72SSIFF - 20/28 September 2024
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Films
Pål Sletaune
Norway 
82 min.
Roy is an overcurious postman with little respect for other people's privacy and no sense of professional ethics who makes a habit of opening people's mail. He is unaffectionate, doesn't get on well with his workmates and has very few friends. He also has a knack of being in the wrong place at the wrong time. One day, a young woman named Line leaves her keys hanging from the letterbox. WIthout giving it a second thought, Roy takes them and enters her flat. From the moment he walks in the door, his life takes a radical turn. 
Gaston J.-M. Kabore
Burkina Faso - France 
96 min.
Young Wend Kuuni sets out on an unpredictable odyssey in search of a healer to cure his sister Pughneere, who is suffering from an unknown disease. An adopted orphan, many of the villagers are convinced that the boy has brought them bad luck and that his sister's illness is simply proof of the fact. Only by finding the healer with the secret of a miraculous panacea will he be able to save his reputation and his sister's life. The action takes place at the beginning of the 19th century in the area around the Niger river. 
Kjell-Ake Andersson
Sweden 
124 min.
The story begins in the 1930's and spans three generations. Solveig, who lives in a village in the Swedish countryside, has a lifelong dream: to play Bach's Christmas Oratorio in the local church. HOwever, she dies in an accident, leaving her husband, Aron, and their son, Sidner, heartbroken. After feeling disoriented for several years, Sidner finds peace in the delicate, although somewhat eccentric, Fanny, with whom he has a son, Victor. One winter's day, Victor manages to carry out his grandmother's dream. 
Ferzan Ozpetek
Italy - Turkey - Spain 
94 min.
Francesco receives a letter telling him that hehas inherited property in Turquey from his aunt Anita and travels to Istanbul to sell it. But to his great surprise it turns out that he is now the owner of the Turkish baths she has been running for years. He decides to continue the business, earning the hostility of the speculators who are desperate to get their hands on the premises. His wife, Marta, is still in Italy, and the earlier cooling off in their relationship does nothing but grow. Marta goes to Turkey determined to ask for a divorce and fins that her husband is no longer the man she knew. She suspects him of having a secret relationship with Fusun, the daughter of the man who looks after the baths, but she's in for a surprise. 
Neil LaBute
Canada - USA 
93 min.
White collar executives, Chad and Howard have been ditched by their respective girlfriends and are being letf at the bottom of the promotional ladder by younger colleagues. Frustrated by their lot in life they draw-up a plan that will ultimetaly make them feel better about themselves as men. During a business trip, they choose a beautiful woman with the intention of dating her and dumping her when they leave. But the girl, who is deaf, isn't quite as fragile as she seems. 
Curtis Hanson
USA 
135 min.
Los Angeles, 1950. Crime and corruption are oozing down the corridors of power, threatening to take over the city. Three officers from the Police Department, Jack, Ed and Bud, find themselves wound up in a conspiracy of intrigue and deception that could end up destroying them all. Bud interrogates a beautiful mysterious woman, Lynn Bracken, as a possible key to a murder, but finds himself falling in love with her. The woman also brings out Ed's deepest desire, leading to a showdown between the two policemen. 
Alain Berliner
France 
88 min.
Ludovic is a little seven-year-old boy who believes he is a little girl. What seems normal to him doesn't seem that way to other people. His parents don't know how to deal with the stubborness and convictions of their child's belief. The mother tries to be tolerant, the father becomes exasperated, the neighbours' give them reproachful stares, and the schoolfriends react with amazement. A paceful neighbourhood discovers the difference, the fear of strangeness, lack of understanding and rejection. But there are also dreams, magic and hope. 
Robert Guediguian
France 
102 min.
Marius and Jeannette are in the prime of their lives. Marius lives alone in a disused cement works and guards the soon to be demolished factory, while Jeannette brings up her two children alone, on the meagre salary of a check-out girl. She lives in a tiny house that opens out onto a typical Mediterranean-style courtyard and her neighbours heartily encourage her with their fits of laughter and loud protests. The encounter between Marius and Jeannette will not be simple, because, apart from their difficult social situations, they have both been hurt by life. They will have to rediscover the key to happiness. 
Anne Fontaine
France - Spain 
90 min.
They used to be called dens of iniquity; now they're jus discotheques. Down by the station, this particular one boasts "hostesses" and strip-tease shows. United by fifteen years of happy marriage, Jean-Marie and Nicole are among a group of friends who start visiting the place. Their whole life has been dedicated to the dry cleaner's, never going out at night or away on holidays. But suddenly everything changes when a young angel-faced man performs a transvestite number with his sister on the disco stage. Nicole and Jean-Marie set out on a new life full of strong sensations and dangerous living where the dry clean by day and let their hair down at night. But the passing of time uncovers feelings they'd never even dreamt existed. 
Mike Figgis
USA 
107 min.
Marketing manager Max Carlyle seems to have everything going for him: a happy marriage, two healthy kids and a successful career. A chance meeting on a trip to New York leads to a night of passion with the seductive and also-married Karen. although both of them promise to forget what happened, Max can't get her out of his mind and becomes increasingly detached from his wife. A year later, his best friend Charlie is in hospital, terminally ill with Aids. When Max goes to New York to visit his dying friend, he discovers that Karen is married to Vernon, Charlie's brother. She and Max try to resist their feelings towards each other, but are finally forced to face the obvious reality. 
Gillies Mackinnon
Canada - UK 
110 min.
This is the story of four men during the First World War in Craiglockart Military Hospital, which is crowded with men who have become mentally incapacitated by their experience in the trenches. Doctor Rivers is assigned to care for the eminent English poet, Siegfried Sasoon, a man by no means mentally disturbed but who has been sent to the hospital for publishing a controversial pamphlet proclaiming his opposition to the war. Wilfrid Owen has a total lack of confidence in his work, but the support and inspiration of Sasoon turn him into an excellent poet. Prior is an officer from a humble background who has been rendered mut by the result of the horror he has endured. 
Peter Cattaneo
USA 
90 min.
Gaz has got with hiz ex-wife for the custody of his son. David, his best friend, has a weight complex and can't get it up. Gerald can't bring himself to tell his compulsive buyer of a wife that he has lost his job. Lomper is a frustrated suicide case who lives with his mother. Horse is an old guy whose hip cracks every time he dances. And Guy is useless at following the beat, although he's got other talents to make up for it. None of them have got a job. None of them have got any money. They've got nothing to lose but their pride. 
Victor Nuñez
USA 
111 min.
Ulee Kackson is a solid, taciturn beekeeper in Florida. Forced to look after his two granddaughters, whose mother, Helen, has left the, and whose father (Ulee's son, Jimmy) is doing time for robbery, he finds himself swarmed with family problems. Helen has got herself into deep trouble with Jimmy's oldtime crime partners, who want to know where the stolen money is, and Ulee grudgingly finds himself obliged to come out of his self-imposed isolation and defend his family. 
Shohei Imamura
Japan 
117 min.
A man is released on parole after eight years in prison for murdering his wife when he found her in bed with another man. He sets up a barber's shop in a small town far from Tokyo. His only friend is a pet eel he tamed during his years in prison, but gradually he begins to open up and get to know the customers. His life suddenly changes on the day he stops Keiko, a young girl with psychological wounds, from killing herself. Takuro gives her a job in his shop and they star feeling a mutual attraction for each other, but an unexpected series of events drag them back down into their respective pasts. 
Zhang Yimou
China 
95 min.
Bookseller Xiao Shuai pines with desire for An Hong, a beautiful and liberated young woman who has unfortunately started going out with an influential member of the nouveau riche. Lao Zhang, a researcher, accidentally gets mixed up in their conflicts. The result is neatly summed up in the advice of a policeman: "If countries can find a way to sit down and negotiate, why can't you?".
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