Manda Meyer Upakhyan
Buddhadeb Dasgupta
India. 2002. 90 min

Based on a short story by Bengali writer Prafulla Roy, the central idea developed by director Dasgupta, tells the story of a girl, Lati (Samata Das), whose mother Rajani (Rituparna Sengupta) is a prostitute living and working in a brothel in rural India. Rajani plans to offer her daughter to an older man, a rich husband and protector to her daughter. Lati, however, wants to return to school and finish her studies. Unwilling to pay such a price for material success, she runs away to Calcutta. The discovery of this new world is described parallel to other stories of emancipation, such as that of three young prostitutes, of an aged couple going nowhere and man’s landing on the moon. In a surrealistic approach typical of the director, a clumsy cat and an intelligent donkey are also present in the film.

Ganesh (Tapas Paul) works full-time as a driver for wealthy Bengali-speaking, Natabar Paladhi (Ram Gopal Bajaj), who lives in a mansion with his wife, children and grandchildren, and runs ‘Anjali Cinema’ He has Ganesh use his vehicle as a private taxi cab. Amongst Ganesh’s customers are a woman named Bakul (June Malia), who alights near a town of Gosaipara to take up prostitution with Jamunabai; an abandoned elderly couple who are in need of hospitalization — there is none in the vicinity, and they end up secretly riding with Ganesh all the time; while Natabar uses this vehicle to travel to Gosaipara to visit a prostitute named Rajani and negotiate with her so that he can have her 14-year-old daughter, Lati, as his mistress. Things get complicated when Lati rebels against her mother so she can return to school, and a prostitute is about to get killed by her vengeful husband.

Lal Darja
Buddhadeb Dasgupta
India. 1997. 97 min

Middle-aged Calcutta dentist Nabin Batta (Subhendu Chatterjee) confronts various psychological and physical problems: His wife Bela (Gulsan Ara Akhtar) no longer sleeps with him, and he suspects her of having an affair with a man from her past. He is experiencing a loss of sensation in his arms and legs, and he finds communication impossible with his college-age son. On his way to see a doctor, he witnesses a woman shot by a jealous husband, increasing his own anxiety about his wife. In this downward spiral,

He compared his situation with his driver Dinu who had two wives, Sukhi (Nandini Maliya) and Maloti (Indrani Haldar). Dinu’s wives were satisfied with him and they had no complaints about Dinu. Nabin tried to understand himself. Most of the time he thought about his childhood in Cherrapunji and the red coloured gate which he thought obeyed him. His mother said that the gate had a huge tolerance and Nabin compared himself with the red coloured gate. Ultimately, after departing from his wife and son, he raised his tolerance to a maximum stage and started to live alone with himself.

Another News Story
Orban Wallace
Great Britain. 2017.84 min

In today’s chaotic era, what is the “who, how, and why” of news spewed forth on world conflicts and crises? A young British director turns his camera lens on the journalists sent by their employers to the Mediterranean to cover the unfolding humanitarian tragedy. When faced with immeasurable suffering, do they maintain a fundamental sensitivity or do they fall back on sensationalized treatments of human misfortune?

ORBAN  WALLACE

Versatile, award winning filmmaker, passionate about human-interest stories and creating unique concept videos. Orban is co-founder of Gallivant Film and has worked with leading brands and clients taking projects from development through to post-production. Orban’s recent feature documentary has garnered international acclaim, selected at 17 international film festivals and winning the Impact Doc Award. The film has been picked up for worldwide distribution. Orban is now working on a slate of feature doc developments and his first feature drama.

His filmography to date lists several short pictures. The documentary Copenhagen, The Musical (2001) screened at the Vancouver IFF, among others, while his 20-minute drama Aeron (2012) earned a nomination for Britain’s RTS Awards and was programmed for the Aesthetica short film fest. Shot on Super 8, the mini film Misty (2016) played the Straight 8 parallel festival during the Cannes IFF. Going forward, Wallace plans on creating feature documentaries; his feature debut ‘Another News Story’ is his first successful step in that direction, having been selected for 17 international film competitions.

CONTACT

Orban Wallace :  http://www.orbanwallace.com

Szamota,s Mistress
Adam Uryniak
Poland.  2017.  46 min

The story about Józef Szamot, a notary who arrives in an abandoned manor in Różowola. His task is to estimate the value of the property. The last owner, count Kalergis, has the opinion of freak among the locals, and different stories are told about him until today. Theophilus, former count’s butler, is in charge of the manor. Main character spends a few days in the property. In the course of his work, he encounters a portrait of a beautiful woman and an old diary of the count. Manor’s atmosphere strongly influences Szamota. The man slowly forgets about his work and is more and more devoted to discovering the secrets of Różowola. One night, a woman from the portrait comes to Szamota. They spend an intoxicating night together. In the morning, there is no trace after his lover, so the man suspects that her “visit” was just a dream, which was influenced by a large amount of consumed wine. Yet another strange events indicate that in the palace, apart from Szamota and Teofil, is also someone else. Main character decides to discover the secrets hidden in the walls of Różowola at any cost.

ADAM  URYNIAK

Adam Uryniak, a graduate of the Crakow School of Film and Audiovisual Communication, tells us about his various film productions and the latest film project – “Szamota’s Mistress” by Stefan Grabiński, and wonders about the state of horror film in Poland.

In the words of the director :  “The first video I did for fun, with friends with whom I studied film theory. We named ourselves Butcher’s Films. The initiative has grown, with each film we learned something new and eventually, most of us took up film in a professional way. In the heroic times of the Butcher’s Film, we were actors ourselves, as well as sound engineers, operators, and if necessary, even make-up artists, so we know the ins and outs of working in different dimensions, we are still supporting ourselves in a similar way. I was attracted to directing in the first place. I made a few short films, and in 2011 I directed a full-lenght film called “Zniknięcie”, based on a short story by Olga Tokarczuk.”

CONTACT

Adam Uryniak :    adam_uryniak@poczta.fm

Family
Veronica Kedar
Israel. 2017.104 min

In a perfect world, Lily would have grown up with a loving father, a caring mother, a sane sister, and a brother who wasn’t madly in love with her.… But you can’t always get what you want… and Lily finds herself in her living room, staring at four dead bodies.
Family is the perfect portrait of every family, if it’s taken in the dark.

The third feature film from writer/director/actress Veronica Kedar, Family is a dark psychological drama that follows a young woman, Lily, who goes to her therapist to confess to the crime of killing her family. Instead of meeting her therapist, she begins pouring forth her story to her daughter Talia (Baremboem), a young woman approximately the same age as Lily who suffers from her own host of problems.

VERONICA KEDAR

Veronica Kedar is an awarding winning director, screenwriter and film editor.

Her debut film “Joe + Belle” was nominated for Best Picture at the Israeli Academy Awards 2012. The film granted her the Excellence Award from the Israeli Ministry of Culture and was screened on Netflix. Veronica has directed two more feature films (‘Endtime’ & ‘Family’), two short films (‘Bunny Love’ & ‘The Woman Who Wanted To Kill Someone”) and the hit web series ‘In Tweetment’.

​Veronica is currently writing her fourth feature film.

CONTACT

Dorit Perel :    dorit@inosan.co.il

King of Peking
Sam Voutas
China / Australia.  2017.  87 min

Set in the countryside of late 1990s China, the film tells the story of a father (Jun Zhao) who goes to great lengths to scrape together the cash for alimony payments, the only way his ex will allow him to maintain custody of their son. Taking advantage of the absurd comedy that tragedy can produce, the father turns to bootlegging the films of the theatre he plunges toilets in. With the help of his kid, the projectionist, turned janitor, turned counterfeiter, give cheap flicks to their community, which they devour intently.

The film sets the stage with the opening of a burgundy velvet curtain, uses the omniscient narrator voice, and includes chapters, splitting each section into delectable bites. The soundtrack, extracted from classic Hollywood flicks, gives magnificence to the humble landscape, and the color palette has a lush quality that matches the magic of cinematic projected light. The humor is relatable, and has an ease and style the likes of which can be seen in Bottle Rocket, while the relationship between father and son recalls the marvelous con artists of Paper Moon.

An homage not only to film, and film aficionados, King of Peking is also a tribute to those silly little moments in life that make it worth remembering. It speaks to the act of creation, cause and effect, choice and consequence. This is a wonderful tale showing what perseverance, love, and a lil’ ghetto rigging can do.

SAM  VOUTAS

Sam Voutas is an Australian actor and independent filmmaker. He is best known for writing and directing Red Light Revolution, China’s “first sex shop comedy” which was nominated for Best Unproduced Screenplay at the 2008 Australian Inside Film Awards, showcased at The Santa Barbara International Film Festival and won the audience award at The Terracotta Far East Film Festival. Voutas played Durdin in Lu Chuan’s acclaimed City of Life and Death, a Chinese film about The Rape of Nanjing. The film won Best Director (Lu Chuan) and Best Cinematographer (Cao Yu) Awards at the 4th Asian Film Awards in 2010. Voutas wrote and directed the documentary The Last Breadbox, featuring Beijing taxi drivers in the run-up to the 2008 Olympic Games.

Red Light Revolution was originally written in English, translated into Chinese, then that version was re-translated to reflect the Beijing slang hua. It was released in China on Tudou in 2011, with producer Melanie Ansley commenting that “We wanted to make a film that might have challenged censors, and if that was the case we were shutting ourselves off from television and cinema. I think the internet offers a place for stuff that takes a little more risk.” It won the People’s Choice Award at the Singapore International Film Festival’s Silver Screen Awards in 2011.

Voutas has spoken in interviews  about film censorship in China, saying “I’d love to keep making movies [in China], my dilemma is whether a script can be passed by the censors without having its wings clipped. My fear is that increasingly censors are the directors of films, and that directors and producers, fearing cuts, then self-censor themselves from the get-go. That’s an environment that isn’t too conducive to creativity in general. So perhaps my next film will be about censors themselves and the final cut will run exactly zero seconds long.”

CONTACT

Sam Voutas :    info@pekingpictures.com

Highway 318
Yunxing Nie
China. 2017. 96 min

More than 5,000 kilometres long, highway 318 connects China with Tibet and is one of the world’s most picturesque routes. It is where Xiaojia, who is Chinese, meets Suona from Tibet one day. Each of them set off on a long journey for a different reason, but they have one thing in common: they both believe it will help them atone for mistakes from the past. Dealing with loneliness, fears and qualms of conscience, they want to find solace. Their tough journey together across endless valleys and snowy mountains will bring them closer to each other, becoming a deep inner journey and a meditation on life. Harsh, mysterious and breath-taking, highway 318 can become a road to redemption.

YUNXING  NIE

Nie Yunxing, 46years old, graduated from Beijing Film Academy and majored in cinematography.

He works as the photographer of Film Dongjiadu, Jiulixiang, Wudaguan and Xuan Zang, and
the producer and photographer of Film Letters To Hometown, Ancient Tea Route and Tibet on the  clouds.

He establishes the company named Wind Whisper Culture Communication Co.ltd in 2013.

Highway 318 is the first film production he directs and the film wins the Special Mention reward
in Free Spirit Competition Unit in 33rd Warsaw Film Festival.

CONTACT

Incomplete :    18099515@qq.com

The Cousin
Tzahi Grad
Israel.2017. 92 min

Tzahi Grad stars as Naftali, a local media presence in an Israeli village, whose belief in more open dialogue between Jews and Arabs is the foundation of a reality TV project he’s pitching. Needing renovations done on a crumbling studio on the grounds of his family home, he arranges to hire a Palestinian Muslim recommended by his gardener. The worker who climbs aboard his car at the designated pickup point is not the man with whom Naftali spoke, but claims to be his equally skilled brother, Fahed (Ala Dakka). While he’s mildly suspicious about the switch, Naftali takes him back to begin the job anyway.

It’s often said in relation to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict that Jews and Arabs are both descended from Abraham, giving them shared genetic roots. That belief supplies the title of The Cousin, Israeli actor-writer-director Tzahi Grad’s message-driven seriocomedy about good intentions that get severely tested when a crime is committed and fingers point automatically to a Palestinian laborer.

TZAHI  GRAD

Tzahi Grad was born in 1962 in Jerusalem, Israel. He is an acclaimed actor, director and writer, known for Big bad wolves (2013), Girafot (2001) and Mal gesto (2006). Was nominated for many awards in Israel for his directing, as well as acting and writing. Won an Israeli Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor in Mishehu Larutz Ito (2006). His latest film and third feature as a director is The Cousin (2017). He graduated “Nissan Nativ” Acting Studio. Participated in many plays, films and television series. Also directed a few plays for theater (fringe).

CONTACT

Nick Donnermeyer :   nick@bleibergent.com

Rukh
Atanu Mukherjee
India. 2017.  106 min

After the sudden death of his father Diwakar Mathur (Manoj Bajpayee), young Dhruv comes back from boarding school to be with his mother Nandini (Smita Tambe). As days go by, he begins to suspect that his father’s death is probably not an accident but a murder.

As far as thrillers go, ‘Rukh’ is a one-of-a kind Hindi film. It does not travel at a breakneck speed as most thrillers do, but the timing is not slow either. The film moves at a perfectly natural pace. At its heart, ‘Rukh’ is a coming-of-age film. In the beginning we see Dhruv, an aggressive young boy whose life changes when he is sent to a boarding for assaulting his schoolmate. But as another tragedy strikes, with the passing of his father in a violent road accident, Dhruv has to make certain choices which will affect how his life shapes up. Does he give in to anger and spiral out? Or does he look at things for what they truly are?

First time filmmaker Atanu Mukherjee seems to have been inspired by Akira Kurosawa’s ‘Rashomon’. He uses a similar plot device as the classic, where Dhruv gets to know about the last days of his father’s life from the point of view of several characters that have a stake in the proceedings. And the ploy doesn’t seem wasted or gimmicky either, because you get to the truth along with the protagonist.

ATANU  MUKHERJEE

Mukherjee, a graduate in editing from the Satyajit Ray Film and Television Institute, came to Mumbai from Kolkata in 2009 and began assisting film editors Namrata Rao and Suresh Pai. In between, Mukherjee made a few documentaries and short films, including My House Is Not So Far (2010) produced by the Public Service Broadcasting Trust, and Stray Dogs (2013). He also edited feature films such as Amit Kumar’s Monsoon Shootout (2014) and Amitabha Singh’s Shortcut Safaari (2014). In an interview, Mukherjee spoke about his foray into filmmaking, his inspiration for Rukh and the process of bringing it from script to screen.

CONTACT

Drishyam Films :    ritika@drishyamfilms.com

Blockage
Mohsen Gharaei
Iran.2017. 82 min

As an enforcement official, Qassem has to combat illegal street hawking in Tehran, but he mainly uses his position to extort money from traders. Now that his boss has noticed and announced his sacking, Qassem has to look for an alternative source of income.
He knows there’s a lot of money in recycling, so he wants to buy a truck using his father-in-law’s bequest as a down-payment. His wife wants to spend the money on a house, so they won’t have to bother her sister’s family any more, but behind her back, Qassem presses on with his risky plan.

In this solo directing debut by Mohsen Gharaei, corruption and hypocrisy set the tone. “Don’t tell anyone I said that” is a regular incantation. The nerve-racking plot development is largely due to Qassem’s impulsive and hot-headed character. He’s certainly not the only one who has trouble doing the right thing – even when no one happens to be watching.

MOHSEN  GHARAEI

Mohsen GHARAEI (1984, Iran) is a graduate of Mining Engineering. In 2006, he started his film career as an assistant director, working with prestigious Iranian filmmakers such as Bahram Bayzai, Reza Mirkarimi, Majid Majidi and Mohsen Abdolvahab. Next to directing, he has worked on casting, editing and line production for various film projects. Gharaei co-directed his first feature film Don’t Be Tired! (2013) with Afshin Hashemi. Gharaei’s first independently directed feature Blockage (2017) won the award for Best Film in the New Currents section of the Busan International Film Festival.

CONTACT

Mohammed Atebbai :    info@iranianindependents.com