Chronicle of lives in Madrid. The story unfolds during the city’s August festivals, when a person’s inner turmoil can be soothed by fleeting encounters and unexpected adventures.
(Country: Spain; Year: 2019; Director: Jonás Trueba; Writer: Itsaso Arana; Stars: Vito Sanz, Joe Manjón, Isabelle Stoffel, Itsaso Arana, Mikele Urroz, Luis Alberto Heras)
World premiere
La Belle Indifference
(Kucuk Seyler)
Onur is sacked from his job as manager of a pharmaceutical company. He’s not too bothered about being unemployed, but the same cannot be said of his wife Bahar.
Grozeva and Valchanov allow a gentle absurdity to flow through the film.
After losing his wife Ivanka, Vasil believes that she is using his phone to reach him from beyond the grave, so he enlists the services of a psychic to try to make contact with her, much to the concern of his son.
(Country: Bulgaria; Year: 2019; Director: Kristina Grozeva, Petar Valchanov; Writer: Kristina Grozeva, Petar Valchanov, Decho Taralezhkov; Stars: Ivan Barnev, Ivan Savov, Tanya Shahova, Hristofor Nedkov, Margita Gosheva, Maria Bakalova, Ana Bratoeva, Georgi Damianov, Boyan Doychinov, Elena Mosholova, Petra Oplatkova, Martina Peneva, Nikolay Todorov, Ivan Barnev, Ivan Savov)
Lara has just turned 60; it’s a very special day that will culminate in a career-defining piano concert given by her son. Viktor remains elusive, however, and his mother’s repeated attempts to get through to him come to nothing.
(Country: Germany; Year: 2019; Director: Jan-Ole Gerster; Writer: Blaz Kutin; Stars: Tom Schilling, Corinna Harfouch, Hildegard Schroedter, Susanne Bredehöft, Steffen Jürgens, Tina Pfurr, Stephan Taubert)
Set against a perpetually snowy background the film paces itself perfectly with a gathering sense of an impending implosion.
A Slovakian man, who works in Germany, returns home for Christmas to discover some brutal truths about his eldest son.
(Country: Slovakia, Czech Republic; Year: 2019; Director: Marko Škop; Writer: Frantisek Krähenbiel, Zuzana Liová, Marko Škop; Stars: Andreas Nickl, Dieter Fischer, Ingrid Timková, Csongor Kassai, Lubomír Paulovic, Zuzana Konecná, Daniel Fischer, Michal Kinik, Anikó Varga, Katarina Kormanakova, Milan Ondrík, Frantisek Beles, Jakub Kuka, Juliane Werner, Maximilian Dusanic)
Michelsen, an elderly truck driver, sets out on his last trip driving freight to the southern tip of Chilean Patagonia, the journey becomes y becomes a recapitulation of his life when he unexpectedly happens upon his adult daughter, whom he hasn’t seen since her childhood.
(Country: Chile; Year: 2019; Director: Felipe Ríos)
World premiere
Monsoon
A British Vietnamese man, returns to Saigon for the first time in over 30 years, after fleeing during the Vietnam-American War.
(Country: UK; Year: 2019; Director: Hong Khaou; Writer: Hong Khaou; Stars: Henry Golding, Parker Sawyers, David Tran, Molly Harris, Nguyen Myan, Lâm Vissay, Edouard Leo, Henry Golding, Parker Sawyers, David Tran, Molly Harris, Nguyen Myan, Lâm Vissay, Edouard Leo)
World premiere
Mosaic Portrait
Drama about a 14-year-old girl at a critical moment of her life.
Michael Hutchence was flying high as the lead singer of the legendary rock band INXS until his untimely death in 1997. Richard Lowenstein’s kinetic yet intimate documentary examines Hutchence’s deeply felt life through his many loves and demons.
(Country: Australia; Year: 2019; Director: Richard Lowenstein; Writer: Richard Lowenstein; Stars: Michael Hutchence)
European premiere. Out of competition
Ode To Nothing
(Oda sa wala)
The story of an embalmer in a funeral parlour... and the corpse that changes her life.
(Country: Philippines; Year: 2018; Director: Dwein Baltazar; Writer: Dwein Baltazar; Stars: Dido de la Paz, Anthony Falcon, Joonee Gamboa, Pokwang, Dido de la Paz, Anthony Falcon, Joonee Gamboa, Pokwang)
International premiere
Old-Timers
(Staříci)
Vlasta and Tonda don’t have much longer to live but they do have one more important task ahead of them – to find and kill the communist judge who sent them to prison in the 1950s. An unusual road movie about two former political prisoners who fight for justice despite every obstacle.
(Country: Czech Republic; Year: 2019; Director: Martin Dušek)
Tim Mielants's quirky comedy is shot through with melancholy and holds a deep affection for its earnest hero even when he seems to be the butt of everybody's jokes.
Patrick lives with his parents on a naturist campsite. When his dad dies and he finds himself in charge he has other things on his mind... namely a quest for his lost hammer.
(Country: Belgium; Year: 2019; Director: Tim Mielants; Writer: Tim Mielants, Benjamin Sprengers; Stars: Jemaine Clement, Kevin Janssens, Hannah Hoekstra, Jan Bijvoet, Bouli Lanners, Pierre Bokma, Jean-Benoît Ugeux, Frank Vercruyssen, Katelijne Damen, Peter Gorissen, Tine Van den Wyngaert, Josse De Pauw, Janne Desmet, Ariane Van Vliet, Louis van der Waal)
Director Martha Stephens uses a palette full of soft browns and pastels designed to evoke nostalgia but shows us plenty of cruelty just under the surface.
Under small town scrutiny, a withdrawn farmer’s daughter forges an intimate friendship with a worldly but reckless new girl in 1960s Oklahoma.
A boy who finds making friends difficult because he has congenital hypertrichosis, meaning that he
suffers from an abnormal amount of hair growth, decides to seek out his mother in order to get answers to unasked questions.
(Country: US; Year: 2019; Director: Martin Krejcí; Writer: Olivia Dufault; Stars: Chloë Sevigny, Eve Hewson, John Turturro, Jaeden Martell, Chris Messina, Stephen McKinley Henderson, Katherine Fudge, Sophie Giannamore, Corey Ronald Walter, Michelle Wilson, JJ Alfieri, Bob Rusch, Caitlyn Stephenson, Joshua R. Aragon, Doug Crane)
