Eye of the Beholder

The Music Master(en)

What is more miserable than love-blighted life? For the heart that truly loves can never forget. Such is the sad fate of the hero of this Biograph story.

My Pretty Lover(en)

An experimental short film loosely adapting the story “My Pretty Pony” by Stephen King.

Garden of Remembrance(ja)

An untidy room. Empty beer tins, empty wine bottles, a half-empty glass of whisky... A girl is getting up absent-mindedly and starts preparing herself. YOUR morning starts. Lazy and hard-to-wake-up YOU. The emoticon is ME watching over YOU. I play tricks on YOU, while YOU are playing the guitar and drinking. One day, in town, YOU walk past THE CHILDHOOD FRIEND who is buying an Anemone I liked, and remembering that I liked them, YOU rush out to buy them. THE CHILDHOOD FRIEND displays the Anemone with care. One day, years after I died, YOU hear noise from the closet. Opened, YOU see MY garden right in front of YOU. Overflowing emotions of ME and YOU. When exiting from the room with memories, a picture of the Anemone that YOU painted is displayed in YOUR new room.

Windup(en)

A father tries to stay connected with his unconscious daughter through music. He plays a windup music box and hopes she can hear it while fighting with his own emotions to stay strong. Meanwhile, his daughter follows the melody in her dreams and looks for a way back.

Robert(sv)

5-year-old Robert lives in a newly built suburban area where all houses look exactly the same.

La chaqueta del botones(es)

Drink(en)

A Twilight Zone-inspired cautionary tale about a young mother forced to come face-to-face with her deepest desire.

En tus manos(es)

In the vicious slums of Colombia, where prosperity is dictated by brutality, a conflicted kid seeks membership in a brutal gang, with the hope of one day having the power to determine his own destiny.

The Raisin(en)

A short film about a raisin.

Dziadowski's Blues Non Camera, ie Legs Forward(pl)

An animated film made without the use of a camera using the technique of drawing and painting directly on a film strip, illustrating a grandfather's ballad, the protagonist of which seeks an explanation for the cruel phenomena of the world around him. Rockets thrown to the ground and bombs exploding, a car falling off a cliff, a driver driving a man on the street or a policeman firing a gun at an opponent - images of this type of catastrophic behavior are intertwined with the recurring image of a man running somewhere.

The Red Villa(en)

Set during the Greek financial crisis, The Red Villa is a tale of suspense and deception, which tells the story of Kate, a young tourism representative who gets embroiled in the amateur attempts of two English boys to smuggle a priceless artefact out of Corfu.

Siren(en)

Two ambulance paramedics put their lives on the line when a routine call becomes a deadly race against time.

Bears Discover Fire(en)

'Bears Discover Fire' is the strange tale of a lonely man, his aging mother, his curious nephew, and a family of bears that have discovered how to use fire.

Artemide’s Knee(fr)

Mourning the death of his partner and collaborator Danièle Huillet, Straub finds tender mercy in music and nature. Out of the abyss, Kathleen Ferrier sings “The Farewell” from Gustav Mahler’s “The Song of the Earth”, (which the composer wrote in 1909 after the death of his daughter) and Heinrich Schütz’s Lament on the Death of His Wife. The landscape also provides solace: the mountain grove where Endymion pines for his beloved Artemis, “a wild thing, untouchable, mortal,” appears to embody the Japanese concept of ‘mono no aware’ — a wistful acceptance of the fleeting beauty of things.

Lughead(en)

Two strangers meet in a motel room where everything is not as it seems.

Chlorine(en)

In a desperate bid for attention, 11-year-old Keira compulsively steals from pregnant women at her local aquatic centre. But her actions put her at risk of losing the only family she has.

Phantoms, Inc.(en)

This Crime Does Not Pay entry focuses on fake spiritualists. A mother is worried about her son, who is missing in action. Over time, she gives a con man all of the family savings to find reassurance that her son is all right. When she can no longer pay, events take a tragic turn.

The Exit(en)

It's the morning after - and four is a crowd. Couple Samantha and Peter negotiate a thoroughly modern and thoroughly awkward situation.

Textiles(fr)

Michel is a funny boy, a kind of intellectual. With Pauline, a very beautiful girl he met on the beach, they are going to get naked and discuss surrealism, sincerely and without trickery. But who are they really?

The Script(en)

Marcus Kendrick finds himself at a crossroads when presented with the opportunity of a lifetime. He approaches a studio that find his screenplay promising, giving his idea the chance to be developed at the potential cost of his creative integrity. His decision is the basis of his future career. Will he allow his dreams to be sold?

Dancer in the Dark(en)

Selma, a Czech immigrant on the verge of blindness, struggles to make ends meet for herself and her son, who has inherited the same genetic disorder and will suffer the same fate without an expensive operation. When life gets too difficult, Selma learns to cope through her love of musicals, dreaming up little numbers to the rhythmic beats of her surroundings.

The Human Voice(en)

A woman watches time pass beside the suitcases of her ex-lover (who is supposed to come pick them up but never arrives) and a restless dog who doesn't understand that his master has abandoned him.

Imagine(en)

A blind teacher breaks the rules to help a female student rediscover the pleasures of life.

Love Is the Devil: Study for a Portrait of Francis Bacon(en)

In the 1960s, British painter Francis Bacon surprises a burglar and invites him to share his bed. The burglar, a working class man named George Dyer, accepts. After the unique beginning to their love affair, the well-connected and volatile artist assimilates Dyer into his circle of eccentric friends, as Dyer's struggle with addiction strains their bond.

The Life of Chuck(en)

In this extraordinary story of an ordinary man, Charles 'Chuck' Krantz experiences the wonder of love, the heartbreak of loss, and the multitudes contained in all of us.

Whose Life Is It Anyway?(en)

Ken Harrison is an artist that lives to make sculptures. One day he is involved in a car accident, and is paralyzed from his neck down. All he can do is talk and move his head, and he wants to die. Whilst he is in hospital he makes friends with some of the staff, and they support him when he goes to trial to be allowed to die.

The Music Never Stopped(en)

Henry struggles to bond with his estranged son, Gabriel, who suffers from a brain tumor that prevents him from forming new memories. With Gabriel unable to shed the beliefs and interests that caused their physical and emotional distance, Henry must learn to embrace his son's choices and try to connect with him through music.

Gigi & Nate(en)

A young man with a bright future suffers a near-fatal accident and recreates his new life with the help of an unlikely animal friend.

Blink(en)

Emma is an attractive girl in her 20s who has been blind for 20 years. A new type of eye operation partially restores her sight, but she is having problems: sometimes she doesn't "remember" what she's seen until later. One night she is awakened by a commotion upstairs. Peering out of her door, she sees a shadowy figure descending the stairs. Convinced that her neighbour has been murdered she approaches the police, only to find that she is unsure if it was just her new eyes playing tricks on her.

Helen(en)

On the outside, Helen has it all – a loving family and a successful career – but when her suppressed mental illness resurfaces, the world crumbles around her. Crippled by depression, Helen finds solace through her friendship with Mathilda, a kindred spirit struggling with bipolar disorder.

Adam(en)

A hard-living salesman becomes a quadriplegic after an accident.

In Darkness(en)

A blind musician hears a murder committed in the apartment upstairs from hers that sends her down a dark path into London's gritty criminal underworld.

Call Me Crazy: A Five Film(en)

A psychotherapist helps a law student cope with schizophrenia in one of five interconnected tales dealing with mental illness.

Seven Pounds(en)

An IRS agent with a fateful secret embarks on an extraordinary journey of redemption by forever changing the lives of seven strangers.

23 Blast(en)

When a high school football star is suddenly stricken with irreversible total blindness, he must decide whether to live a safe handicapped life or bravely return to the life he once knew and the sport he still loves.

I Swear(en)

Diagnosed with Tourette Syndrome at 15, John Davidson navigates his way against the odds through troubled teenage years and into adulthood, finding inspiration in the kindness of others to discover his true purpose in life.

Ray(en)

Born on a sharecropping plantation in Northern Florida, Ray Charles went blind at seven. Inspired by a fiercely independent mom who insisted he make his own way, He found his calling and his gift behind a piano keyboard. Touring across the Southern musical circuit, the soulful singer gained a reputation and then exploded with worldwide fame when he pioneered coupling gospel and country together.

Stutterer(en)

A lonely typographer with a cruel speech impediment but an eloquent inner voice must face his greatest fear.

Goodbye June(en)

Four siblings' lives change drastically when their ailing mother takes a turn for the worse over the holiday season.

The Safety of Objects(en)

In a suburban landscape, the lives of several families interlace with loss, despair and personal crisis. Esther Gold has lost focus on all but caring for her comatose son, Paul, and neglects her daughter and husband. Lawyer Jim Train is devoted to his career, not his family. Helen Christianson wants to find a new spark in life, while Annette Jennings tries to rebuild hers.