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Mohamed Siam
Director
Mohamed Siam is a director, producer and DOP. His previous projects have received support from international institutes such as the Sundance Institute and the IDFA Bertha Fund. He has taken part in the Berlinale and Durban Talents, won the AfriDocs prize at the Durban FilmMart and won the Film Prize of the Robert Bosch Stiftung in 2015 for his project Amal.
SYNOPSIS
This film gives an overview of Egypt through Amal’s eyes, that of a child becoming a woman surrounded by unrest and violence.
This documentary has followed a teenager for four years as she comes to terms with her identity and sexuality in a male-dominated society and post-revolutionary police state. Amal embodies the chaos reigning in Egypt, where the people try to fulfil their potential despite the authoritarian regime and political upheavals.
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Imam Hasanov
Director
Imam Hasanov is a young filmmaker from Baku, Azerbaijan. For many years, he directed television dramas. His first feature film, Holy Cow, premiered in the First Appearance Competition at IDFA in 2015. Imam is an active member of Baku’s underground scene and founded Azerbaijan’s first independent theatre. He has participated in the Sarajevo and Berlinale Talents.
SYNOPSIS
A son is reluctant to follow ancient death rites.
Deep in the Caucasus Mountains, no one dares to disobey the ancient customs. To free their parents souls, children must abandon them at the mercy of vultures to be devoured. Sahran, the village’s teacher, disallows this funeral rite.
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Tinatin Kajrishvili
Director
Tinatin Kajrishvili was born in Tbilisi, Georgia, in 1978. In 2001, she graduated from Georgia’s state theatre and film university as a qualified film director. In 2014, her first feature film Brides premiered and was awarded at the Berlin International Film Festival.
SYNOPSIS
There is no place for saints in today’s society.
One day, the statue of a crucified saint comes to life. None of the investigators, government officials or locals know what to do with him. The Saint is accused of damaging artwork, ruining the city’s only tourist attraction and being a swindler. Everyone agrees: a saint’s place is on the cross. After interminable discussions, they put him back on his cross and crucify him again. Mary, an employee in a the city’s local museum, wants to protect him.
ARTIZM
PRODUCTION
The production company Artizm was founded in 2013 by Lasha Khalvashi. It became specialized in first films and documentaries and produced among others the short films Guest, and Waiting for Anna in 2016, in coproduction with France.
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Pocas Pascoal
Director
Pocas Pascoal is Angola’s first camerawoman. She studied cinema in Paris before directing several documentaries and short films. Since 2002, she has participated in a number of contemporary art exhibitions. In 2012, she made her first feature film Alda and Maria, winning seven film festival awards.
SYNOPSIS
This film explores emotions and the environment, showing one parent’s capacity to deprive the other of their child and a child’s inability to choose between his parents.
Ema (6) lives with her father, a musician, in Lisbon. One day, during an authorised visit, her mother kidnaps her and takes her back to her home country, Cape Verde. Ema’s father attempts to find them, but her mother keeps running away. As Ema travels closer to the country’s heartland, she must face the solitude and mysteries of this new world.
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Alaa Eddine Aljem
Director
Alaa studied film at ESAV in Morocco and INSAS in Brussels. His films have been selected for festivals around the world, winning several awards. His most recent short film, The Desert Fish, won the critics’, screen-writing and grand prizes at the Moroccan National Film Festival. His first feature film project, Saint Inconnu, featured in the Open Doors section at Locarno Film Festival.
SYNOPSIS
A whole village worships by mistake a devilishly large sum of money. The mausoleum reveals the absence of spirituality and the influence of local traditions.
Amine, a thief who has stolen a large sum of money, escapes into the hills with the police hot on his heels. He buries the cash, hiding it under a makeshift tomb, before being arrested. Ten years later, he is released from prison and sets off in search of his money. Meanwhile, a shrine has been built where he buried it to honour an unknown saint.
Le Moindre Geste production
PRODUCTION
Le Moindre Geste is an independent production company founded by Francesca Duca and Alaa Eddine Aljem in Casablanca in January 2012. The company aims to support young filmmakers throughout the production process by building strong relationships between directors and producers. Le Moindre Geste does not set themes, but is open to authors’ artistic approaches.
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Maya Da-Rin
Director
After studying design and the philosophy of art in Brazil, Maya Da-Rin graduated with honours from the French visual arts school Le Fresnoy. Her work has been shown at film festivals (Locarno) and museums (MoMA). She is working on her first feature, The Fever, selected for a Cinéfondation residence and Torino Script&Pitch, and supported by the Hubert Bals Fund.
SYNOPSIS
Caught between the fever of the city and the humidity of the forest, an Amerindian family is disrupted by the appearance of a creature reported on television to be a dangerous beast.
Manaus is an industrial city surrounded by the Amazon rainforest. Justino, a 45- year-old Amerindian, works as a security guard at a cargo port and lives with his daughter on the outskirts of town. When she decides to leave to study medicine in the capital, Justino is gripped by a mysterious fever. He believes he is being followed, but he is not sure whether it is by an animal or by a man.
Enquadramento Produções
PRODUCTION
The Fever is a Brazilian coproduction bringing together Enquadramento Produções, a company founded eight years ago by the producer Leonardo Mecchi to produce features and short films by emerging directors, and Tamanduá Vermelho, a company recently created by the director Maya Da-Rin to produce and coproduce art house films.
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Carlo Francisco Manatad
Director
Carlo Francisco Manatad, born in Tacloban City, is an alumnus of the Asian Film Academy, the Berlinale Talents and the DocNet Campus Project. His short film, Junilyn Has, screened at the Locarno and Clermont Ferrand film festivals and since then, has travelled the festivals circuit.
SYNOPSIS
This film is a love song to my hometown, a long- forgotten place that seemingly belongs only to my past; a fact I never faced until this tragedy. Now I ask myself what more, what now?
In autumn 2013, in the aftermath of Typhoon Haiyan, the strongest typhoon in recorded history, the jail warden temporarily releases the prisoners so they can tend to their families during the disaster. Miguel, one of the released prisoners, looks for his mother and his ex-girlfriend to flee the city. When his mother decides to stay, Miguel’s freedom and life are put in jeopardy.
Quantum Films, Inc
PRODUCTION
Quantum Films, Inc. was founded in 2004 by Atty Joji Alonso. Its mission is to make quality films that reflect the artistic merits and universal values of Filipino culture. It has produced significant Filipino films such as The Bet Collector (International Critics Jury Prize – 28th Moscow IFF, FIPRESCI prize - 8th Osian’s Cinefan Festival of Asian Cinema, Special Jury Prize – Asiatica Film Mediale in Rome) Woman in the Septic Tank (Berlinale 2012, the Philippines’ Academy Award entry in 2011), and The Bit Player (Toronto International Film Festival 2013).
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Massoud BAKHSHI
Director
Massoud Bakhshi was born in Tehran. Between 1990 and 1998, he worked as a film critic, script writer and producer. He has made ten documentaries and one short film, which have received many prizes. His first feature film, A Respectable Family (distributed by Pyramide in France), was selected for the Directors’ Fortnight at Cannes in 2012. Yalda is his second feature film.
SYNOPSIS
In Iran, the future of a young woman facing retributive justice plays out live on the country’s most popular reality show. This film is about women and dignity.
Maryam (26) is “temporarily married” to Naser (65). She accidentally kills him, but is pregnant with his child. In Iran, only a victim’s family can pardon the killer. For Maryam, this pardon plays out on the country’s most popular reality show. She quickly realises that nothing is what it seems, including her own family. She must choose between her child and a pardon, in front of millions of viewers.
Bon Gah
PRODUCTION
Bon Gah is an independent art and cultural centre founded by Mahmoud Bakhshi to produce a number of creative artistic projects, including books, exhibitions and films. Over the past ten years, it has been active in various ways. Bon Gah has produced or co-produced several films directed by Massoud Bakhshi, including Tehran Has No More Pomegranates (2006), Bag Dad Bar Ber (2007), Our Persian Rug (2010) and Image to Image (2016).
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Gustavo Fallas
Director
Gustavo Fallas, a director, producer and writer, was born in Costa Rica in 1974. He studied screenwriting at UQAM, Canada, before founding Centrosur, a production company that makes documentaries, music videos, commercials and fiction films. The film Puerto Padre received the Silver Zenith award for Best First Fiction Film at the Festival des Films du Monde de Montréal.
SYNOPSIS
In Costa Rica’s rural areas, where there is a strong family tradition, life replays itself. Here, a grandfather takes the place of his grandson, and the grandson takes the place of his grandfather.
Río Sucio tells the story of the meeting of two strangers: an elderly hermit living alone in the mountains where he hates his only neighbor, and his 12-year-old grandson whose mother has left him in his grandfather’s care. During their time together, the grandfather teaches the boy how to survive life in the mountains, but he also learns a lesson about hate and its fatal consequences.
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Tapiwa Chipfupa
Director
An original, eclectic and creative filmmaker, Tapiwa Chipfupa worked on various projects in southern Africa before deciding to study. After gaining a Master’s degree from AFDA, Tapiwa received support from HotDocs (2016), Berlinale Talents (2015), Talents Durban (2013) and AfricaDocs (2010). Her projects have been acquired by broadcasters and won awards worldwide.
SYNOPSIS
My identity crisis became a desire to understand my world.
Estranged from her family by a dispute over her marriage, Tapiwa Chipfupa attempts to reconcile the situation through encounters with other Zimbabwean women from all walks of life also facing their own challenges. The film develops as a brutally honest story of Zimbabwe’s women that paints a vivid and intriguing portrait of contemporary Zimbabwe and its vast contradictions.
Mahaka Media
PRODUCTION
Founded in 2001, Mahaka Media is one of the leading production companies in the southern African region with a proven track record in most SADC countries. The company takes pride in producing films that strike a good balance between disseminating information and good old-fashioned storytelling. Over the past three years, the company has sought to grow its portfolio to expand and interact with the world on an international level by shifting its focus to creative fiction and documentary projects that are strong, driven and authentic.
