L'Échappée Belle(2025)

The Secret(fr)

Marie, who works as a successful door-to-door encyclopedia salesperson, has been married to her husband Francois for 12 years and has a two-year-old son. Though she is relatively content with her life, she feels something is wanting. Enter 50-year old African-American Bill. Initially she is annoyed by his insouciance, but she finds that she is irresistibly attracted to him. Soon the two are in the midst of sordid illicit affair. She knows little about her new lover, and he seems uninterested in learning about her, but the long sessions of lovemaking are something else entirely. Feeling out of control, Marie is increasingly repelled by her own actions. Psychologically, she struggles to reconcile her torrid encounters with Bill and mundane domestic chores such as bathing her son. Moreover, she finds herself incapable of hiding her adulterous behavior, rather she comes home with scratches and hickeys all over her body, to the devastation Francois.

Celebration(sr)

It's cold up on Mount Manjaca. "In the winter it snows, there's nowhere to go," says the central figure in Celebration. "We have to wait until someone comes to clear the road. Sometimes they come, and sometimes they don't." He diligently ploughs the knee-high snowdrifts as the wind howls at his ears.

Rest Stop.(en)

It's 1975, and John Dykstra, a lowly college professor, with not much confidence but a semi-successful author, is on his way home from his monthly meet up group with fellow authors, when he decides to pull off to the nearest rest stop. What he encounters there is an unnerving domestic assault, that will force him to embrace his alter ego, Rick Hardin, the hitman in his novels, and finally decide what kind of man he wants to be.

Ruth(en)

Inspired by the scriptural tale. Moabitess priestess Ruth is drawn both to a Judean man and to his talk of a forgiving God. After tragedy strikes, she begins a new life in Bethlehem.

Minden(hu)

Final Exams(fr)

Four friends are waiting for their final exam results... and their lives to begin. In the mean time, Lang-Vonh is worrying about his Asian heritage, Cédric is struggling to come to terms with being gay and Gaëlle and Chloé are trying to forget about everything until the results are in.

Rufus(en)

Rufus is a child with an extraordinary obsession: a burning, inþamed desire for anything red. Driven by this impassioned, scarlet fixation, which he can neither control nor understand, he shifts through life in a whirlwind of redness, entirely in the hands of his bizarre compulsion.

Skate(ko)

A frozen stream runs past a town. Bo Young, a girl of about 14, wants to skate; her friend has to study, so she goes by herself. A young man watches her; she falls, he helps her up and asks her name. She tells him, but runs away from him at her first opportunity, returning to her friend's house. Upon reflection, how will she respond to what are probably the first stirrings of adult feelings? 

Heart Attack(en)

An orphaned and accomplished cardiologist, Dr. Khanyaqhawe Mabuyakhulu is challenged when she has found out she has to operate on Bheki, a man that killed her mother.

Dead Youth(ja)

The homoerotic poetry of Mutsuo Takahashi sets the stage for these associated images based on male desire.

Blind Rain(ru)

A poetic story about the first love of boy Sanya to girl Lena.

Resemblance(en)

Dirk discovers something from his past that haunts him. He tries to use his skills to help him escape the guilt that he feels.

Eye of the Beholder(en)

An artist struggles to come to terms with the fact that his eyesight is failing.

Cierva(en)

An emerging photographer is forced to make a crucial decision while on a career-defining job.

Aether(xx)

A woman is picking up her boyfriend at his flat as suddenly a red ball appears... .

Flight of the Imagination(nl)

An explicator of silent movies falls in love with the star of film he's accompanying.

Parelisa(es)

The dream of leading a life where personal growth and economic freedom are possible is discussed by a teenage prostitute and her male friend in this poignant vignette.

Buck(en)

Caught in the throes of a depressive fugue, young Lynn resorts to debauchery to find joy — only to discover that happiness is a much more complicated proposition.

Dirty(en)

Marco cuts class to spend the afternoon with his boyfriend, Graham. Things do not go as planned.