THE LAST EMBRACE

29 minutes, 2015
Director: Sergi PITARCH GARRIDO (Spain)
Production: Ambra Projectes Culturals (Spain)

A true story: a few years ago I bought a handbag in a local auction in Valencia. It cost me a euro.
When I got it home, I found a several documents inside the bag.
Among them, two letters dated 1946. Letters never sent.
The author announced his imminent suicide, because of the negative effects of the war, of prison and the loss of his family.

Sergi PITARCH GARRIDO was born in Valencia, Spain, in 1976.
He completed studies in journalism and film training in creative documentaries. For 10 years, from 2004 to 2014, he worked as scriptwriter on several Spanish TV shows. In 2007 he began working for RTVV, Valencia’s public television. From 2010 to 2013 he made the documentary series “De temporada” about agriculture and the world of small-holding farmers.

REBELLE DE RAQQA

23 minutes, 2015
Direction : Claire BILLET (France) and Lyana SALEH (France)
Production : France 24 (France)


“Rebelle de Raqqa” is about Haya El Ali, alias Rezane, a 26 year old Syrian activist fighting the current regime. She received death threats for recording images of Raqqa being seized first by the Free Syrian Army, then by the Organization of Islamic States, so in September 2014 she fled to France. The images she filmed clandestinely in Syria have been around the world. Exclusively, France 24 followed her. She talks about loneliness and exile, her daily life in Paris where she has found refuge at the Maison des Journalistes.

Born in 1981, Claire BILLET is a journalist. She made her first magazine documentary for Arte in Afghanistan ten years ago. Fascinated by the region, she moved there and lived for a year in Pakistan then for five in Afghanistan, as correspondent. She was France 24’s first Afghanistan Bureau Chief. As a director, she records the consequences of the on-going conflicts with pen and camera.

Lyana SALEH is a Franco-Palestinian journalist.
She has been working for 10 years in radio, television and film, and has also worked as production co-ordinator on many radio shows, particularly for Monte Carlo Doualiya, part of France Médias Monde. She joined France 24 in 2009. She has made numerous reports in Libya, Palestine, Israel and Jordan. In 2007, Lyana Saleh took part in the Media Film Development programme in Morocco. She has been a jury member of the INPUT television conference in Berlin and Warsaw but also of many film festivals in Italy, Spain and Iraq.

NODAS. LAUNEDDAS AL TEMPO DELLA CRISI

29 minutes, 2015
Réalisation : Umberto CAO (Italie) et Andrea MURA (Italie)
Production : Associazione Culturale Iscandula (Italie)

Dating back 3,000 years to the Nuragic civilization, the launeddas is a woodwind instrument played in Sardinia.
Interest in launeddas fell away in the 1960’s and 70’s, but has grown recently with the internet giving the instrument a new lease of life.
The documentary “Nodas. Launeddas al tempo della crisi” shows five of the new generation’s best launeddas players and, through them looks at the differences between folklore and ethnicity, tradition and experimentation, local identity and globalization. We also discover the living conditions of a whole generation of Sardinians as they learn to cope with the socio-economic crisis.

Umberto CAO is an anthropologist. With a master’s in medical anthropology from the Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales in Paris, he became interested in the social inequalities experienced by indigenous peoples in many parts of the world, particularly Greenland and Quebec.
During the last three years he has been co-ordinating international co-operation for disabled people at the University of Bologna. He currently works in visual anthropology, particularly street art and documentary films.

Andrea MURA is a film-maker. After studying philosophy, he began to teach himself about documentary film, working at the University of Cagliari (Sardinia) and taking part in several workshops run by directors such as David MacDougall and Giuseppe Ferrara. In 2012 he obtained a degree in cinema documentary and docu-drama at Palermo’s Centro Sperimentale di Cinematografia. Since then he has been working as a director, cameraman and editor.

ALGÉRIE LA BATAILLE DE L’AVENIR

28 minutes, 2015
Réalisation : Nasser BAKHTI (Algeria, Swiss)
Production : Troubadour Films (Swiss)

Even after so many years of war, the Algerian people’s thirst for freedom is still intact. Many injustices are still present. The findings are staggering for this giant of Africa: 70% of young people are blighted by unemployment.
Algerian youth are getting ready for something, in this country so different from its North African neighbours. The disputed re-election of their sick president, Abdelaziz Bouteflika, for a fourth mandate, in April 2014, seems a new barrier to the desire for change rumbling among the population.

Nasser BAKHTI is a producer/director with 23 years experience, extensive knowledge and valuable skills for every stage of the film production process, from creation to distribution. He has produced and directed high level films for broadcasters such as Radio Télévision Suisse RTS, ARTE, Channel 4, TV5 Monde, Yle TV, the History Channel, Cuisine TV and Radio Canada. He has also directed and produced several long documentaries and drama films, at the same time supporting and producing other film-makers by providing them with resources and supervision to help them realize their projects and put them into images.

SPEED SISTER

79 minutes, 2015
Director: Amber FARES (Canada)
Production Company: SocDoc Studios LLC (United States)

Desperate for the rush of adrenaline and throb of multi-cylinders, five Palestinian women decided to compete in male-dominated car races. They are Betty, Marah, Mona, and Rhana Noor, between 22 and 32 years, and in Palestine they are known as the Speed Sisters. The first women to compete in car racing, they challenge men on the circuit trying to become the Fastest Palestinian Woman and prove to the world that a woman is equal to man.

 
Amber FARES is a Canadian film-maker with Lebanese roots.
After 9/11 she abandoned her career in marketing to deepen her knowledge of life in the Middle East. Then she co-founded the production company SocDoc Studios to make films exploring social issues.
Her first film as director “Ghetto Town” (2009), has been shown at several festivals. “Speed Sisters” is her first long documentary.

Patience, patience t’iras au paradis !

85 minutes, 2015
Director: Hadja LAHBIB (Belgium)
Production Company: Les Passeurs de Lumière, Clair-obscur Productions, RTBF, Arte (Belgium)

 

In the 1960’s, thousands of North Africans came to work in Belgium. Among them, women who had left everything behind to follow a man to an unknown land.
“Patience, patience, t’iras au paradis!” is the catch-phrase repeated a thousand times to help these women put up with their lives without complaint.
50 years later, the taste for emancipation is taking over. They are incredibly happy, capable of deeply uninhibited self-mockery. This film accompanies them in their many discoveries, by the simplicity of their ballads, the warmth of their femininity and humour.

Hadja LAHBIB
Journalist, film-maker and presenter, Hadja LAHBIB is known to the general public as one of the faces of RTBF. She presents RTBF’s TV news as well as two cultural programmes on Arte Belgique. For many years she has travelled the world, now she focuses on culture and directing.
“Patience, patience, t’iras au paradis!” is her third documentary, after “Afghanistan. Le choix des femmes” (2007) and “Le cou et la tête” (2008).

JE SUIS LE PEUPLE

111 minutes, 2014
Director: Anna ROUSSILLON (France)
Production Company: hautlesmains productions, Narratio Films (France)

In January 2011 Egypt’s anti-government protests gather tens of thousands in Tahrir Square and the streets of Cairo, while villagers in the southerly rural areas follow the events on their TV screens and newspapers. From Mubarak’s overthrow to the election of Mohamed Morsi, the film follows these political changes from the perspective of a village in the Luxor Valley. Between hopes and disappointments, change is overdue.

Anna ROUSSILLON was born in Beirut in 1980 and grew up in Cairo, before going to live in France. She teaches Arabic in Lyon, translates literary texts and takes part in radio broadcasts, while working on several film projects linked to Egypt. “Je suis le peuple” is her first long film.

IN THE SHADOW OF WAR

80 minutes, 2014
Director: Sophia et Georgia SCOTT (United Kingdom)
Production Company: GroundTruth Production (United Kingdom), Dartmouth Films (United Kingdom), UpperGate Entertainment (United States)

“In the Shadow of War” is a journey through the hopes, dreams and fears of a new generation living with the effects of a war which ended before most of them were born. The film shows the energetic spirit of Bosnia and Herzegovina, but also the legacy of a brutal conflict.

After a year at the European Film College in Denmark, Sophia SCOTT received her documentary film diploma at the Newport Film School of the University of Wales. She then spent six years in Nairobi and worked as a documentary director and producer for PBS and the BBC, amongst others.

After a diploma at the University of Arts in London, Georgia SCOTT made her first documentary with her sister Sophia “Karibuni Lamu”, shot in Kenya.

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THE GROCER

52 minutes, 2013
Director: Dimitris KOUTSIABASAKOS (Greece)
Production Company: KinoLab (Greece)

Since 1980, Nikos Anastasiou, a Greek travelling grocer, has been working the same route.
Once a week, accompanied by his wife Sophia, he leaves Trikala to go up into the abandoned villages in the Pindos Mountains, northern Greece, a route of 75 km by car.
In recent years, their two sons, Kostas and Thimios, help.
The documentary follows their journey during the four seasons of the year.

Dimitris Koutsiabasakos was born in 1967. He studied film and television directing at Moscow’s National Film Institute V.G.I.K.
He has made several documentaries, series, short and longer films.
Among his recent films: “Hercules, Acheloos and My Granny” (1997 30-minute documentary), “Hill 33” (1998 43 minutes), “The Guardian’s Son” (2006 98 minutes), “The Grocer” (2013 documentary 81 and 52 minutes) and “Becoming an actor” (2014 61-minute documentary).

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THE DREAM OF SHARAZAD

107 minutes, 2014
Director: François VERSTER (South Africa)
Production Company: Undercurrent Film & Television (South Africa), Fireworx Media (South Africa), Middlewest Films (Egypt), Melia Films (France)

“The Dream of Shahrazad” is a documentary showing recent political events in North Africa and the Middle East through the wider historical and cultural heritage of the famous collection of stories The Arabian Nights.
Using the metaphor of Shahrazad or Scheherazade – the princess who saves lives by telling stories at night – and filmed before, during and after the Arab Spring, the documentary weaves a canvas of music, politics and storytelling to explore ways through which creativity and political commitment can oppose oppression.
A series of characters drawing their inspiration from the Arabian Nights and putting their creativity at the service of political use – like Shahrazad.

François VERSTER
D’origine sud-africaine, François VERSTER est écrivain, musicien et cinéaste.
Il a travaillé pour l’industrie du cinéma de New York et du Royaume-Uni.
Ses films se caractérisent par des approches créatives et d’observation à des questions sociales : “Sea Point Days” (2009), “The mothers’ house” (2006), “A lion’s trail” (2002) et “When the war is over” (2002), entre autres. Il enseigne le cinéma documentaire dans plusieurs universités.