Housebound

A story about normal people who have not lost themselves in today's narcissistic world.

On the brink of puberty in 1962 suburban Winnipeg, Sarah Matthews is increasingly challenged and confused by her mother’s instability and sexual power. While her father refuses to acknowledge that the family is fracturing under the stress of his wife’s mental illness, Sarah uses her creativity, inner strength, and a new friend to discover her own identity. With courage, Sarah bears witness and demands truth from the adults around her, demonstrating love’s capacity to endure.

Louise meets Nathan, her dreams resurface. It's also the story of her ailing brother, their mother, and the destiny of a leading family of wealthy Italian industrialists. The story of a family falling apart, a world coming to an end and love beginning.

Blaise and Nessa are outcast methadone users in their small town. Each day they push a rusty lawnmower door-to-door begging to cut grass. Nessa plots an escape, while Blaise lingers closer to collapse. Tethered to one another, their getaway dreams are kept on a suffocatingly short leash.

Irene, a former member of the terrorist gang ETA recently released from prison in Catalonia, recalls her past during her return trip to the Basque Country.

Andre omgang is the story of a father and his two sons trying to adjust to life's later summers; the father becomes a member of a singles' club, Sverre joins a swingers club, and Erik finds a new woman to live with. The three of them are passionate supporters of Skeid Football Club.

Anna, 50 years old, moves into her new house. Rooms are full of boxes which contain a lot of things and plenty of memories. Anna has lived many lives and her past comes out of these boxes. Her parents surely, but also her children and their fathers, the living and the dead. In this breakneck period of her life, time is running faster and faster and Anna takes a run-up to face the past and try to go towards the future. And, maybe, to manage to still believe in love?

While on a business trip in Shanghai, a man sees a woman he has had recurring dreams of.

Bright days ahead? Caroline has retired, at last. A new life lies before her: time to take care of her children, her husband, and, most of all, herself. However, she soon comes to realize that this new freedom is synonymous with boredom and idleness. Especially when she receives a membership to her neighborhood’s senior club as a birthday present… Reluctant at first, she nevertheless decides to take the plunge. Oddly enough, she meets great people there, starting with the young computer science teacher, who is far from insensitive to her charms. Caroline gradually takes control of her life again and lives a second youth: taking a new lover, living new experiences, breaking the rules, not doing what’s expected of her… Who said that retirement was the beginning of the end and not a new beginning?

Bernice, a shy young woman, leaves her safe home to go visit her flapper cousin. When her cousin tries to teach Bernice how to be much more modern, Bernice gives her much more than she bargained for.

When Nénette discovers the identity of her father in a letter, she quickly goes off in search of him. But instead of finding her father, she is met by her half-brother, Paul. Paul, a bitter man who gave up his dream to take over his father’s pharmacy business, is less than thrilled at the arrival of his ‘embarrassing’ half-sister. After refusing to take her in, he soon gets a taste of his own medicine. Under the influence of a potent drug, for one day Paul is generous, happy and sensitive. The next morning, however, once the drug has worn off, his nasty side comes back...

A high school sophomore questions the school system by posing a very uncomfortable question in the midst of a literature exam.

An aging Hong Kong couple move to Australia with their two youngest sons. They stay with a daughter who has already begun a successful career. Meanwhile their eldest daughter lives in Germany and their eldest son remains in Hong Kong. The film explores the different ways the family members cope with isolation and alienation.

In this "inside look" at French filmmaking, Marechal - who is a has-been director - a producer, Vito Catene and Camile Dor, a big-name actress, have agreed to make a film about drugs, but don't have a story, financing, or any of the other elements needed to make it. This doesn't stop them; they cobble together the financing and begin shooting anyway. The producer is very fond of the leading actress, and when she gets hooked on drugs for real in the course of shooting what he feels to be a farcical imitation of a film, he gives up his shares in the film and heads off for the back of beyond (Zanzibar) to lick his wounds. To add insult to injury, the film winds up being a critical and commercial success.

After the death of her father, Anne — a brilliant but emotionally unstable painter/sculptor — returns from Switzerland to her home town in Quebec. Setting up a studio, she becomes obsessed with her work, to the extent that she grows farther and farther from her Swiss lover.

Norm, an aimless writer, witnesses the murder of rock video star Madelaine X and feels guilty, as he did nothing to prevent it. At Madelaine’s funeral, he meets a mysterious woman in black with unexplained connections to the deceased singer.

A Greek-Irish sailor becomes friends with a 10-year-old sampan girl while his freighter is docked in Hong Kong.

A passionate and unpredictable film about three characters in love, Les Sauf-conduits explores the tenuous balance between friendship and romantic love. When three friends set out to break the world’s egg-tossing record, their relationships become increasingly entangled and complicated. In her arresting first film, director Manon Briand crafts poetic images that are striking, fresh and occasionally quirky, and elicits uncannily natural performances from her actors. Les Sauf-conduits garnered several awards on the festival circuit, including the award for Best Canadian Short Film at the 1992 Festival of Festivals (now the Toronto International Film Festival®) and Golden Sheaf Awards for Best Director and Best Film at the Yorkton Film Festival.

A couple makes love in a hotel. She lives in Switzerland, he lives in Belgrad. What’s been destroyed by war will be reborn in this hotel room.

Three disconnected siblings find themselves living once again under the same roof when the father who abandoned them returns to their lives.