This Is How Mayakovsky Began(1959)

Moulin Rouge!(en)

A celebration of love and creative inspiration takes place in the infamous, gaudy and glamorous Parisian nightclub, at the cusp of the 20th century. A young poet, who is plunged into the heady world of Moulin Rouge, begins a passionate affair with the club's most notorious and beautiful star.

Le Divorce(en)

While visiting her sister in Paris, a young woman finds romance and learns her brother-in-law is a philanderer.

Narcissus and Psyche(hu)

Narcisus and Psyche is based on a novel by Sandor Weores which was adapted by Vilmos Csaplar and director Gabor Body for a feature-length film. Borrowing the character of Psyche from mythology and placing her in Europe in the 19th century, the authors give her a "modern" life. She is an attractive young woman - and remains so throughout the film, in spite of one hardship after another. Psyche is libidinous, and her prurient interests shock her staid contemporaries.

The Libertine(en)

The story of John Wilmot, a.k.a. the Earl of Rochester, a 17th century poet who famously drank and debauched his way to an early grave, only to earn posthumous critical acclaim for his life's work.

Decidme cómo es un árbol(en)

Riyadh Poem(ar)

A doctor is tasked by his general manager, who suffers from cancer and is being manipulated. Will the important thing be based on what he won, or is there something facing the patient?

Orpheus(fr)

A famous poet in postwar Paris, scorned by the Left Bank youth, is in love with both his wife Eurydice and a mysterious princess. Seeking inspiration, the poet becomes obsessed and follows the princess from the world of the living to the land of the dead.

Shelley's Blaze(fr)

A pictureless film in 3D sound full of political, poetic and incendiary echoes around the death and words of Percy Bysshe Shelley, an infamous young poet driven out of his country after kidnapping his future young wife, Mary Shelley, and who was found dead in 1822, at the age of 29, on the shore of Viareggio in Italy. This sound movie uses text, music and sophisticated sound design projected via 27 speakers to conjure powerful images in the listener's mind.

Pir Sultan Abdal(tr)

The film tells the story of Pir Sultan Abdal, a famous folk poet in Turkey, who criticized some Ottoman governors, Hizir Pasha in particular and as a result was hung by him.

Interiors(en)

When Eve, an interior designer, is deserted by her husband of many years, Arthur, the emotionally glacial relationships of the three grown-up daughters are laid bare. Twisted by jealousy, insecurity and resentment, Renata, a successful writer; Joey, a woman crippled by indecision; and Flyn, a budding actress; struggle to communicate for the sake of their shattered mother. But when their father unexpectedly falls for another woman, his decision to remarry sets in motion a terrible twist of fate…

Leopardi(it)

In 19th-century Italy, Giacomo Leopardi channels his debilitating illness and isolation into poetry.

The Degenerates(it)

A series of bawdy and satirical episodes written during the reign of the emperor Nero and set in imperial Rome. Like the more famous version made by Federico Fellini, an adaptation of Petronius' Satyricon.

The Night of the Iguana(en)

A defrocked Episcopal clergyman leads a bus-load of middle-aged Baptist women on a tour of the Mexican coast and comes to terms with the failure haunting his life.

The Edge of Love(en)

When the Welsh poet Dylan Thomas and his flirtatious wife Caitlin sweep into war-torn London, the last thing they expect is to bump into Dylan's childhood sweetheart Vera. Despite her joy at seeing Dylan after so many years, Vera is swept off her feet by a dashing officer, William Killick, and finds herself torn between the open adoration of her new found beau and the wily charms of the exotic Welshman.

The Poet and the Boy(ko)

Trapped in routine, a Jeju poet finds himself drawn to a boy—and to emotions he’s never dared name.

Phantom Valley(en)

In the desolate countryside, haunted by recurrent dreams, a young drifter finds himself at the borderlands between the living and the dead.

Nobel Son(en)

Soon after his insufferably arrogant father wins the Nobel Prize for chemistry, Barkley Michaelson is kidnapped by Thaddeus James, a young genius who claims to be Barkley's illegitimate half-brother. Motivated not so much by money as revenge, Thaddeus tries to convince Barkley to help him carry out a multimillion-dollar extortion plot against their patriarch.

The Bad Poet(it)

1936. Giovanni Comini, the youngest Federal in Fascist Italy, is summoned to Rome for a delicate mission: to surveil aging national poet Gabriele D'Annunzio, whose increasingly restless behavior Mussolini fears could damage his alliance with Nazi Germany. However, after spending time with D'Annunzio, Comini finds himself torn between loyalty to the Party and his fascination with the poet, who will put his burgeoning career at risk.

Luís(pt)

A ghostly meeting with Luís de Camões, the one-eyed adventurer, widely considered Portugal’s greatest poet. Luís de Camões is considered Portugal’s national poet, an equivalent to England’s Shakespeare or Spain’s Cervantes. João Lopes’s film takes us on an otherworldly journey to Camões’s five-hundred-year-old epic Os Lusíadas, which he composed in Macau whilst he was stationed in the colony.

Lord of the Ants(it)

Based on true events of the late 60s in Italy, poet, playwright and myrmecologist Aldo Braibanti is prosecuted and sentenced to prison for the love he shares with his barely-of-age pupil and friend, Ettore. Amidst a chorus of voices of accusers, supporters and a largely hypocritical public, a single committed journalist takes on the task of piecing together the truth, between secrecy and desire, facing suspicion and censorship in the process.