circles(2014)

Closed Vagina(ja)

Adachi's follow-up to Bowl using the figure of a woman suffering from an unusual sexual aliment has often been taken as a controversial allegory for the political stalemate of the Leftist student movement after their impressive wave of massive fiery protests failed to defeat the neo-imperialist Japan-US Security Treaty. The ritualistic solemnity of the charged sexual scenes contribute to the oneiric qualities of Closed Vagina which Adachi would later insist was an open work, not meant to deliver any kind of deliberate political message. - Harvard Film Archive

Guts and Glitz(en)

Audiovisual material gathered by filmmaker Fox Maxy over a decade, including documentary footage, television clips, and animation—sometimes layered on top of one another—are presented as one collage. Amid this sensory barrage, themes of sexual violence, community, confidence and joy are explored.

Filth(en)

Intense high school senior Michael finds himself in a passionate series of hookups with a teammate on his track team, the enigmatic and mysterious Evan. This quickly dissolves when Evan realizes the extent of Michael’s feelings for him, plunging Michael into a kaleidoscopic rabbit hole of his own making.

CACOPHONY(en)

Three adrift artists wander around a college campus and its local sites as they struggle to engage with art and its creation.

Pussy Trash(es)

Pussy Trash is an ex dancer now invalid that lives with "Grandpa" in their poor home. After finding a video of his youth he will try to find a way to dance again despite his limitations.

The Abyss of shadows(hi)

Ayush suffers from sleep paralysis and dark hallucinations, haunted by shadowy figures that represent his repressed fears. Trapped between dream and reality, he confronts these manifestations of his inner turmoil.

The Notebook(en)

An epic love story centered around an older man who reads aloud to a woman with Alzheimer's. From a faded notebook, the old man's words bring to life the story about a couple who is separated by World War II, and is then passionately reunited, seven years later, after they have taken different paths.

Cotton Candy(en)

Gehr uses a mini-digital recorder to look back on the Machine Age in the form of San Francisco's soon-to-be-shuttered Musee Mecanique. For slightly more than an hour, Cotton Candy documents this venerable collection of coin-operated mechanical toys—including an entire circus—mainly in close-up, isolating particular details as he alternates between ambient and post-dubbed (or no) sound. By treating the Musee's cast of synchronized figures as puppets, the artist is making a show—but is it his or theirs? Gehr's selective take on the arcade renders it all the more spooky. There's a sense in which Cotton Candy is a gloss on the moment in The Rules of the Game when the music-box-collecting viscount unveils his latest and most elaborate acquisition. (It also brings to mind the climax of A.I.: The DV of the future tenderly regards the more human machine of the past.) (J. Hoberman, The Village Voice)

Oxygen(sl)

In this story set in near future, a group of young rebels, hippies and 1968 protesters want to cede and make an independent Island from the Mainland. A journalist who came to the Island to make a report about political summit that takes place there gets involved in the clash between young rebels and establishment.

Northern Lights(en)

Emma approaches adulthood, she tries to live an ordinary life and keep up to her late mothers expectations. However her anxiety weighs over her, stopping her from enjoying the last few youthful years.

Torre 1(xx)

The port of a Mediterranean coastal city, which had once been the symbol of prosperity and the epicenter of life in the region, is now only the reflection of a decaying present. Static and empty shots reveal glimpses of a brilliant past, only interrupted by the intermittent sound of the construction of a residential apartment building that stands menacingly a few meters from the dock, presaging an even darker future.

The World Is Not a Landscape(en)

A quasi-sequel to Michel Houellebecq's novel The Possibility of an Island, Masbedo's short presents a post-apocalyptic landscape overseen by a distant mother nature or perhaps mother of nature portrayed by French icon Juliette Binoche.

Big Bang Love, Juvenile A(ja)

An unknown future. A boy confesses to the murder of another in an all-boy juvenile detention facility. More an exercise in style than storytelling, the story follows two detectives trying to uncover the case. Homosexual tension and explosive violence drives the story which delivers some weird and fascinating visuals.

The Giverny Document (Single Channel)(en)

Filmed on location in Harlem and in Monet’s historic gardens in Giverny, this multi-textured cinematic poem meditates on the bodily integrity and creative virtuosity of black women.

Eautopsie(en)

An enigmatic glimpse of life through precarious vignettes, propelling a narrative through a nebulous and opaque structure that sutures the filmmaker's home movie footage to archival material—from Hollywood narrative films to political selfie videos. A handmade impression of a time suspended between past and present and the ghosts and places occupying it, contemplating the nature and meaning of vision, memory and image making.

Madrid(fr)

Series 4(en)

This experimental short documents the clash, sometimes obsessive, sometimes glorifying, between humans and their mechanized environment. Using photographs, the animator creates varying perspectives through optical manipulation and changing colour, achieving bold and provocative effects.

12 O'Clock High: Volumes 1 & 2(en)

Ground breaking music videos from some of the most influential bands of the 90s Punk/Grunge scene such as the Flaming Lips, Mudhoney, Bad Brains, Afghan Whigs, Foetus Inc, Soul Asylum, American Music Club, Babes in Toyland, Dinosaur Jr and more.

Re/cycle(en)

With input from actor and writer Jan Hlobil, director and cinematographer Rene Smaal presents a film in the true surrealist tradition, in the sense that only 'found' elements were used, and that it defies interpretation based on ordinary cause-and-effect time sequence.

Bramayugam(ml)

Thevan, a folk singer of the Paanan caste, has a fateful encounter when escaping slavery, leading to discover an ancient tradition altering his destiny.