International competition | The journey

#MYESCAPE
Regia | Director Elke Sasse
Fotografia | Photography Fariba Nilchian, Oliver Gurr, Marcel Schmitz, Frank Lehmann, Jean Schablin
Montaggio | Editing Janine Dauterich
Produzione | Production Berlin producers film GmbH & Co. KG
Germania, 2016, 90’, arabo e inglese con sot- totitoli in inglese e italiano | Arabic and English with Italian and English subtitles

The documentary film #MYESCAPE assesses the journey that refugees from Afghanistan, Syria and Eritrea chose to undergo, as the circumstances in their home-countries became increasingly unliveable. Hundreds of thousands are leaving their countries, families and old lives behind, in search of some basic safety and freedom. In most cases, the mobile phone became a quintessential tool to facilitate the organisation of ones escape and the constant companion. This has lead many to document their experiences. The director chose to use footage which has been shot by the refugees themselves in order to show first hand accounts through their own eyes and lenses. The camera was there with them as bombs hit their streets and houses were crushed to rubble, as they risked their lives to pass borders by feet, boats, trains or cars. Their memories provide an unique form of narration that allows us a very personal glimpse into their lives before, during and after their escape. It leaves us with a realistic impression.

Trailer
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A WALNUT TREE
Regia | Director Ammar Aziz
Fotografia | Photography Danyal Rasheed
Montaggio | Editing Khushboo Agarwal
Pakistan, 2015, 81’, pashtu e urdu con sottoti- toli in inglese e italiano | Pashto e Urdu with English and Italian subtitles

An old man feels nostalgic for a distant homeland. He wants to return. Internally displaced as a result of the ongoing conflict between Pakistan’s military and the Taliban, he is forced to live in a camp. His family is caught between memories of what life was, an insecure present and a bleak future. Time and again, the question arises as to whether he’ll risk a return to his motherland.

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ARABIC MOVIE
Regia | Director Eyal Sagui Bezawie, Sara Tsifroni
Fotografia | Photography Sara Tsifroni
Montaggio | Editing Avigail Spherber
Produzione | Production Trabelsi Productions
Israele, 2015, 62’, Ebreo, arabo, inglese con sottotitoli in inglese e italiano | Hebrew, Arabic, English with Italian subtitles

When Egypt was Israel’s biggest enemy, an Egyptian film was screened weekly on the Israeli TV quickly becoming a ritual which people are still nostalgic about. Nobody ever wonder why Israeli TV insisted on showing movies made by “the enemy” and how they arrived to the Israeli TV. Though these films let us catch a glimpse at our neighbours across the border, most of us didn’t really want to see those people. “Arabic Movie” brings us to a fleeting moment, when we shared the same cultural heroes as everyone else in the Middle East.
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ASMARINA
Regia | Director Alan Maglio, Medhin Paolos
Fotografia | Photography Federico Giammattei, Alan Maglio
Montaggio | Editing Walter Marocchi
Produzione | Production Alan Maglio e Medhin Paolos
Italia, 2015, 68’ italiano con sottotitoli in inglese | Italian with English subtitles

There has been an Eritrean/Ethiopian community in Italy for at least half a century, integrated into the urban fabric in a socially and culturally active way. Starting from the photographic and audio-visual material present in institutional and private archives which form the collective memory of the community. Through direct accounts, the film brings together the heritage of personal stories and investigates the nuances of identity and migration. The result is a choral narration which brings to light a postcolonial heritage, scarcely investigated until today: from the stories of daily life of those who have been living in the city for years, of those who were born there, to the reception of the newly arrived refugees.

Trailer
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CHERRY DAYS
Regia | Director Mohamad and Ahmad Malas
Fotografia | Photography Youessf Saif-Jawdat
Montaggio | Editing Aamen Alarand
Produzione | Production Ministère des Affaires Etrangères, République Française, Syria Charity
Siria, 2016, 74’, arabo, inglese e francese con sottotitoli in italiano | Arabic, English and French with Italian subtitles

In a small town in Aleppo’s suburbs, continual bombings lasted for more than two years. During the very hot summer of July 2014, the most followed sports event in the world took place: the FIFA world cup. The city lies in ruins, its women and children having all left long ago, and a group of young men still tries to live day after day. This documentary shows the everyday life of the young Syrians today, and listens to what they have to say. Sports, poetry, dance and dreams are everywhere alongside bombings, tears and weapons. Discussing soccer and politics, criticizing the regime and the jihadis alike, it is at often surprising to realise how vulnerable they actually are. Their insight reveals a complex reality of a still hopeful youth, enduring beyond the morbid images of the bloodiest war of our century.
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The film tells the story of Erminando, photographer and professor of fashion photography in a Milan academy, and raised in Brescia where he studied until graduation. In April 2014, after more than 20 years after his arrival in Italy, he decided to return to his Albania. Finding himself in places and with people of his childhood he remembers the feelings and the experience of that November night when, thanks to the courageous decision of his mother, his life radically changed.
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ET NOUS JETTERONS LA MER DERRIÈRE VOUS
Regia | Director Anouck Mangeat, Clément Juillard, Noémi Aubry, Jeanne Gomas
Fotografia | Photography Anouck Mangeat, Clément Juillard, Noémi Aubry, Jeanne Gomas
Montaggio | Editing Anouck Mangeat, Clément Juillard, Noémi Aubry, Jeanne Gomas
Produzione | Production Ozho Naayé
Francia 2016, 72’, francese, inglese, turco, greco, farsi, arabo con sottotitoli in inglese e italiano | French, English, Turkish, Greek, Farsi, Arabic with English and Italian subtitles

In most Middle Eastern and Central Asian countries, water is thrown onto the steps of one who is leaving the house to ensure that they return in good health. Et Nous Jetterons la Mer Derrière Vous represents a breakaway to the West, dives into a narrative crossroad: Aziz, Sidiqi, Housine, and Younes bring us into their journeys from Afghan or Moroccan homes to the chaos of a Greece in crisis and the streets of Istanbul. Between the lines, we can read their dreams and the hopes they carry with them. We travel with them through the stopping-off cities and frontier zones, these places themselves as large as countries. This is the story of a Europe and its realities, its laws and policies. This is a story of exile. We call them migrants (kaçak, metanastes); but above all, they are women and men on the path of their lives. These paths are just beginning, and perhaps they will not ever find an end.

Extract
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ITALIANI D’ERITREA
Regia | Director Giampaolo Montesanto
Fotografia | Photography Giampaolo Montesanto
Montaggio | Editing Giampaolo Montesanto
Produzione | Production Giampaolo Montesanto
Italia, 2015, 69’, italiano con sottotitoli in inglese |Italian with English subtitles

After the loss of the Eritrean colony in 1941, many Italians returned to Italy. Others remained in that other homeland, Eritrea, where they settled chasing the dream of a better life. Committed to rebuilding a country destroyed by both bombs and fascism, Italy’s government supported the thousands of compatriots who continued to live and thrive in East Africa at least until the ‘70s when Colonel Mengistu Hailemariam’s regime forced them in a hasty return home. Some, however, remained – as they still do today – to witness with their lives and their stories a piece of the Italian history that perhaps was too quickly closed. It remains an Italy within Eritrea. It even has its own capital: Asmara, with its cafes still named ‘Moderno’, ‘Vittoria’, with nightclubs like the ‘Mocambo’ still echoing the Alberto Sordi and Anna Magnani variety shows, and with the Cinema Roma or the Cinema Impero belonging to Renato Carosone.
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LA MIA CASA E I MIEI COINQUILINI
Regia | Director Marcella Piccinini
Fotografia | Photography Raoul Torresi, Gigi Martinucci, Marcella Piccinini, Marcello Dapporto
Montaggio | Editing Paolo Marzoni, Marcella Piccinini
Produzione | Production Marcella Piccinini
Italia, 2016, 57’, italiano con sottotitoli in inglese |Italian with English subtitles

When interviewing Joyce Lussu in 1994, Marco Bellocchio discusses her attitude towards a life seemingly devoid of dreams and illusions yet remaining very active – ultimately asking Joyce how it is possible to continually transmit the extraordinary things she has experienced. The interview covers minor and major details of Joyce’s life: from the straw purse that has hung on her bedroom doorway for years, to the cuckoo clock, the rocking chair, the beautiful colourful combs propped near the mirror, to the Sardinian carpets and flowers that her mother Julia always keeps on the table. Such details reveal how Joyce’s home in Fermo (near Marche) is a house that breathes an often-dramatic life, rich in poetry. The interview also discusses the Joyce’s exile period with her husband Emilio in Paris, the women’s struggles in Sardinia, and the translation of poets who wrote “useful poetry” that is able to immediately reach other realities and feelings with few words. But Joyce’s journeys are not made of words: instead they are composed of many stages from an active participation in a common struggle and a dream to realise a world undefined by gender distinctions. A dream for a fairer and more peaceful humanity.
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LES TOURS D’AILLEURS
Regia | Director Anatoly Stolnikoff
Fotografia | Photography Kinga Bardos Feltoronyi
Montaggio | Editing Lenny Guit et Sami Cuzin
Produzione | Production Groupe Arpad
Belgio, 2015, 30’, francese con sottotitoli in italiano |French with Italian subtitles

Written, directed and produced by Kinga and Anatoly Stolnikoff this film chronicles their artistic journey, their meetings and the transmission of this experience to their young son Sacha. The first beat of his heart and his birth are followed by an archetypal spiral traced on a potter’s wheel, which will lead us to the practices of ceramic, painting and sculpture, dance and music, as a celebration of the present. Connections and resonances with other civilizations feed their creations through sign and word, hand and tool, body and sound. This research in the “elsewheres” of the world is the main theme of the film, fragile choice but a magical one when it results in works that provide the emotion of talent and gift. The child is involved in all of these steps and reminds us of the authentic values of play and discover, between innocence and knowledge, expressing the freedom of telling.
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LUOGHI COMUNI
Regia | Director Angelo Loy
Fotografia | Photography Angelo Loy
Montaggio | Editing Angelo Loy, Desideria Rayner
Produzione | Production Asinita Spot.q tv
Italia, 2015, 75’ italiano e arabo con sottotitoli in italiano | Italian and Arabic with Italian subtitles

Having lived in Italy for 18 years, Mona dreams of returning to Egypt. Her two sons, both born in Italy, love Egypt but they never would leave. Her husband Ahmed hates Egypt yet does not like Italy. As Ahmed manages this predicament with Mona, along with the many puzzles it presents, he faces further vicissitudes such as eviction and climbing employment path, till a result representing a symbolic return to Egypt where Mona left a brother who she has been mother to, and where she placed the hope of an adult life.

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MY ENEMY, MY BROTHER
Regia | Director Ann Shin
Fotografia | Photography Brendan Uegama
Montaggio | Editing Steve Guise
Produzione | Production Nyt Opdocs & Fathom Film Group / Melanie Horkan
Canada, 2015, 17’ inglese con sottotitoli in inglese e italiano | English with Italian and English subtitles

Zahed and Najah are two former enemies from the Iran-Iraq War who become blood brothers for life. 25 years after one saves the other’s life on the battlefield, they meet again by sheer chance in Canada. Considering the recent coverage of the Middle East this emotional documentary story of Najah and Zahed is a surprising affirmation of humanity that cuts across political borders.

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NEMICO DELL’ISLAM? UN INCONTRO CON NOURI BOUZID
Regia | Director Stefano Grossi
Fotografia | Photography Felice D’Agostino, Arturo Lavorato
Montaggio | Editing Luca Mandrile
Produzione | Production Own Air Srl
Italia/Tunisia, 2015, 72’ italiano, francese, ara- bo con sottotitoli in inglese e italiano | Italian, French and Arabic with Italian and English subtitles

Why did Tunisia, the country of dates, of tourist resorts and mass tourism, turn overnight into a powder keg, produce the first of the so-called “Arab Spring” and today, after the Revolution of 2010- 2011, become the country that provides more volunteers to Isis militias? Here is the idea of this film: a trip, even a road movie, between the images produced by a culture and within that culture, to understand the roots of a crisis that the cinema by Nouri Bouzid has said for twenty years.

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SOUTHEAST ASIAN CINEMA. WHEN THE ROOSTER CROWS
Regia | Director Leonardo Cinieri Lombroso
Fotografia | Photography Leonardo Cinieri Lombroso, Roszali Bin Samad, Ian Marasigan
Montaggio | Editing Valeria Biclungo
Produzione | Production Blue film
Italia-Singapore, 2014, 80’ inglese, tagalog, indonesiano e thai con sottotitoli in inglese e italiano | English, Tagalog, Indonesian and Thai with English and Italian subtitles

“Southeast Asian Cinema. When the Rooster Crows” is a voice of diversity reaching for change. Brillante Mendoza, Eric Khoo, Garin Nugroho, Pen Ek Ratanaruang give voice to a region rich with traditions, ethnic groups, languages, politics, and religions. It is cinema, at its purest form, fighting for freedom of expression, documenting real lives of ordinary people, giving voice to the underdogs and the outcasts. The amalgamation of these aspects gives birth to an ultra-neo-realistic cinema language currently unique to films from this region.
Through their words, each director candidly shared their experience working and producing independently, all of them, breaking barriers and challenging norms. They discuss the issue of censorship, both state and self-imposed and how to navigate through it. Largest part of their work is both a reflection and a critique toward today’s society in their country, from culture preservation, fundamentalism, society induced malaise, ethnic favouritism. They ponder on the future of the region and the prospect of working together.

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SU CAMPI AVVERSI
Regia | Director Andrea Fenoglio, Matteo Tortone
Fotografia | Photography Matteo Tortone, Francesca Cirilli, Andrea Fenoglio
Montaggio | Editing Andrea Fenoglio, Matteo Tortone
Produzione | Production Produzione Spinosa
Italia, 2015, 63’ italiano, francese, dialetto burkinabè e dialetto piemontese sottotitoli in Italiano e inglese | Italian, French, Burkinabe and Piemontese dialect with English and Italian subtitles

Every year, hundreds of seasonal migrants from sub-Saharan regions arrive in a northern Italian city searching for work in the fruit fields. Upon arrival, they are hosted in a refugee camp that lies on an expropriated farmer’s land, who now lives in a small enclosure with his own machinery, his trailer and his dogs. This documentary tells of two defeats through the eyes of two authors – “the field” by Matteo Tortone and “the fence” by Andrea Fenoglio; two stories of disappointment, isolation and unfulfilled hopes but not yet deserted. Furthermore, they are two extreme points of view of a single reality, vividly made by the contact lines that have deep roots and that transcend spatial and social distance: facing a reality that isolates, plunders, closes, exploits and distorts the logic of production. The African workers and the farmer find themselves face to face with their most pressing needs: eating, fulfilling their own needs, searching for affection, and ultimately surviving. A man without land is only a man, at the mercy of increasingly adverse conditions. The melancholic smile of migrants turned back to a place far away is all that remains of the enthusiasm of the peasant, looking to a time that is no more, to his ancestors and to the land that exists only as memory.

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THE JERUSALEM DREAM
Regia | Director Meni Elias
Fotografia | Photography Meni Elias
Montaggio | Editing Tor Ben Mayor, Tuvia Hizkiyahu
Produzione | Production Unicorn Film Ltd
Israele, 2016, 63’, ebreo, aramaico, tigrino e inglese con sottotitoli in italiano e inglese | Hebrew, Amharic, Tigrinya and English with Italian and English subtitles

At the late 1970’s, after thousands of years of praying and longing for Jerusalem, the first Ethiopian Jews arrive in Israel. Yet for the first time, the child Jews of Ethiopia ask: “Was it worth it?” Brave and direct, their words pierce through to the heart. Words shifting between the great happiness of village life and the longing for Jerusalem. Words stirred by fear and loss while making their way in the desert only to be slammed into the great despair of the refugee camp in Sudan.

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TIDES. A HISTORY OF LIVES AND DREAM LOST AND FOUND (SOME BROKEN)
Regia | Director Alessandro Negrini
Fotografia | Photography OddGeir Saether
Montaggio | Editing Stuart Sloan
Produzione | Production Alessandro Negrini Film Productions, William Silke, Docucity
Irlanda, 2016, 40’, inglese con sottotitoli in italiano | English with Italian subtitles

“Imagine an island. Within this island there is another island. And within this other island there is a city; a city with two different names. Inside this city with two names, it flows a river. This is its autobiography”. Is the story of a river able to reveal the meaning of a life imprisoned by history? Despite the end of the conflict in Northern Ireland there is still a city with two different names: Derry for Catholics, Londonderry for Protestants. In the middle of the city flows a river, the Foyle, which separates them and at the same time, acts as their border.
This film, narrated from the point of view of the river itself – through dream images and archival material made by ordinary people in the 60s and 70s – invites us to discover its story: how was this liquid wall seen, heard and experienced by the lives of those it passed on its his long run to the ocean? What could it tell us? What does it know about us? Moving between past and present, the River Foyle invites us to reflect on issues that are going beyond its own borders – What is a border? Are the dreams of those who lived before the conflict different from those dreamed today? And above all, what happens to our dreams?

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UN CONDOR
Regia | Director Yiannis Kolozis
Fotografia | Photography Yiannis Kolozis
Montaggio | Editing Yiannis Kolozis
Produzione | Production Yiannis Kolozis
Grecia, 2015, 79’, inglese e spagnolo con sottotitoli in italiano e inglese | English and Spanish with Italian and English subtitles

A road trip in Chile’s past and present. Sergio Contreras was born into a rich family, his mother was the maid. Passing from a life in which he was kept secret, to a life in poverty, he had to make his own life. He put himself in exile in November 1973, a few months after Pinochet overthrew Allende’s government in Chile. He was 17 years old. After a long journey he ended up in Sheffield, England. Thirty eight years later he decided to do his first trip to Chile since he left. We follow him through this journey, trying to sense the similarities and differences between the past and the present. This is not a dramatic story of a Chilean exile, but a composition of all the negative and positive moments of the life of a man who knows how to survive and evolve. Having as a guide an innate sense of justice which is the source of his political thought, Sergio, full of optimism and positive energy, tells the eternal story of people being forced to leave their homes.

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