Straight for the Heart

Bend It Like Beckham(en)

Jess Bhamra, the daughter of a strict Indian couple in London, is not permitted to play organized soccer, even though she is 18. When Jess is playing for fun one day, her impressive skills are seen by Jules Paxton, who then convinces Jess to play for her semi-pro team. Jess uses elaborate excuses to hide her matches from her family while also dealing with her romantic feelings for her coach, Joe.

36 Fillette(fr)

Lili, a pouty and voluptuous 14-year-old, is caravan camping with her family in Biarritz. She's self-aware and holds her own in a café conversation with a concert pianist she meets, but she has a wild streak and she's testing her powers over men, finding that she doesn't always control her moods or actions, and she's impatient with being a virgin. She sets off with her brother to a disco, latching onto an aging playboy who is himself hot and cold to her. She is ambivalent about losing her virginity that night, willing the next, and determined by the third.

Monsoon Wedding(hi)

As the romantic monsoon rains loom, the extended Verma family reunites from around the globe for a last-minute arranged marriage in New Delhi. This film traces five intersecting stories, each navigating different aspects of love as they cross boundaries of class, continent and morality.

Cléo from 5 to 7(fr)

Agnès Varda eloquently captures Paris in the sixties with this real-time portrait of a singer set adrift in the city as she awaits test results of a biopsy. A chronicle of the minutes of one woman’s life, Cléo from 5 to 7 is a spirited mix of vivid vérité and melodrama, featuring a score by Michel Legrand and cameos by Jean-Luc Godard and Anna Karina.

Monster(en)

An emotionally scarred highway drifter shoots a sadistic trick who rapes her, and ultimately becomes America's first female serial killer.

Fire(en)

In a barren, arranged marriage to an amateur swami who seeks enlightenment through celibacy, Radha's life takes an irresistible turn when her beautiful young sister-in-law seeks to free herself from the confines of her own loveless marriage.

The Almost Perfect Man(de)

A single man must suddenly look after his nephew.

Mauri(en)

Rewi Rapana returns to the small country town of Te Mata after his family has left the district. His arrival rekindles old tensions as well as renewing family ties. He is seeking an identity and a permanent place to call home yet desperately hiding a secret from his past. Oddly enough there is one person with whom he finds peace of mind. She is an old woman known as Kara. A special relationship develops between Rewi, Kara and Kara’s great granddaughter Awatea.

The Funeral(en)

A girl gives a eulogy for her father's funeral.

D.E.B.S.(en)

The star of a team of teenage crime fighters falls for the alluring villainess she must bring to justice.

Between the Sunset and the Sea(en)

On the beach at sunset a man waits for his one true love. When she arrives, a bittersweet romance ensues.

Alice Rose(en)

A damsel in distress agrees to run away with her wealthy lover in order to escape from her abusive husband. But all is not as it seems in this 1940s film noir.

The Sounding(en)

On a remote island off the coast of Maine, Liv, after years of silence, begins to weave a language out of Shakespeare's words. A driven neurologist, brought to the island to protect her, commits her to a psychiatric hospital. She becomes a full-blow rebel in the hospital; her increasing violence threatens to keep her locked up for life as she fights for her voice and her freedom.

Come Around(en)

Bela, a first-generation Filipina immigrant, must face her parents' prejudice regarding her sexual orientation.

The Master of Kõrboja(et)

Anna, the daughter of an elderly owner of Kõrboja farm, is told by her father that if she won't move in their home farm then it will be sold to strangers. But the farm needs also a master, and Anna has been living in town for years. She comes back home and reunites with Villu, her friend from childhood.

From Evening Till Morning(et)

During the German occupation of Estonia a young mother finds a Red Army soldier hiding in the hay in her barn.

Second Encounters(da)

In this tale of second chances, two ex-lovers run into each other in a restaurant. Both are with new partners. Both are unhappy. Both are still in love with the other. Dormant feelings rush to the surface and the opportunity to rekindle the past presents itself. Will the outcome be different?

The Piano(en)

When an arranged marriage brings Ada and her spirited daughter to the wilderness of nineteenth-century New Zealand, she finds herself locked in a battle of wills with both her controlling husband and a rugged frontiersman to whom she develops a forbidden attraction.

Little Miss Sunshine(en)

A family loaded with quirky, colorful characters piles into an old van and road trips to California for little Olive to compete in a beauty pageant.

The Belt(it)

Vittorio, an American novelist teaching in Rome, meets the beautiful but damaged Bianca and they rapidly fall into an urgent, tempestuous affair. He's hesitant over their relationship since she seems to thrive on conflict and is constantly baiting him into physical altercation. Bianca gives Vittorio an exquisite leather belt as a gift; he knows immediately that she wants him to whip her with it. Driven by his craving for her, Vittorio complies to Bianca's desire. Their relationship escalates into a dark realm of S&M which becomes more and more self-destructive.

The Peasants(az)

A historical revolutionary film depicting the struggle of peasants and the Baku proletariat against landowners and Musavatists in 1919.

Work(en)

Unable to move on from a breakup, Gabi, a queer Latina freelance editor, impulsively drops into an old job at an underground lap dance party, where she unexpectedly runs into a friend from her past.

NJPW Battle in the Valley 2024(ja)

Battle in the Valley 2024 was a New Japan Pro-Wrestling (NJPW) pay-per-view held on January 13, 2024 at the San Jose Civic in San Jose, California, headlined by Kazuchika Okada vs. Will Ospreay

Strange Object(en)

An archival investigation into the imperial image-making of the RAF ‘Z Unit’, which determined the destruction of human, animal and cultural life across Somaliland, as well as Africa and Asia.

Elvis Costello & The Imposters: Club Date - Live in Memphis(en)

An Elvis Costello concert film with guest Emmylou Harris.

Muxˣ(de)

Mux spent many years in a coma in a clinic with a constant stream of television. But at least he survived a serious car accident! Now he has woken up, and he has a plan: during his time in hospital, he came up with the idea of a fairer society. From now on, Mux sees it as his task to save the world from neoliberalism and goes to France, the motherland of revolutions, with his long-term nurse Karsten and a self-written manifesto.

The Last Runway 2, Commando Yaguareté(es)

Betty Jara reassembles the Yaguareté Commandos to exchange an imprisoned criminal for one of her own agents. A risky operation becomes even more so when she realizes they are not just fighting a drug ring but the highest spheres of power.

The Shaft(zh)

In a mining town in western China, separately, we follow three members of a family. Each individual family members’ story flows from one to another chronologically, although they do not simply trace the continual development of a single family. There is the daughter who has to choose between her dreams and a suitable husband, the son who is about to start work down the mine, and the father who has just retired. Their lives are inextricably bound together as they symbolically represent the men and women from all mining towns who must accept their thwarted dreams and aspirations, and learn to accept their lot in life.

Lupe(en)

The film — a mix of music, colors, abstract scenes and little dialogue — is based loosely on the life and death of Mexican-American actress Lupe Velez. The music, far more than mere background, borders on serving as the film’s narrative and ranges from classical to contemporary pop music.

Sandy: Manuscrito - Ao Vivo(pt)

Linking Rings(en)

A self-penned, semi-autobiographical theatre piece marking a distinct change of direction for Paul Zenon, award-winning magician, comedian and actor who, in a career spanning four decades, has performed in around forty countries and made literally hundreds of network TV appearances. By far his most personal work to date. About the show - 'Houdini's right-hand man deals with the death of his boss. A half-century later, a Blackpool joke shop proprietor takes on a wide-eyed young protege. An affectionate look at a misspent youth and unsung heroes. Not a magic show, but magical nonetheless.'

Fue El Estado, Fuimos Todos(es)

The James Gang(en)

After an audacious jewellery robbery the whole James family heads for home on the run with the obsessive detective Julia Armstrong in hot pursuit.

Con th(es)

Miss Harry's Snake Woman(fr)

Miss Harry's, remarkably flexible and double-jointed, offers us a sensational acrobatic number. (Fondation Jérôme Seydoux-Pathé)

Dark Soul(it)

Enrico Russo rapes and slaughters children. A magistrate, a policeman and a psychiatrist try to arrest him, but it’s too difficult to identify a cancer that hides itself behind a normal life. Then, one day, Enrico meets Andrea, a 7 year old child, and falls in love with him. He wants to be Andrea’s good father, the good father he himself never had. But his emotional delirium isn’t able to hold back his animal instinct. By pure ‘chance’, the detectives find the monster in the act of his last execution. On time?

Smash TV - Skinemax(en)

Skinemax is Koyaanisqatsi for a generation raised on late night television and B-movie VHS tapes. It's long form entertainment for short attention spans. An hour long VJ odyssey, it will move your body and warp your mind. A nostalgic look back at a half remembered childhood growing up in the 80s and early 90s, Skinemax takes a close look at the culture of that era. The images that motivated, delighted, and terrified us on the silver screen, set to propulsive modern music that pines for a simpler time.

Fatale Collective: Bleed(en)

In this brisk six-shooter anthology, an ensemble of women share entertainingly twisted tales that span disturbing subjects and sick styles through decidedly feminist lenses.

Nevada(en)

In this stop-motion animated comedy, a young couple's romantic weekend getaway is interrupted by a birth control mishap.