A Very Animated War

In Jakarta, a young journalist struggling to escape from the confines of familiar obligations, receives a telegram informing him that his mother is dying.

Three episodes from the history of socialism: Babeuf, whose virulent discourse is a radical assessment of the bourgeois revolution of 1789 (Vincent Nordon episode); the legend of Napoleon I, or the formation of the state as it still dominates today (François Barat episode); and the carnage of the Paris Commune, which official history strives to repress and forget (Joël Farges episode). What does it mean to make a historical film today? It means illuminating the present in the light of the past, and therefore adopting the new modes of modern storytelling to challenge what dominates us, structures us, and oppresses us.

A young woman, fleeing the bloody 1934 events in Shanghai, is sheltered in France by two friends of her late father, the psychiatrist Freyer and cardiologist Ménard. While the first turns her into a subject of study, the second feels compassion for her

A pioneer of cinema and inventor of the first moving images, Émile Reynaud achieved dazzling success before the advent of the cinematograph, but was sadly forgotten thereafter. Yet his pantomimes still fill us with wonder today.

"In The Moonless Night, the whole of Albania seems to head for the coast by train in order to emigrate to the West. So too is 16-year-old Rudina and her strict and secretive grandfather, who have left their village with that aim in mind. In the train, Rudina meets Gjergj, who is on his way with his friend Millo. The grandfather tries at all costs to keep the two away from each other, but is left powerless in the train when Rudina and Gjergj miss the train at the station. As they continue their journey on foot, they get to know each other better. When they reach the beach, the local Mafia is busy organising the smuggling of people and goods. When the train travellers arrive there too, it slowly becomes clear how much Rudina's grandfather tries to hide about his past and why he doesn't want the two young people to be together." - IFFR

Two young men went on a ride with their old friend in his truck across the whole Mauritius, the sole purpose of it being finding and getting two girls to entertain them that very night back home.

Set against the backdrop of the Indian Emergency, the movie tells the story of three youngsters in the 70s, when India was undergoing massive social and political changes.

Jakub's life arrived at a dead-end. He leaves his job, and gets into conflict with his father. The trouble just grows by his relation with a married woman. Breaking out, Jakub realizes the pleasures of the countryside in the old garden of his grandfather. He finds true love with an angel, and encounters various exciting moments of his new free life. Strange visitors arrive, and he wont get back to town anymore.

China’s rapid changes from the late 1970s to the early 1990s, as seen through the lives of four performers in a theater troupe.

Jan Nemec, a leading filmmaker of the Czech New Wave, creates an original portrait of one of the most provocative artists of the 20th century: Toyen (Marie Cerminova). As a female artist, Toyen broke through the male-dominated art world to create paintings and drawings often erotic in nature. She co-founded the surrealist movement in her native Prague, survived the Nazis and the Communists, maintained artistic and personal relationships with artists Jindrich Heisler (whom she hid during WWII) and Jindrich Styrsky.

A hangman questions the moral implications of his job after learning that he executed an innocent man.

A prominent Czech journalist Saša Uhlová leaves her family and joins “cheap labour force” in Western Europe. Undercover, she works at an asparagus farm in Germany, tries her hand as a maid at a hotel in Ireland and takes care of the elderly in France. She experiences first-hand the struggles of Eastern European low-wage workers whose sacrifice and hard work allow for the Western society’s comfort. What is the real price that Europe pays for exploiting its own citizens? How do the lives of economic migrants, who have been forced to leave their children and elderly parents, look like? And why are privileged Europeans looking the other way?

Whenever people are released from their society's constraints, there is the possibility that they will behave badly, at least according to the rules of the society they have left behind. This seems to have been particularly the case for Europeans living in colonial establishments in Africa and Asia. In this drama, based on a story by Stefan Zweig, Dr. Steiner (Andrzej Seweryn) was caught with his fingers in the till at a German hospital. Rather than prosecute him, they gave him the option of emigrating elsewhere. He chose to serve at a clinic in a remote part of Portuguese Goa. He has been on his best behavior for years, but when the beautiful wife (Fanny Ardant) of a diplomat comes to him asking for an abortion, he is tempted to ask for sexual favors in return, and his life swiftly goes out of control.

A story of an extraordinary artist who has unintentionally signed a deal with a devil. Jiří Trnka was one of the biggest Czech artists of the 20th century and one of the founders of the puppet animation. His work demonstrated the world that communist society can provide better conditions for extraordinary artistic creations. The ideological clash between West and East didn’t leave children and their stories apart from their struggle in ideological and political positions.

Told via flashback, this raw, emotional drama chronicles the events that led a 22-year-old Czech Gypsy to prison. Marian was born to an alcoholic father and a terrible mother. As a result he is sent to a government orphanage where he is labelled a problem child for his inability to speak Czech. Life in the orphanage is devoid of love and offers only minimal physical comforts. Sometimes life there is brutal. His one bright spot was the time he first spent with a kindly and encouraging teacher who inspired in him hope for a better future. One day something goes wrong and the teacher is forced to punish Marian who retaliates by stabbing her. Marian is a teen by the time he is released from a juvenile reformatory. He falls in love for the first time, but because it is a foreign emotion, he doesn't know how to deal with it. By this time, the cruelty that has marked his life in institutions seems to have fated him to be a criminal and for Marian there can be no turning back.

A filmmaker, Kobessov, awakens from an anxiety nightmare: during the preview of his newest film, the projectionist mixes up the reels and begins to show a bad karate film by accident. Although Kobessov objects to the mix-up, the public is ecstatic and refuses to allow the projectionist to interrupt the screening to show Kobessov's film.