Mission Congo

A feature-length documentary on Yvonne Bezerra de Mello, award-winning artist and human-rights activist who has gained international recognition for her work with street children in Rio. The film recounts how a woman turned her back on a wealthy lifestyle, driven into action by the execution of 8 streetkids by military police in 1993. In subsequent years Yvonne's struggle to better the lives of endangered and abandoned children has led her to found "Projeto Uere" ("Children of Light") a radical project committed to protection and education of kids who live in the streets and slums of Rio which has brought her into conflict with Brazil's wealthy elite.

The Pimp and His Trophies

A pseudo-documentary, “Samarang” tells the story of lowly Ahmang (Captain A.V. Cockle) and his socially superior love, Sai-Yu (Theresa Seth). Both live in the village of Samarang in the Indian Ocean. Because Sai-Yu is the daughter of a chief and Ahmang is but a poor fisherman, he needs to increase his wealth before asking for her hand. Thus he accepts the perilous offer of the wily Chang-Fu, who seeks pearl divers. Ahmang must brave the treacherous waters of the Forbidden Lagoon of Sakai, home to bloodthirsty cannibals, killer sharks, and a monstrous grasping octopus. Sai-Yu and Ahmang’s younger brother Ko-Hai come along for kicks, too. Ahmang finds his pearl, but he and Sai-Yu are stranded on the island, where they befriend a local orangutan. When they return to the boat, a shark kills Ko-Hai, and Ahmang must get revenge.

Eleven major film makers from Europe, America and Asia talk about Akira Kurosawa and discover surprising influences on their own work.

Laila Paattinen is a working woman. Tired of low-paying jobs, she completed a five-month course in dry-wall installation. Because she had chosen a non-traditional job for women, she ran into resistance in the marketplace. She finally solved her problems by opening her own dry-wall application business. A useful film for women seeking non-traditional jobs.

My Legacy follows Helen as she explores the often tenuous relationship between a mother and daughter made more complex by the legacy of residential school.

Harry Schein was an anomaly in Swedish cultural society. Equal parts playboy, intellectual, and political visionary, his life story could very well be the foundation of a Hollywood film. Citizen Schein is a film about a refugee who refused to look back, a film about powerful men, and the myths that fuel them.

Horses have been part of daily life for generations in the deprived Dublin suburb of Ballymun – and for 17-year-old Lorna and her family too. Her unemployed father finds structure and purpose in daily life by caring for his horses, while her sick mother wistfully remembers the days when she used to turn heads as she galloped through the town. These days it's Lorna who likes to spend all her free time in the stable or riding Bigfoot, her horse.

In June 1893, European prospectors unlawfully took claim to ‘The Golden Mile’ on Aboriginal land. In little over a hundred years the natural landscape has been transformed into the industrial hellscape of Kalgoorlie-Boulder. As incumbent Mayor John Bowler starts to campaign for a second term, independent prospector John ‘General Hercules’ Katahanas decides to run against him on an anti-corruption ticket. What starts out as a quirky David-vs-Goliath political battle, unravels into a portrait of a man, a town and a country sent mad by the timeless cycles of exploitation, racism and greed.

A homeless musician finds meaning in his life when he starts a friendship with dozens of parrots.

THE ARYANS is Mo Asumang's personal journey into the madness of racism during which she meets German neo-Nazis, the US leading racist, the notorious Tom Metzger and Ku Klux Klan members in the alarming twilight of the Midwest. In The ARYANS Mo questions the completely wrong interpretation of "Aryanism" - a phenomenon of the tall, blond and blue-eyed master race.

Edie Bouvier Beale and her mother, Edith, two aging, eccentric relatives of Jackie Kennedy Onassis, are the sole inhabitants of a Long Island estate. The women reveal themselves to be misfits with outsized, engaging personalities. Much of the conversation is centered on their pasts, as mother and daughter now rarely leave home.

A documentary about urban violence in Brazil, especially in Rio de Janeiro. Policemen, drug dealers, and shantytown dwellers get trapped in a daily war that knows no winners.

Rated X, a short documentary about the adult industry, focuses on giving a voice to the porn actresses working within it. In a perspective of showing how these women empower themselves with their job, Rated X shows the porn industry like never before.

Three children living in a displacement camp in northern Uganda compete in their country's national music and dance festival.

Examines the public scandal and private tragedy which led to legendary director Roman Polanski's sudden flight from the United States.

In the 1920s, Angela Murray Gibson chose an unusual location to embark on a career in silent filmmaking: her tiny hometown of Casselton, North Dakota. She had previously helped Mary Pickford as an advisor and assistant director on The Pride of the Clan (1917), which Mary Pickford produced and starred in. She opened North Dakota's first movie studio, and she had the audacity to be a woman in an industry dominated by men.

When confronted with their lingerie factory (Starissima) going bankrupt, the employees attempt to take it over by forming a cooperative. Soon questions about fundamental economic and social issues pop up amidst the bras and panties. Through this adventure together they discover a new freedom.

Through previously undiscovered private letters, photos and diaries that were found in the Himmler family house in 1945, the "The Decent One" exposes a unique and at times uncomfortable access to the life and mind of the merciless "Architect of the Final Solution" Heinrich Himmler.

Lisbon's lost and found items.