View from an Alley

"Laia" is located in the imaginary village of Sinera, a fishing village inhabited by a series of extreme characters, indiscriminately diverted to the adversities of destiny. There, Laia lives, a woman marked by a miserable and unhappy childhood, that is debated between her cruel husband and lover who is his best friend and faces the hatred of a whole town while dreaming of a freedom that only the sea can grant.

In this Korean omnibus film, three stories and relationships between the North and South are explored - stories about a hopeless romance, an unknown future and an expected and coincidental comfort.

Kaj is a stubborn man with a great deal of pride. The former chef lives in a council flat. He has wasted his life and is now on a council job training scheme for the long-term unemployed, where he refuses to let the foreman of the activation project boss him about. When Kaj's daughter, with whom he has not been in touch for nineteen years, moves into the same council estate on the run from her violent husband, a change comes over Kaj. His initial instinct is to avoid her, but by chance he ends up helping to look after Jonas, her six-year-old son. For the first time for years Kaj need not survive on his own devices. Now he has responsibilities and a family of his own.

After fourteen years in Japan a small-time crook returns to his hometown.

Three friends from the northern half of Seoul move to the more affluent southern half, but experience many troubles there.

Rome, 1957. A woman, Cabiria, is robbed and left to drown by her boyfriend, Giorgio. Rescued, she resumes her life and tries her best to find happiness in a cynical world. Even when she thinks her struggles are over and she has found happiness and contentment, things may not be what they seem.

A woman struggles as she is caught at a supermarket for shoplifting. This award-winning short film is inspired by the cost of living crisis in Britain.

A headstrong young girl in Afghanistan, ruled by the Taliban, disguises herself as a boy in order to provide for her family.

An idle part-time college lecturer is annoyed by the yapping sound of a nearby dog. He decides to take drastic action.

Sentenced to six years in prison, Malik El Djebena is alone in the world and can neither read nor write. On his arrival at the prison, he seems younger and more brittle than the others detained there. At once he falls under the sway of a group of Corsicans who enforce their rule in the prison. As the 'missions' go by, he toughens himself and wins the confidence of the Corsican group.

Gisela

Two out-of-work actors -- the anxious, luckless Marwood and his acerbic, alcoholic friend, Withnail -- spend their days drifting between their squalid flat, the unemployment office and the pub. When they take a holiday "by mistake" at the country house of Withnail's flamboyantly gay uncle, Monty, they encounter the unpleasant side of the English countryside: tedium, terrifying locals and torrential rain.

A mentally ill man searches New York for his missing eight year old daughter. He recreates her steps each day hoping for some clue to her disappearance, until he meets and befriends a woman with a daughter the same age. Could she help him with the missing piece of the puzzle?

Yeong-shin and Dong-hyuk graduate from college with a cause. They plan to bring education and modernization to farmers living in the rural area of their hometown. When they arrive, the pair immediately get to work, Dong-hyuk builds a village hall and starts aiding the farmers while Yeong-shin tries to gather the children to form a school. However, the villagers at first resent and resist the pair. It is not until one child, Ok-bun, takes the initiative and and learns to read under Yeong-shin’s care that the villages trust the pair and allow their children to be taken from the fields and taught reading, writing and math.

A man tries to raise his two sons and two daughters under some of the most adverse conditions known to man. The father operates a horse-drawn cart, but in a city that is modernizing after the destruction of the Korean War, automobiles are making carts obsolete. The children are experiencing difficulties as well. The eldest son has flunked the bar exam twice and is not hopeful of passing it a third time to become a lawyer. The eldest daughter is mute and married to an abusive husband. The younger daughter tries to pose as a rich university student to move up in life. The youngest son has a penchant for petty theft.

Mr. Kim is jobless, lost in debt and has been dumped by his girlfriend. He decides to end it all by jumping into the Han River - only to find himself washed up on a small, mid-river island. He soon abandons thoughts of suicide or rescue and begins a new life as a castaway. His antics catch the attention of a young woman whose apartment overlooks the river. Her discovery changes both their lives.

The 1975 film by Georgi Daneliya "Afonya" was an unexpected commercial hit in USSR. The main character "Afonya" Borshev is a plumber, who spends his life partying with "buddies", many of whom he doesn't even remember after nights of heavy drinking. His wife leaves him, his boss places him on probation, his whole life is falling apart, but he doesn't realize it. Afonya met Katya at a dance club, yet didn't pay her much attention. But she is the one, who can save him... In this movie Daneliya achieves a perfect balance of satire and drama. Quotes from the movie gained a cult status in USSR.

In 1916, a Chicago steel worker accidentally kills his supervisor and flees to the Texas panhandle with his girlfriend and little sister to work harvesting wheat in the fields of a stoic farmer.

A very impoverished man wanders the cold and hostile city looking for cigarette butts. After being humiliated by rude people at a bar, he comes back to an isolated hut where he lives with a lazy man who refuses to abandon the place, which is more a lair for savage animals than a shelter for human beings.

A teenager has to undo the mess his older brother made and protect his family even if he has to stand against dangerous thugs.