Ken Campbell was a hugely respected maverick of the British theatre, an eccentric genius who would snort out forgotten artforms. Nina was his protégé in ventriloquism and has been said to have reinvented the artform. This film is truly unique in genre and style. No one has seen ventriloquism like this before.

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Internationally acclaimed ventriloquist Nina Conti takes the bereaved puppets of her mentor and erstwhile lover Ken Campbell on a pilgrimage to "Venthaven" the resting place for puppets of dead ventriloquists. She gets to know her latex and wooden travelling partners along the way, and with them deconstructs herself and her lost love in this ventriloquial docu-mockumentary requiem. Ken Campbell was a hugely respected maverick of the British theatre, an eccentric genius who would snort out forgotten artforms. Nina was his protégé in ventriloquism and has been said to have reinvented the artform. This film is truly unique in genre and style. No one has seen ventriloquism like this before.
2012-03-11
7.4
The legacy of six bereaved puppets
6.0Paul is agonising over his interpretation of 'Uncle Vanya' and, paralysed by anxiety, stumbles upon a solution via a New Yorker article about a high-tech company promising to alleviate suffering by extracting souls. He enlists their services—only to discover that his soul is the shape and size of a chickpea.
6.5Stuck at a crossroads in her personal life, it falls on high school English teacher Miss Stevens to chaperone three of her students — Billy, Margot and Sam — on a weekend trip to a drama competition.
6.3Seven mini-stories of adultery: a widow misbehaves at her husband's funeral, a wife turns to streetwalking for revenge, a prudish girl surprises, a neglected wife vies for her husband's attention, a fight over a dress, a death pact, and a detective revealed as a jealous husband's spy.
7.5Four tales unfold in Wes Anderson's anthology of short films adapted from Roald Dahl's beloved stories, "The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar", "The Swan", "The Rat Catcher", and "Poison."
6.2A wheelchair-bound singer and her best friend embark on a roadtrip to Memphis.
6.0With a new iPhone, an apartment near the Grove, and a comfortable bank account left to her by her beloved late husband, Marnie Minervini has happily relocated from New Jersey to Los Angeles to be near her daughter Lori, a successful (but still single) screenwriter, and smother her with motherly love. But when the dozens of texts, unexpected visits, and conversations dominated by unsolicited advice force Lori to draw strict personal boundaries, Marnie finds ways to channel her eternal optimism and forceful generosity to change the lives of others - as well as her own - and find a new purpose in life.
6.7A movie spun out of equal parts folk tale, fable and real-life legend about the mysterious, 1930s Tennessee hermit who famously threw his own rollicking funeral party... while he was still alive.
6.4An improv group deals with several crises, including the loss of their lease and one member hitting the big time.
6.4A woman and her son enlist a motley crew of so-called spiritual experts to help rid their home of supernatural squatters.
6.4Davey Gordon, a New York City boxer at the end of his career, falls for dancer Gloria Price. However, their budding relationship is interrupted by Gloria's violent boss, Vincent Rapallo, who has eyes for Gloria. The two decide to skip town, but before they can, Vincent and his thugs abduct Gloria, and Davey is forced to search for her among the most squalid corners of the city, with his enemy hiding in the shadows.
6.1After returning to her childhood home, young nun Colleen finds her old room exactly how she left it: painted black and covered in goth and metal posters. Her parents are happy enough to see her, but her brother is living as a recluse in the guesthouse since returning home from the Iraq war.
6.2Jon Katz is close to burnout. He's a writer with writer's block; his wife has left for her sister's because he's emotionally distant; he rarely answers his phone. A kennel sends him a border collie that's undisciplined because of abuse. Despite a series of mishaps, Jon decides to keep trying with the dog, and he rents a dilapidated farm house to give the dog room to run. A local handyman refers Jon to a woman who might be able to help him train the dog. Reluctantly, Jon gives her a try. Is the dog the problem, or the owner?
6.5With ruthless mobsters on her tail, a young woman with a split personality becomes entangled with a man on a pilgrimage across the country to scatter his brother's ashes.
6.8Stand-up comedian Kevin Hart talks about his family, travel and a year full of reckless behavior in front of a live sold-out crowd in London.
6.2Everything changes for Eva when she receives an insurance settlement check accidentally made out for $5,000,000 instead of the expected $50,000. She and her best friend take the money and head out for the adventure of a lifetime.
7.7This 2005 documentary film chronicles the life of Daniel Johnston, a manic-depressive genius singer/songwriter/artist, from childhood up to the present, with an emphasis on his mental illness and how it manifested itself in demonic self-obsession.
6.1A service which creates holographic projections of late family members allows an elderly woman to spend time with a younger version of her deceased husband.
6.3An unlikely friendship evolves over one wild night in LA between a struggling journalist and actor Hervé Villechaize, the world's most famous gun-toting dwarf, resulting in life-changing consequences for both.
7.0A race car driver tries to transport an illegal beer shipment from Texas to Atlanta in under 28 hours, picking up a reluctant bride-to-be on the way.
6.1A fatally ill mother with only two months to live creates a list of things she wants to do before she dies without telling her family of her illness.
6.6The strange comedy film of two close brothers; one, Wilbur, who wants to kill himself, and the other, Harbour, who tries to prevent this. When their father dies leaving them his bookstore they meet a woman who makes their lives a bit better yet with a bit more trouble as well.
7.4A young transgender man explores his gender identity and searches for love in rural Nebraska.
7.4Two lost souls visiting Tokyo -- the young, neglected wife of a photographer and a washed-up movie star shooting a TV commercial -- find an odd solace and pensive freedom to be real in each other's company, away from their lives in America.
Sina and her best friend Aleks are young teenagers of immigrant origin in Germany in 1993, but a film project on a school trip puts their symbiotic friendship to the test.
6.4Several lonely hearts in a semi-provincial suburb of a town in Denmark use a beginner's course in Italian as the platform to meet the romance of their lives. The film, which unspools the connections and family drama shared between the students, complies with several aesthetic principles of Dogme 95 movement.
7.0A solitary nurse bonds with a badly burned patient who survived an accident on an oil rig.
5.3A single mother gets entangled in a web of lies to protect her sons.
0.0The story of the Northern Ireland Troubles through the unflinching testimony of two men who played key roles on opposite sides of that bloody conflict. Nearly ten years ago the two paramilitary leaders told their stories on condition that they could never be revealed while they were still alive. The stories told by the Irish Republican Army's Brendan Hughes and Ulster Volunteer Force's David Ervine tell us of the motivations of the participants, the planning of campaigns of violence, the misery of a hunger strike, the tracking and killing of informers and the duplicity that ended a conflict that had lasted too long. It is also a narrative of the fate of combatants when their wars are over.
7.1After being neglected by her mother, a little girl is taken in by her uncle and his transgender girlfriend, who create a loving home for her.
4.6A couple goes on a hike in the woods, and the woman refuses to return.
5.8Since they were both five, Ryosuke has been stalked by Momoko - the ugliest girl in the village. Her love for Ryosuke is so boundless that she has her face surgically altered to suit his taste - but still he wants nothing to do with her. Ryosuke goes in for fleeting romance - for example, with the girlfriend of a gangster boss. But when he finds out about their affair, he has Ryosuke's little finger hacked off. Magically, the finger falls into Momoko's hands, and she uses it to clone Ryosuke, so she can finally have him (or almost him) for herself. And this is just the first five minutes of Lisa Takeba's short-but-powerful feature debut. Just like in her previous short films, the director - who cut her teeth in the advertising world and as the writer of a video game - throws a lot of genres and techniques into the mix: from science fiction to gangster films, from hospital eroticism to animation. Hectic and absurd, but with its heart in the right place. © IFFR
Sitting in a theater box, Edgar Bergen and Charlie McCarthy make comments between the acts of a vaudeville show.
7.1Cecilie and Joachim are about to get married when a freak car accident leaves Joachim disabled, throwing their lives into a spin. The driver of the other car, Marie, and her family don’t get off lightly, either. Her husband Niels works in the hospital where he meets Cecilie and falls madly in love with her.
4.8Danny Warren is a former minor-league shortstop that becomes a narc to uncover drug dealing in this situation comedy. Investigating at a high-school adult-education class, he falls for the tempting teacher. He joins a colorful group of characters that includes ex-cons, illegal aliens, and brain-dead baby boomers that cause more trouble than their younger counterparts. Swimming classes and wine tastings serve as background for a series of comic catastrophes.
5.6After their mother ends up in jail, two sisters turn to train robbery in order to support their family.
0.0Danny has a rare skin condition that prevents him from being in the sun and a desire to be a regular teenager.
5.2Jorge, bastard child of the infamous Red Light Bandit, decides himself to pursuit a life of crime after meeting with his father, who has been incarcerated for the last 30 years.
6.8Sylvia and Cora Miao play two widowed mothers, best friends and confidants who spend their days reminiscing about times past. Over the course of a lazy weekend afternoon, the two women conjure memories of Cora's husband, his life, his death, and his passionate affair with Sylvia. A series of wistful flashbacks reveal the sometimes touching, sometimes painful circumstances around the women's deep friendship with one another, and their love for the same man.