The Luddites

Shades of Fern(cs)

Based on the only extensive prose work by the surrealist painter Josef Capek, Shades of Fern most resembles the philosophical fairy tales and fables of Josef’s older brother, the legendary Czech novelist and playwright Karel Capek. Two young poachers, more boys than men, kill a gamekeeper when they are caught illegally hunting. Panicked, they retreat into a forest that grows steadily more forbidding and deadly as their fear for the future—and guilt over their action—mounts. Loosely based on hundreds of oral folk tales and legends that haunt the woods of Czechoslovakia, Vlácil’s contemporary updating artistically underscores the relationship between man and nature, crime and punishment, isolation and society, and guilt and memory.

Frustrated(en)

Afro-American men and women express their views on why some Black men are travelling from the US to Brazil to find sex partners.

Tardor Calenta(es)

Short Working Day(pl)

A dramatisation of the workers' protests in June 1976 in Radom, seen from the perspective of the local Secretary of the Polish United Workers' Party. [Produced in 1981, but not commercially released until 1996.]

Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World(en)

After an abrupt and violent encounter with a French warship inflicts severe damage upon his ship, a captain of the British Royal Navy begins a chase over two oceans to capture or destroy the enemy, though he must weigh his commitment to duty and ferocious pursuit of glory against the safety of his devoted crew, including the ship's thoughtful surgeon, his best friend.

Another's Freedom(pt)

A housewife with the dream of becoming a writer is unhappy in her marriage and finds love in the arms of another woman.

Pride & Prejudice(en)

A story of love and life among the landed English gentry during the Georgian era. Mr. Bennet is a gentleman living in Hertfordshire with his overbearing wife and five daughters, but if he dies their house will be inherited by a distant cousin whom they have never met, so the family's future happiness and security is dependent on the daughters making good marriages.

Mary Berry's Country House at Christmas(en)

Mary Berry visits Harewood House in Yorkshire as it prepares for Christmas on a grand scale, and demonstrates how to make delicious recipes inspired by festive dishes of the past.

The Quest(en)

Ghang-gheng, the ancient winner-take-all competition in which the deadliest fighters from around the world employ the most spectacular feats of martial arts skills ever displayed in order to win the prized Golden Dragon. But fighting prowess alone will not be enough for Chris to triumph over such daunting foes.

Dazed and Confused(en)

The adventures of a group of Texas teens on their last day of school in 1976, centering on student Randall Floyd, who moves easily among stoners, jocks and geeks. Floyd is a star athlete, but he also likes smoking weed, which presents a conundrum when his football coach demands he sign a "no drugs" pledge.

Trash(es)

March, 2021. Claudia, a 24-year-old girl, tries to barely survive in the pandemic and precarious Madrid. After being threaten by his landlord in case she doesn’t pay the months’ rent that she owes him, Claudia decides to start working as a rider for a food delivery app. An unexpected reunion when she is delivering an order takes her on a bittersweet journey into the past and raises some questions she had never asked herself before.

The Man in the Iron Mask(en)

Years have passed since the Three Musketeers, Aramis, Athos and Porthos, have fought together with their friend, D'Artagnan. But with the tyrannical King Louis using his power to wreak havoc in the kingdom while his twin brother, Philippe, remains imprisoned, the Musketeers reunite to abduct Louis and replace him with Philippe.

The stain(es)

Rosario a young mixed race woman who works as a maid of a bourgeois family in Quito in 1945. One day the family, because of her daughter's 15 years, decides to take a family photograph. Rosario struggles to get out in this picture.

Sense and Sensibility(en)

The Dashwood sisters, sensible Elinor and passionate Marianne, whose chances at marriage seem doomed by their family's sudden loss of fortune. When Henry Dashwood dies unexpectedly, his estate must pass on by law to his son from his first marriage, John and wife Fanny. But these circumstances leave Mr. Dashwood's current wife, and daughters Elinor, Marianne and Margaret, without a home and with barely enough money to live on. As Elinor and Marianne struggle to find romantic fulfillment in a society obsessed with financial and social status, they must learn to mix sense with sensibility in their dealings with both money and men.

Baragaki: Unbroken Samurai(ja)

Set in the 19th century, "Moeyo Ken" follows the life of Toshizo Hijikata. He was the vice-commander of the Shinsengumi and fought against the Meiji Restoration.

Earth(hi)

It's 1947 and the borderlines between India and Pakistan are being drawn. A young girl bears witnesses to tragedy as her ayah is caught between the love of two men and the rising tide of political and religious violence.

Sisi/Last Minute(de)

The immature young ruler of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Franz Joseph, was extremely shy around women but (according to this film) was constantly being propositioned, lewdly or otherwise, by ambitious courtesans. When he was finally married to his Empress, the teen-aged Bavarian princess Sisi (Elizabeth), it seems that his relief knew no bounds, for he was now sure that he would never have to think about sex ever again. According to the filmmakers, this is the true history of that marriage. This story is a complete reversal of the romantic legend depicted in the popular 1955 film Sissi, which helped brighten the emerging stardom of Romy Schneider.

The Broken Commandment(ja)

At the strong insistence of his father, Ushimatsu Segawa conceals his origins from a “buraku” area of low-class “untouchables,” leaving his hometown to serve as an elementary school teacher where he excels and is loved by his students. But he constantly struggles with the secret of his low-birth status and is disturbed by all of the discrimination levelled upon his class. It prevents him from pursuing a romance with Shiho, whom he meets at the temple where he resides, but who descends from a samurai family.

Figure 8(en)

Lyla was once a concert pianist, and the love of her life was once George. A memory stirred up at the figure 8 rock pools reveals how far life has strayed from what once was.

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button(en)

Born under unusual circumstances, Benjamin Button springs into being as an elderly man in a New Orleans nursing home and ages in reverse. Twelve years after his birth, he meets Daisy, a child who flits in and out of his life as she grows up to be a dancer. Though he has all sorts of unusual adventures over the course of his life, it is his relationship with Daisy, and the hope that they will come together at the right time, that drives Benjamin forward.