Léandre l'Eté

SINOPSIS / SYNOPSIS Every year in Spain, some 16,000 Fiestas are organized, during which animals are used. Honoring the Holy Virgin and the Patron Saints, and with the blessing of religious and political authorities, entire towns -including children- are involved in celebrations of unbelievable cruelty. 60,000 animals are hence abused each year during these “Fiestas of Blood”.

The unique journey of three reserved and endearing teens as they test their limits, discover the meaning of strong connections and live and learn in synch with the natural rhythms of the land and its animals.

Maverick soul mates Ged and Dave are on a mission through the winding lanes and hidden tracks of North Devon, to record the lives and experiences of people living without mains electricity.

A documentary that records the daily life of a mother with a limited life expectancy and a grandmother, directed by the daughter, Haruyo Kato.

Les doléances

Set in the sparsely populated lobster fishing villages of southern Nova Scotia, Plains is a cinema vérité approach to documenting the curious lives of Jon and Cat, a young couple who are developing politically left-leaning virtual reality video games. Against the busy backdrop of their art practice, we sit in on their quiet rural life, which, in its proximity to nature and the vast green and oceanic spaces that surround, echoes the romanticism of a simpler time. As the decaying world of physical labour and the mechanical industry faces up to an expanding digital empire, Jon gradually retreats into the alternative realities of his own design.

A real-time portrait of 2020 unfolds as an Asian-American family in Trump’s rural America fights to keep their restaurant and American dream alive in the face of a pandemic, Neo-Nazis, and generational scars from the Cambodian Killing Fields.

When the Cows Come Home introduces audiences to Tilly and Maggie, a pair of cows that musician, journalist, artist and cow whisperer, Andrew Johnstone has befriended and subsequently saved from slaughter. The garrulous herdsman is enthusiastic to expound his views on animal husbandry, bovine communication and the vagaries of life in general, before the film walks us back through the events that have shaped the singular farmer-philosopher. From personal family tragedy to warring with Catholic school authorities, innovating in Hamilton’s nascent music scene to creating guerrilla art installations; Johnstone’s life has had a truly idiosyncratic trajectory. Mental health issues may have seen him retreat to life on the farm, but the film makes clear its subject’s restless inquisitiveness is far from being put out to pasture.

The village commune is struggling with huge debt incurred by it's overambitious mayor, who once suffered a personal tragedy. Did this affect his overly ambitious actions? A warm and humorous observation of the life of a village near Krakow.

Former flight attendant Émilienne, 76, lives on a small farm in Centre-du-Québec. As the seasons go by, she helps us discover a way of life in symbiosis with the living and the passing of time.

When Werner Herzog was still a child, his father was beaten to death before his eyes. His mother was overwhelmed with his upbringing and thereupon shipped him off to one of the toughest youth welfare institutions in Freistatt. This was followed by a career as a bouncer in the city's most notorious music club and an attempt to start a family. Today, the 77-year-old from Bielefeld lives with his dog Lucky in a lonely house in the country. Despite adverse living conditions, he has survived in his own unique and inimitable way.

A song is heard in the distance. It comes from the Hekeng village, famous for its ancient earthen buildings, also called tulou. It is where the last original Hakka families live amidst the exodus of those looking for a more modern environment. Among them there is Zhang Zhouyin, an elderly man concerned about the state of the village's temple; or her daughter-in-law, Wei Yi, who spends her entire day guiding tourists through these awe-inspiring houses. And then there’s young Zhang Weibo, her son, who manages to find joy even in the simplest of things... Hekeng: a place frozen in time whose songs have endured for centuries.

A Traveltalks visit to some small towns in Mexico. In Mazatlán, away from the tourist spots, we see a small village where fishing, growing coconuts, and gathering large sea turtles are the main pursuits. We then visit Toluca on market day, where people sell produce and pottery. The last stop is Taxco, where the Castilian influence of the Spanish conquerors is still prevalent.

An atmospheric and dreamy picture poem from Argentina's vast La Pampa region, where ancient stories of spirits are evoked in dark and evocative images between reality and the beyond.

The efforts of a community to build a bridge which would allow their children to go school during the rainy season.

Meet Brian Boland—the beloved, eccentric hot air balloonist and artist from the rural Upper Valley of Vermont.

As coronavirus begins to sweep the globe, Zhang returns to her father’s village with her camera, seeking to understand where the extraordinary phenomenon might sit in the grand palimpsest of China’s history. As with all of Zhang’s work, this is a committed, reflective, formally assured non-fiction film, grounded in collaboration and blessed with an uncanny sense of unhurried time.

A representation of queer and feminist imagery that was mainly shot in the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau, remote and developing areas in southwest China, and metropolitan cities like Beijing from 2000 to 2004 to document the social changes in contemporary China. The director sympathetically and erotically represents a variety of women, including women as laborers, women as prayers, women in the ground, women in marriage, and women who lie on the funeral pyre with their dead husbands. Her camera juxtaposes the mountains and rivers in old times, the commercialized handicrafts as exposition, the capital exploitation of the elders’ living space, and the erotic freedom of the young people in a changing city.

An intimate portrait of the lives of Delvys and Carlos, siblings who live alone with their elderly mother in a rural part of a small Cuban town. The film portrays a family engulfed in their inner worlds. Between the sacrifices they make out of love for those who are present, and their longing for things that are absent, they struggle to find meaning as they reflect, contemplate, and carry the weight of existence, trying together, to move forward.

Esperanza and Teodula are calling for justice in rural Peru, part of 300,000 people sterilised without consent more than 18 years ago. The Quipu Project is their phone line that allows the affected across the country to share their shocking testimonies and ensure those responsible are punished.