Shambala
Artykpay Suyundukov
Kyrgystan. 2020. 85 min

Based on the story “White Ship” by Chingiz Aytmatov
On a forest cordon, lost high in the mountains, an old man with an old woman and an old man’s daughter with a husband live with a patriarchal way of life. It is a peculiar model of society-four adults and the fifth is the seven year old grandson of an old man, named Shambala.
In the Kyrgyz language “sham” means “candle”, and “bala” means “a boy”, “a child”. That is, literally “boy candle” or “a boy emitting glow”.
Shambala firmly believes into the ancient fairy tale – the myth about Mother Deer, who saved the last baby of their kinship from its enemies and fed it with her milk.
Despite the fact that over time people have killed Deer, the boy believes and looking forward that someday deer will still return to their edges.
The plot of the film is based on the tragedy occurred from an ancient myth about the Doe, which saved little boy from death and fed her own milk to him to helped him survive.
It is a distinctive parable about crime and punishment. It is a warning, pantheistic feeling of the wildlife, which is perceptible in each tree and each animal.

ARTYKPAY SUYUNDUKOV

Artykpay Suyundukov was born in 1947 in Kyrgyz Republic. In 1978 he graduated All-Union State Institute of Cinematography (VGIK). After graduation, he worked on the position of film director in the Kyrgyzfilm Film Studio. He had made three feature films and about 15 documentaries. Since 2000, he is a faculty member in the university.

Filmography :

1992  “Mourner”

1987  “The roads met”

1978  “Among people” 

1978-2018 over 15 documentary films

POSTER

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CONTACT

filmshambala@gmail.com

Blindfold
Taras Dron
Ukraine. 2020. 105 min

The war in Eastern Ukraine has ended, and the country is trying to return to regular life. So is Yulia, a 25-year-old professional MMA fighter. She has been waiting a long time for her fiancé Denys to return from the war. He is now presumed dead. Yulia is dealing with the trauma from the loss of her boyfriend. She also feels pressured by the people around her to keep living in endless mourning “for the war hero”. She is young and wants to open a new chapter in her life. She wants to escape from everything old and familiar. That is when Denys’s mother receives a dubious text message saying that her son was found alive and urgently needs money for a surgery that will save his life. They have one night to find the money. Yulia has to decide what she believes and what she really needs.

TARAS DRON

Ukrainian film director, producer and screenwriter, born in 1980. He studied information security at the Faculty of Automatics of the Lviv Polytechnic National University and film directing at the Lodz Film School. Founder and owner of a film and video production studio and equipment rental, Nord Production. He has worked as a film director, music video director and commercials director in Ukraine, France and Poland. “Blindfold” is his second feature film.

Director’s filmography

2020 Blindfold
2018 DZIDZIO. First time
2016 Black Mountain (short)
2015 Ostap (short doc)
2013 Touch and see (short)

POSTER

CONTACT

v.sochyvets@cuc.com.ua

The Scapegoat
Tathagata Ghosh
India. 2020. 25 min

A woman in rural Bengal has to stand up against the deep rooted patriarchy and hate politics to prevent the bigots from causing more atrocities.

TATHAGATA GHOSH

 A Berlinale Talents 2021 alumni, Tathagata has always believed in telling stories of people from different social backgrounds. People who do not have a voice of their own. He completed his B.Sc in Mass Communication and Videography from St. Xavier’s College, Kolkata and then his post-graduation from Vancouver Film School in Writing for Film and Television.

Tathagata has written for various leading web film magazines as well about cinema and film making. His Bengali detective novel “Senilar Sonket” got published in the 40th Kolkata International Book Fair in February 2016. He has also directed numerous commercials, music videos and written screenplays for several projects.

His last short films “Miss Man” and “Doitto”(The Demon) have travelled to numerous prestigious international film festivals like BFI Flare, Out on Film, Coalition of South Asian Film Festivals (CoSAFF), Tallgrass Film Festival, Cheries-Cheris, Wicked Queer, International Documentary and Short Film Festival of Kerala to name a few and have won several awards. “The Demon” is currently streaming on Disney+Hotstar and Cinemapreneur and “Mangsho”(The Meat) is streaming on MovieSaints.

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PRESS ARTICLE

PRESS ARTICLE

POSTER

CONTACT

tathagata314@gmail.com

Life Among War Flags
Mohsen Eslamzadeh
Iran. 2020. 75 min

Life Among War Flags is the narration of war from two perspectives. At the beginning of documentary, the camera accompanies the army into regions under control of government; and then it narrates the war from the interior view of the Taliban.

 ISIS members from Turkey, Indonesia, Uzbekistan and some European countries who were interviewed in the Taliban’s secret prisons, provides another fascinating chapter of the documentary. When the war between Taliban and ISIS in Darzab (the most southwestern district of Jowzjan Province), finally ended after 58 days of conflicts with victory by the Taliban, he was able to enter to the sectors liberated from ISIS domination.

MOHSEN ESLAMZADEH

Mohsen Eslamzadeh the Iranian documentarist was born in 1980. He has lot of activities around art issues during more than 12 years. Eslamzadeh started documentary filmmaking in Sistan and Baluchestan of Iran and he could direct documentaries in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Libya, Syria, Iraq, Lebanon and Venezuela. His distinguished documentaries are “The Sunnies of Iran”, “Mothers of the Revolution“, “Mysteries of Abu-Salim Prison”, “In the name of Liberty” and “Looking for Peace“. He participated in few film festivals such as: “Fajr”, “Cinema Verity” and “Rooyesh” in Iran, “Aljazeera” in Qatar and “Human Rights” in Spain and he awarded in some of them. In 2015 Eslamzadeh injured during documenting a film about Takrit in Iraq; but he came back to directing after a while. “Alone among the Taliban” is the last film of Eslamzadeh, that it was a unique experience as he could attend among the Taliban of Afghanistan.

DIRECTOR,S NOTE

2 years after making my documentary “Alone Among Taliban” I decide to travel to Afghanistan once again. It took 2 months during the summer 2018 to make my latest documentary, “Life, Among War Flags ”.

The documentary has been filmed in a very difficult security circumstance. The lives of both me as the filmmaker and cameraman were at risk of being killed by either the Taliban or the Afghan army, if not by American drones. In the final segment, during which I decide to go to Taliban’s secret prisons to interview ISIS members, I accept those risks. Indeed, some months later US commandos would invade these prisons and kill many of the Taliban at the scene.

POSTER

CONTACT

ALIREZA SHAHROKI ; 7thart.ifd@gmail.com

Charcoal
Esmaeel Monsef
Iran. 2019. 90 min

In rural northwest Iran, Gheirat, a modest charcoal producer, is pushed into a tragic spiral after his son, sentenced to jail, evades to Azerbaijan.

The story is set in a village in Azerbaijan, focusing on a family deep into some financial crisis. Yashar, son of the family is on parole for her sister’s wedding.

ESMAEEL MONSEF

Born in 1976 in Ardebil, Esmaeel Monsef studied cinema. He has directed three short films: Oyan (2010), Under the Colors (2012), Tears (2015) which were presented at Clermont Ferrand France, Teluride USA, Leeds England, Winterthur Switzerland Film Festival. As an editor he has worked on feature films such as, A Minor Leap Down, Without Borders and also documentaries such as I Want to be a King, Wining, The Rock and Slowness.

POSTER

CONTACT

Caracteres Productions : etienne@caracteresproductions.com