About the Possibility of a Life

The life and work of Argentinian writer Jorge Luis Borges, a long interview, fragments of some of his most significant verses and dramatizations of some of his stories. Borges for everyone.

In the period 1891-1927, Henriette Roland Holst goes through a dramatic development. As an aspiring poet from an affluent bourgeois milieu she throws herself, full with idealism and conviction, into the labour movement. Within the various socialistic parties however, a fierce battle on direction takes place, wherein Henriette has trouble finding her place. After returning disillusioned from a trip to the Soviet Union, she does not feel at home in any leftist party. Later she will recollect on this period in her biography "Het vuur brandde voort" (translation: "The fire rages on"). The film reconstructs this period with the use of old film material combined with texts by Henriette Roland Holst herself: fragments from letters, poems, speeches and books, sparingly supplemented with personal commentary by the filmmaker.

How have one poet and his single book of poetry from the last century continued to inspire people today? A Life That Sings follows the legendary poet Ya Hsien from Vancouver to Nanyan, to the mobile library from his childhood and to the basement of his current home. Through his collection of books and love letters, the film unearths the treasure trove abound with stories of Ya Hsien's life.

Ken Bugul: Nobody Wants Her - Portait of an Author

Seamus Murphy’s documentary examines Irish writer Pat Ingoldsby’s unique world. Ingoldsby’s poems and candid anecdotes bear witness to a visceral relationship with his beloved Dublin, fellow Dubliners and anything that catches his interest. Personal challenges, a sensitive humanity and a lifetime as a maverick have taught him to harness reality and reach well beyond it to avenge the banal with absurd magic. It heals him as it does us.

A cinematic portrait of farmer and writer Wendell Berry. Through his eyes, we see both the changing landscapes of rural America in the era of industrial agriculture and the redemptive beauty in taking the unworn path.

Erwin Romulo, the late Alexis Tioseco’s best friend, recalls the events after the critic and his girlfriend Nika Bohinc’s untimely death in their home in Quezon City. Diaz makes use of one long take to allow Romulo an uninterrupted narration of the events. The pain of recalling is palpable.

A short documentary about the rapidly disappearing era of heritage movie palaces and the film going experience once offered within those hallowed walls.

The story of Muhammad Iqbal, a turn of the century poet/philosopher from South Asia. Through Iqbal's work we open a dialog between the East and West, refute the notion of a class of civilizations and discover our shared humanity.

About Swedish artist, painter, sculptor and set designer Sven "X-et" Erixson, presented with Lars Johan Werle's music and accompanied by readings from various literature and poetry.

A documentary that tells the epic life story of Alfreda Glynn, 78-year-old Aboriginal woman, stills photographer, co-founder of the Central Australian Aboriginal Media Association (CAAMA), and Imparja TV, mother, grandmother, great grandmother, radical, pacifist, grumpy old woman, who in equal measure loves the limelight and total privacy. Part bio-pic, part social history, it details the life of a woman born beneath a tree north of Alice Springs in 1939, her childhood living under the Aboriginal Protection policies and the impact, both good and bad they had on her life.

When Robert Lax was approached in the early 1980s about doing a video documentary on him, he had only one condition—that it be focused on his creative work and not a biography of his personal life. “Let’s keep it simple and about the work, with maybe some comments on it. No baby pictures PLEASE!” This documentary is an attempt at an introduction to the important works of poet Robert Lax.

Documentary about the writer Thomas Verbogt and the creation of his latest work. The film shows how Verbogt takes a radical experience from his earliest childhood as the starting point for a novel. Drawn animations, combined with filmed scenes, depict how the writer's imagination sprouts from a literary character.

This film is dedicated to Mas-Félipe Delavouët, the poet discovered by Lawrence Durrell, who wrote 14,000 verses in Provençal over a period of thirty years, and who died on November 18, 1990. "The sky, history and Mediterranean and Provençal myths are the inexhaustable wellspring of this man rooted down there, near Salon-de-Provence" (J.-D. Pollet). "Mas-Félipe Delavouët wrote five books in Provençal, 14,000 verses. A sort of "Odyssey". Of myths. What is stunning in him is that he always talks of disappearances. Cities, works, men, writings, television, etc., everything has to disappear. In order to be reborn. No pain. A sort of hand-to-hand of man and nature. During the filming, I would simply throw out some words... For example, one time I said "creation" and he said: "creation doesn't exist..., creation is before me..., I can only read creation"; this sentence describes Delavouët perfectly (J.-D. Pollet, 1989 and 1993).

A documentary recreating the life and writings of celebrated Irish author James Joyce with readings from his most famous works filmed on location in Dublin and Paris and hosted by Peter O'Toole.

Elmore Leonard, author of more than 40 novels, is renowned in the literary community. From his westerns and early novels of crime based in Detroit and South Florida, right through his complex and virtually plotless later work, Elmore Leonard dissected an America whose founding sins have continued to haunt it all the days. Leonard’s depiction of America is as real as Twain’s Hannibal, Faulkner’s Mississippi and Steinbeck’s Monterey. The new documentary ELMORE LEONARD: “But don’t try to write” explores the prolific author’s legacy and his influence on generations of writers. The documentary features exclusive images and previously unseen home movie footage, family photographs, and in-depth interviews with both literary experts and those who knew him well, including colleagues, family, and childhood friends.

A lost chapter in black British film: extraordinary rushes from a documentary showcasing talented members of the black community.

Based on the idea that drugs have influenced some of our greatest minds (Poe, Baudelaire etc.), this film documents just how influential drug experiences have been on the minds of great writers, poets and thinkers.

The life of Sara Winter - former Brazilian feminist and founder of FEMEN in Brazil - told by herself; since the troubled youth, through the years of prostitution and feminist militance, until the discovery of motherhood and God.

After being for eleven years in the city, José António Baptista returned to his home village to focus on literature.