In 1921, Charles, a young Luxembourgish cartographer is sent to Albania as part of a border commission to gather information on the topography and the people of the region. The country has recently become independent, but it does not yet have clearly defined borders. Back in Paris, Charles gets to report to the Conference of Ambassadors. At first, he is overwhelmed by the impressive architecture and the intimidating grandeur of the event. However, he soon learns that the party of self-serving diplomats has little interest in the future of the people he has just met. With no representative of Albania even present, Charles feels the need to speak up for the young country. Despite breaking protocol in doing so, Charles shares an observation with the quarrelling diplomats that allows them to find a peaceful solution to the question of where to draw the urgently needed borders.
“The Lion and The Unicorn” is a short film inspired by the heraldic symbols found on the Royal Coat of Arms of The United Kingdom, the lion (representing England) and the unicorn (representing Scotland). The piece uses representations of both alliance and opposition to explore national identity within the context of the 2014 referendum on Scottish independence.
A young girl who treated her pets as comrades and liked to play with construction blocks, experiences her life changing after the dissolution of the Soviet Union.
A young lieutenant must persuade a captive resistance fighter to betray his comrades, or enforce a law which states that for every German soldier killed, one hundred civilians must be executed.
Footage of Québec City locations and the artwork of well-known Quebec animator Frédéric Back are used to tell the tale of Champlain’s life in New France – from his first explorations and settlement to his death in 1635.
An essay film on the editing of erotic movies.
This short follows the political career of Theodore Roosevelt, beginning in 1895, when he was appointed police commissioner of New York City. In 1897 he was appointed Assistant Secretary of the Navy. His charge up San Juan Hill during the Spanish-American War in 1898 is re-created. He becomes vice president in March 1901 and assumes the presidency when William McKinley is assassinated six months later. According to the narrator, Roosevelt refused to be beholden to political bosses, doing what he believed to be right for the American people.
On the island of La Gomera, children imagine stories while they examine archeological remains. An ethno-fictional journey in which past and present coalesce, creating resonances between the volcanic landscape and Silbo, the whistled language of the island.
In 1913, designer Coco Chanel opens her first boutique in the French city of Deauville.
Short comedic subject on the history of photography from the daguerrotype to modern amateur photographers.
Set in 1932, at the height of prohibition and the growing American eugenics movement, the state of Vermont passes a law allowing for sexual sterilization of "idiots, imbeciles, feeble minded or insane persons likely to procreate." Dormancy follows a young woman and her new husband who work the land and earn a small income herding sheep and working with lumber. The couple is lured into a rural clinic where they subjected to the sadistic goals of the doctors and eugenics field workers. For this modest family, life will never be quite the same...
Do Útero Ao Túmulo
Constantinople, Ottoman Empire, 1910. There are too many stray dogs on the streets, so the government decides to deport thousands of them on a desert island, off the coast of the city.
Follows Iwao Ichikawa, a second-generation Japanese Mexican, navigating racial segregation in Mexicali, Baja California during WWII, offering a poignant exploration of identity and belonging amidst adversity.
When the path to safety has been destroyed and you’re forced to abandon your life because the enemy is at the gates, all that’s left to do, is save your home in your heart.
Europe, 1940. For thousands of Jews, a Japanese diplomat and his wife defy Tokyo and the Nazis, and offer visas, for life.
When a junior high student in 1963 suspects his teacher of being a communist, he investigates the truth to gain approval from his father.
Made for straight 8's 2018 competition on one cartridge of super 8mm film with only in-camera edits and no post-production. Premiered on may 14th 2018 at straight 8's Cannes film festival screening.
To recover a silver lion ornament for singer Emma Bunton Tim travels back to the court of Henry Vlll where Anne Boleyn (Emma again) asks jester Tim to send invitations to the guests for her Christmas party. However Cardinal Wolsey aims to steal them so that they will come to his own party and Tim must thwart him.
Three Kiowa boys attempt to escape a government boarding school in 1891, Oklahoma.