SFFILM
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Continuing his very particular parsing of language and politics—here, the politics are cinematic— Corneliu Porumboiu tells the story of a film director rehearsing the details of a nude scene with his lead actress. Investigating the repetitive natu...
Romania/France | 89
The patient cameras of Harvard's Sensory Ethnography Lab (Sweetgrass, Leviathan) return in Manakamana, Stephanie Spray and Pacho Velez's intimate record of an isolated Nepalese pilgrimage site and the cable car journey that brings adherents, trave...
USA/Nepal | 120
Argentinian director Juan Taratuto and actor Diego Peretti make a sharp detour from their previous comedies in this finely observed character study set against the desolate beauty of Patagonia. Peretti is remarkable as an embittered, rough-hewn oi...
Argentina | 93
Angus McGilpin, director of content development at Dolby Laboratories, and a guest sound designer will explore the art and history of sound in film-from how it is created and designed in the mixing room to how it is experienced by audiences in the...
75
Armed with her inimitable insight and ability to find beauty where one least expects it, director Agnès Varda travels to various far-flung locales, interviewing artists, filmmakers and friends, in this puckish and profound five-part miniseries ori...
France | 225
On the eve of an ambitious remodeling and reinstallation at Vienna’s famed Kunsthistorisches Museum, this perceptive and slyly humorous documentary peers into the inner workings as the big day approaches. The Great Museum unsurprisingly makes for ...
Austria | 95
A student leader fighting against the bosses of striking packinghouse workers in 2002 Uruguay experiences a coming-of-age crisis when he inherits his father’s ranch. The radical becomes the boss and finds himself responsible for paying months of b...
Uruguay/Argentina | 121
This revelatory documentary details a year in the life of immigrant youth from around the globe—boys and girls age 11 to 15—who are living in Paris and enrolled in a “reception class” where an extraordinary teacher helps them learn to speak French...
France | 89
Art-house favorite Lav Diaz's latest epic explores everything from the state of present-day rural Philippines by way of Dostoevsky (Diaz’s favorite writer) to the 1890s Philippine Revolution against the Spanish. Actor Sid Lucero gives a remarkable...
Philippines | 250
A backwoods-dwelling pariah in 1960s Tennessee stumbles upon a pair of dead lovers and becomes romantically obsessed with the woman’s corpse, spiriting her body away to his squalid abode. James Franco’s latest directorial effort is a seething, sna...
USA | 104
A doting mother and her lethargic 15-year-old son pass away the idle hours of the off season at an empty Mexican resort hotel, luxuriating in their laziness until an odd and taciturn girl arrives and attracts the boy’s attention. Though theirs may...
Mexico | 82
A poverty-stricken father and his two young children try to survive in modern-day Taipei in yet another remarkable piece of cinema from the great Tsai Ming-liang. Tsai's oblique approach to space and time renders Stray Dogs an often mysterious wor...
Taiwan/France | 138
Single and 40, Sandro has zero prospects for finding true love. Fate lends a hand when he runs into a hairdresser, but there’s a catch: Her husband is getting out of prison the next day. For those new to the Georgian New Wave, this low-key, comic ...
Georgia | 95
Justin Simien reinvigorates the campus comedy with his sharply written satire about race and identity. Following a group of students at a fictional Ivy League university, his film tackles taboo topics with finesse and verve, and earned a Special J...
USA | 106
Comedian Mike Myers pays homage to the talent manager who first tasted success alongside his client, rocker Alice Cooper. This affectionate documentary blends Gordon’s reminiscences, archival footage and testimonials from clients and friends, incl...
84
In Peter Chan's clever crowd-pleaser, three college buddies become caught up in the thrall of China's budding entrepreneurial spirit. Abandoning dreams of stateside success in favor of establishing an empire at home, they yearn to beat America at ...
Hong Kong/China | 110
Investigating musician/writer/poet Nick Cave’s history, psyche and creative path, 20,000 Days on Earth is a must-see for fans or anyone interested in an artist’s journey. This highly stylized biopic presents a choreographed “day-in-the-life,” depi...
UK | 95
The 1994 Cannes Jury Prize Winner—now technically enriched and restored to full length—immerses viewers in the bosom-heaving passion and political intrigue of 16th-century France, with Isabel Adjani as the titular monarch caught up in bloody battl...
France/Italy/Germany | 159
In this playful, inventive experiment in narrative plotting, the story of Thai teenager Mary’s final year of high school is told via 410 tweets, taken verbatim from the Twitter feed of a real-life Thai teenager. The tweets provide the outlines for...
Thailand | 127
Among cinema’s greatest humanists, Filipino director Lino Brocka made this masterpiece tale of displaced youth and corruption in the teeth of Ferdinand Marcos’s brutal dictatorship. Restored in 2013 by the World Cinema Foundation and the Film Dev...
Philippines | 124
Are strange occurrences in an affluent Buenos Aires suburb evidence that the skittish residents are actually being targeted? Paranoia runs rampant in this accomplished first feature, instilling a disorienting sense of dread in the viewer. The film...
Argentina/France/Germany/Qatar/Uruguay | 79
Unemployed folks across America want new oil jobs in North Dakota, but housing is at a premium. Enter Pastor Jay Reinke. Despite protests from his own congregation, he opens up his church to “overnighters"—people in search of a second shot at the...
USA | 100
Muslim, Christian, Roma and atheist Communists live together peacefully in Satovcha, a Bulgarian village. They have differing theologies and politics, but are united by a love of food and the eternal mystery of being men and women. Beautifully sho...
Bulgaria/Finland | 69
South Sudan may have declared its independence but that hasn't stopped multinationals and missionaries from laying claim to its natural resources and influencing its people's religious beliefs. Employing intrepid techniques and striking visuals, d...
France/Austria | 110
Antigone returns to her seaside hometown in hopes of starting anew but soon discovers troubling undercurrents of despair and exploitation pervading the town. Subtly referencing both classical Greek tragedy and Westerns, this unflinching look at au...
Greece | 90
As a follow-up to his epic 15-hour documentary series The Story of Film, writer/director/curator/critic Mark Cousins has created a captivating companion piece more on the scale of its small-statured subject: children in film. His lilting Scottish ...
UK | 101
A 10-year-old boy's desire to straighten his kinky hair causes outsized conflict with his unemployed, harassed single mother in Mariana Rondón's Caracas-set drama. Unexpected issues related to Venezuela’s volatile economic situation and the young ...
Venezuela/Peru | 93
In this erotically charged nail-biter, director Robin Campillo takes the audience on an unexpected ride when Daniel, a dapper, 50-something Parisian businessman, coyly cruises the Gare du Nord and awkwardly propositions an eastern European immigra...
France | 128
Patricia Clarkson gives a spirited performance as an aging matriarch who wants her family and friends to gather one last time for a fond farewell to the magnificent Lake Tahoe manor she intends to sell. But comically, her plans quickly crumble in...
USA | 94
Luc Schaedler's latest work presents distinct and illuminating portraits of contemporary life in China. Attentively observing life on a parched farm, a grim industrial zone, a rural village and a booming megacity, the documentary expressively rev...
Switzerland | 80
After being flushed out of his subterranean forest hovel by a hatchet-wielding priest, the scruffy Borgman knocks on the door of a well-heeled couple and requests the use of their bath. He soon worms his way into their home, hatching a bizarre plo...
Netherlands | 113
This unique hybrid of documentary and narrative offers an evocative portrait of the quotidian lives of a devout young Christian goat farmer and the bull-riding cowboy who lives nearby. As much a portrait of the Eastern Texas town where they live, ...
USA/Belgium/Italy | 100
A drama as stylish as one of Saint Laurent’s dresses, this sleek biopic focuses on 20 years in the designer’s life, as he reaches the heights of couture success at Dior, revolutionizes fashion when he strikes out on his own and falls in love with ...
France | 105
In this behind-the-scenes look at the creation of the legendary Bay Lights project, director Jeremy Ambers offers a close-up view—from inception to execution—of the project that transformed the Bay Bridge into the internationally renowned art inst...
USA | 71
Mike Cahill (Another Earth, SFIFF 2011) returns to the Festival with the story of a molecular biology PH.D. student (Michael Pitt) whose research into the evolution of eyes leads him on an unexpected journey in this affecting science fictional dra...
USA | 113
It’s 1985 and in the seaside resort town of Ocean City, Maryland, table tennis looms large for one young teen in this coming-of-age comedy that pays affectionate homage to all things ‘80s as a shy, hip-hop obsessed 13-year-old boy makes new friend...
USA | 92
Brilliant, beloved indie rock singer-songwriter Elliott Smith—whose Academy Award–nominated “Miss Misery” from the Good Will Hunting soundtrack earned him unexpected fame, and who died tragically in 2003 at age 34—is fondly remembered by friends, ...
USA | 96
Ann Hui's moving and suspenseful drama showcases the heroic activities undertaken by resistance fighters during the Japanese occupation of Hong Kong from 1941–44.
Hong Kong/China | 130
Set in the 1970s and early ‘80s, Lawrence Ah Mon’s action-packed crime saga tells the true story of a reformed drug dealer who struggles for redemption from his perilous past.
Hong Kong | 101
In the wake of his girlfriend Eva’s sudden departure from the apartment they share, shallow kickboxing teacher Adam finds her journal, which catalogs his various transgressions as depicted in flashbacks.
Hong Kong | 93
An aspiring female chef (Zhou Dongyu) finds that the way to the heart of a reserved Japanese CEO is through his stomach in Derek Hui's rom-com.
China | 107
When a woman visits an egotistical sleep-disorder specialist about a mysterious sickness afflicting her brother, the doctor must in turn seek help from a medium to uncover the origin of the malady.
Hong Kong | 102
Boat People details the experiences of a Japanese photojournalist who is sent to Vietnam after the war to document life under the Communist government and its "new economic zones."
Hong Kong | 110
A stirring exposé of Hong Kong's juvenile justice system, With Prisoners uses real events (and casts several former offenders) to dramatize an institutional structure in need of reform.
Hong Kong | 100
Love Off the Cuff depicts Jimmy and Cherie at a pivotal stage in their relationship—where living together, rather than cementing their connection, instead brings personal idiosyncrasies to the fore.
Hong Kong | 120
'Watergate,' from Academy Award-winning director Charles Ferguson, chronicles one of the biggest criminal conspiracies in modern politics.
USA | 120
Hong Kong cinema takes a bold and progressive leap forward with Jun Li’s powerful portrait of a middle-aged man recognizing he is transgender.
Hong Kong | Fiction Feature | 119
