Twenty-five films from twenty-five European countries by twenty-five European directors.
Mere seconds before the Earth is to be demolished by an alien construction crew, Arthur Dent is swept off the planet by his friend Ford Prefect, a researcher penning a new edition of "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy."
Reverse Cowgirl. Rusty Trombone. The Wheelbarrow. Go inside the government office responsible for creating sexual positions as one woman pitches the position she hopes will take the world by storm.
A documentary about the corrupt health care system in The United States whose main goal is to make profit even if it means losing people’s lives. "The more people you deny health insurance, the more money we make" is the business model for health care providers in America.
Mivtza Savta ("Operation Grandma") is a satirical Israeli comedy about three very different brothers trying to get around many obstacles to bury their grandmother on her kibbutz. The story takes place in Israel, in the fictional kibbutz "Asisim".
Low-level bureaucrat Sam Lowry escapes the monotony of his day-to-day life through a recurring daydream of himself as a virtuous hero saving a beautiful damsel. Investigating a case that led to the wrongful arrest and eventual death of an innocent man instead of wanted terrorist Harry Tuttle, he meets the woman from his daydream, and in trying to help her gets caught in a web of mistaken identities, mindless bureaucracy and lies.
Alex Kerner's mother was in a coma while the Berlin wall fell. When she wakes up he must try to keep her from learning what happened (as she was an avid communist supporter) to avoid shocking her which could lead to another heart attack.
Ahmed heads to Tahrir compound to extract papers to move his son to another school. There he clashes with the administrative obstacles. He suddenly finds himself involved in carrying a weapon and taking hostages at the government building and becomes a terrorist in the process.
Three episodes. Faith: a woman is attacked. Hope: a fakir is crucified. Charity: a woman faces bureaucracy.
A satirical take on the mundane absurdities of life in modern-day Iran, these nine vignettes illuminate the lighter side of enduring under authoritarian rule. Whether choosing a name for a newborn, graduating from grade school, getting a driver’s license, applying for a job, or seeking approval for a film script, if you live in Iran, you best come fluent in Orwellian discourse.
A young man attempts to fight the system in an entertaining account of bureaucracy amok and the tyranny of red tape. Restored by the Academy Film Archive and the Instituto Cubano del Arte e Industrias Cinematográficos in 2019.
A man is downtown and urgently needs to pee, but a vindictive voice on the phone holds the combination to his pants in this dark comedy of desperation.
This romantic drama follows two policemen whose job is to investigate the lives of foreigners who have applied for Swiss citizenship. Among the applicants they must screen are a French psychiatrist and his wife, and a ballet dancer. The married couple are quickly accepted, but the dancer's life offers some objections. However, since the younger policeman has fallen in love with her, there is a chance that she, too, will win Swiss citizenship.
When her husband is kicked in the groin by the village head, Qiu Ju, a peasant woman, despite her pregnancy, travels to a nearby town, and later a big city to deal with its bureaucrats and find justice.
A young couple decides to build their dream house, but run into numerous complications in the process. Everything from useless carpenters to building control gets in their way. Norwegian comedian Rolv Wesenlund plays 7 different roles in this movie.
Giuseppe Di Noi, an Italian surveyor living in Swiden, gets arrested at the border while going back to Italy with his family for a vacation. But can someone tell the man why?
A fisheries expert is approached by a consultant to help realize a sheik's vision of bringing the sport of fly-fishing to the desert and embarks on an upstream journey of faith and fish to prove the impossible possible.
When a young couple in Vienna suddenly find themselves unemployed, they open a little restaurant near a local soccer place. Soon they have to find out about the odds and ends of self-employment as they have to learn that their newly won independence suffers from bureaucracy and greed.
A copying error by a military scribe turns the Russian words "the lieutenants, however" into what looks like "lieutenant Kizhe". The Tsar reads the error, and wants to meet this (non-existent) lieutenant. The courtiers, eager to avoid the wrath of the temperamental Tsar, create a Kizhe to serve as their royal scapegoat.
When Death wants to bring the plague to Württemberg in 1349, he has not reckoned with the two guard soldiers Volckel and Utz, who engage him in a heated argument about plague ordinances and entry regulations.