Dabis controls revelation with discipline, letting meaning accumulate rather than announcing itself, so that what finally emerges feels earned rather than engineered.
After a Palestinian teen confronts Israeli soldiers at a West Bank protest, his mother recounts the series of events that led him to that fateful moment, starting with his grandfather’s forced displacement.
Sen could easily just have made an observational documentary about the brothers' day-to-day work or simply focused on the kites themselves but he stretches its wings much further than that.
Against the darkening backdrop of Delhi's apocalyptic air and escalating violence, two brothers devote their lives to protect one casualty of the turbulent times: the bird known as the black kite.
The problems with gun violence in Chicago are well documented, so the directors don't have to do much to set the scene here, which means they can immediately shift the focus to the men at the projects' heart.
On Chicago’s South and West sides, the scourge of guns and gangs is destroying countless lives. Taking matters into their own hands, two men dedicate their lives educating, empowering and healing young black men at high risk for being victims or perpetrators of deadly gun-violence.
All The Fires is a film built out of contradictions from which meaning gradually emerges.
Conflicted by his mother's new relationship and his best friend's crush on him, Bruno, a pyromaniac teenager, escapes from the city. He sets off on a journey in search of a girl he met online who will push him to confront his father's death and the doubts about his sexuality, but not before leaving all his fires behind.
Clements discovers a story that is diverse, inclusive and profoundly optimistic.
A personal exploration of LGBTQ women's communities, cultures, and social justice work through the lens of the physical spaces they create, from bars to bookstores to arts and political hubs.
It’s fitting for a film set in the “City of Dreams” and that is concerned with life’s illusions and how we navigate them as it is about the here and now.
Triptych explores the lives of three women in Mumbai.
It’s solidly rooted in the ordinary and yet its habit of drawing out small absurdities means that ordinary things and places won’t seem so safe after you’ve seen it.
A young couple records and collects folk songs in rural Ireland, selling them to a mysterious, rich buyer. When rumours of a song never-before-heard reach the couple, they find themselves in an uneasy alliance with a music professor to discover an ancient song.
A semi-autobiographical film with a potent sense of place, Almamula alternates between realism and fantasy, its camerawork reflecting the conflicting ways of thinking at its core.
12-year-old Nino is assaulted for being homosexual. In an effort to protect the boy, his parents move the family to a small rural village.
Although this is familiar territory, with a long pedigree going back through cinematic history, it's no less watchable as a result.
A recently widowed traveller is kidnapped by a cold blooded killer, only to escape into the wilderness where she is forced to battle against the elements as her pursuer closes in on her.
As a feelgood film about relationships, Along Came Wanda works well.
A memory jogged by a teapot from an old lover quickly turns into an adventure of discovery for Mary Beth Higgins and her new found friend Wanda as they hit the road in Wanda's RV/Soup Truck.
Cassavetes could easily have made all this into a dead serious finger-wagging morality tale of wasted youth. Fortunately, he realises the potential for jet-black comedy.
The party-hearty lifestyle of bored Californian rich kids is rocked to the core when a botched drug deal has tragic consequences.
There have been a number of grim films on subjects closely related to this in recent years, so it’s nice to see it approached with humour and some measure of sympathy for all the characters.
A young man enters into a mysterious masculinity therapy, whose objective is to re-balance their relationship. He soon discovers that the leader of this therapy has radical, terrifying views on women and his dangerous methods are highly controversial.
Although strong in its documentary feel and scathing in its message, it otherwise runs through the Alpha to Omega of predictable thriller elements.
Set against the background of the government's crackdown on illegal drugs, the SWAT-led police force launches an operation to arrest a drug dealer, with a detective and his informant Elijah providing the intelligence.
Siam gives his film a strong sense of place, marked by chaos and flux - a city where you can drive past a "Welcome to Egypt" sign and army tanks within two blocks and where revolution may lead you to come full circle.
Documentary tracks the adolescence of a teenager in Cairo.
The story may be presented in a quirky way, with a highly distinctive visual style, but it’s well observed and relatable.
As far as 24-year-old Amanda can remember, she has never had friends. It’s the thing she desires most. When she finds out that as infants she and Rebecca had spent a lot of time together, Amanda settles on her new mission: convincing her that they are still best friends.
As a spy story it's not great and as a revenge thriller it's not new and between them there's not much else to say.
When his supervisors at the CIA refuse to take action after his wife is killed in a London terrorist attack, a decoder takes matters into his own hands.
The performances are subtly realised by the three main stars.
Eli works as a swimming coach in Chicago but news of his father’s death necessitates his return to his native Israel. His decision to contact a friend from his childhood sets in motion a series of events that have a lasting impact on everyone’s lives.
Pniowsky...has raw star quality of the sort most actors can only dream of.
Oli becomes an outcast in her small Texas town when she gets pregnant at 15. As she seeks out the suddenly absent teenage father-to-be, Oli confronts the growing isolation from her community.
News and features
News & Features
Going ape
Antonin Niclass on character creation, empathy and animated short Into The Forest
Freeform
Will Niava on grief, new immigrant experiences and Jazz Infernal
In silence
Emir Kumova on child marriage in Türkiye, moral challenges and making The Witness
