Feature

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Winner - Un Certain Regard Jury Prize, Cannes Film Festival 2008

Every family has its secrets.

Director Kiyoshi Kurosawa?s latest tale is an ironic, quietly offbeat take on a family in massive self-denial; a portrait of a seemingly ordinary Japanese family. All is normal and the same?or so it seems.

Bent, but not yet broken, the Sasaki family shows how the pride of men can bring a family to its knees, and how, sometimes, it takes the dreams of children to lift it back up again.

Season:
2009
Director:
Kiyoshi Kurosawa
Cinematography:
Akiko Ashizawa; Editor: Koichi Takahashi
Cast:
Teruyuki Kagawa, Kyoko Koizumi, Haruka Igawa, Yu Koyanagi, Kai Inowaki, Kanji Tsuda, Koji Yakusho
Producer:
Yukie Kito, Wouter Barendrecht
Executive Producer:
Yasushi Kotani, Michael J. Werner
Language:
Japanese (w/ English subtitles)
Genre:
Drama
Music:
Kazumasa Hashimoto

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Two couples, one Russian and one Kazakh, live side by side in relative harmony amidst a beautiful yet semi-desolate region of the Great Steppe. But when the fair-skinned Russians give birth to a boy of decidedly darker skin, fifteen years of suspicion and acrimony arises between them, which can only be resolved by an ironic twist of family and fate.

Season:
2009
Director:
Marat Surulu
Cinematography:
Giorgi Beridze
Cast:
Ivan Vladimir Yavorsky, Asan Dzhaidarbek Kunguzhinov, Maria Irina Agejkina, Aisha Ajzhan Ajtenova
Editor:
Karl Riedl
Producer:
Sain Gabdullin, Karsten Stöter, Benny Dreschsel, Yuri Obukhov, Guillaume De Seille
Language:
Russian (w/ English subtitles)
Genre:
Drama
Music:
Andrey Sigle

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A supernatural thriller sure to grip even the biggest disbeliever.

Bryan (Tim Daly, Private Practice), an emphatic doubter of everything, finds his own rationality challenged by the events that beset him in an old family manor inherited from his death-stricken aunt. When rationalization fails to explain the perplexing incidents that lurk around every corner in his new home, where will he turn? Left unnervingly poised between arrested wits and command of his faculties, Bryan must turn to the unknown to decrypt these haunting disturbances.

Season:
2009
Premiere status:
North American Premiere
Director:
Tennyson Bardwell
Cinematography:
Claudio Rocha
Cast:
Tim Daly, Tom Arnold, Zoe Saldana, Andrea Roth, Edward Herrmann, Robert Prosky, Bruce Altman
Editor:
Ann Marie Lizzi
Producer:
Mary-Beth Taylor, Tennyson Bardwell, Isen Robbins, Aimee Schoof
Executive Producer:
Paul Bardwell, Dave Silipigno
Language:
English
Genre:
Suspense
Music:
Brett Rosenberg

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This is, ?Sushi Western!?

He has waited eight years for his revenge. His family brutally murdered by Nathan Flesher and his sight taken in a desperate effort to save his wife and daughter, he trained as a samurai swordsman in order to exact his vengeance. Now known only as The Blind Wolf, he returns to face his foe. However, there is a surprise waiting for him: seven assassins await him, eager for the bounty placed on his head by the Flesher.

Season:
2009
Premiere status:
North American Premiere
Director:
Kurando Mitsutake
Cinematography:
Keiko Nakahara
Cast:
Kurando Mitsutake, Jeffrey James Lippold, Domiziano Arcangeli, Amanda Plummer
Editor:
John Migdal
Producer:
Kurando Mitsutake, Chiaki Yanagimoto
Language:
English, Japanese (w/ English subtitles)
Genre:
Action
Music:
Dean Harada

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Winner ? Audience Award, Sydney Film Festival

?The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy.? -- Martin Luther King, Jr.

Season:
2009
Director:
Matt Norman
Cinematography:
Martin Smith
Cast:
Peter Norman, Tommie Smith, John Carlos
Editor:
Jane Moran, John Leonard
Producer:
Matt Norman, David Redman
Executive Producer:
Thomas Augsberger, Shana Levine, Dean Murphy
Language:
English
Genre:
Documentary
Music:
David Hirschfelder

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Rock crushes scissors. Paper covers rock. Scissors cuts paper. Can purity beat commerce?

The Walker brothers wanted to turn a child?s game into a good-natured competitive sport, but when the RPS fanatics converge on the world championships, they?re caught between big business, talk show pundits, Playmate mascots, and a battle of good versus evil.

Season:
2009
Premiere status:
United States Premiere
Director:
Mike McKeown
Cinematography:
Chris Malby, Pat KcKinnon
Cast:
Douglas Walker, Graham Walker, Master Roshambollah, C. Urbanus
Editor:
Evan Finn, Julian Cautherley, Mike McKeown
Producer:
Julian Cautherley, Michael Lane, Mike McKeown, Pat McKinnon
Language:
English
Genre:
Documentary
Music:
Dan Raziel

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Renaldo Kuhler is a charming, funny and utterly captivating man?who just so
happens to have created his own country.

Season:
2009
Premiere status:
World Premiere
Director:
Brett Ingram
Cinematography:
Brett Ingram
Cast:
Renaldo Kuhler
Editor:
Brett Ingram
Producer:
Brett Ingram
Language:
English
Genre:
Documentary
Music:
Shark Quest (Sara Bell, Laird Dixon, Chris Eubank, Chuck Johnson, Groves Willer)

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Ten-year-old Josh is on the wrestling team but would much rather be a cheerleader.

Josh loves dolls, fashion and desperately wants to cheer. As he continually argues his case with his school?s strict Mother Superior, his mother, Andrea, searches for her own answers on how to convince Josh that aspiring to be on the cheerleading squad, relishing the art of the French braid and calling Maria von Trapp his most influential role model is just not what little boys do!

Season:
2009
Director:
James Vasquez
Cinematography:
Elizabeth Santoro
Cast:
Lurie Poston, Carrie Preston, John G. Preston, Michael Emerson, Kali Rocha, Tara Karsian
Editor:
Piedmont Jones
Producer:
Sebastian Jobin
Executive Producer:
Mark Holmes, Carrie Preston
Language:
English
Genre:
Comedy

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?In jail there are no castes. Everyone is equal.?

As two nations? uneasy armies face each other across the Indian-Pakistani border, Ramchand, an 8-year old Hindu Pakistani village boy of the Untouchable caste, followed soon by his worried father, wanders across the nearby border into India, setting off a chain of events that will test the love and endurance of a family, but proves that even in the most unlikely places understanding and affection can be found.

Season:
2009
Director:
Mehreen Jabbar
Cinematography:
Sofian Khan
Cast:
Nandita Das, Rashid Farooqui, Syed Fazal Hussain, Maria Wasti, Noman Ijaz
Editor:
Aseem Sinha, Mehreen Jabbar
Producer:
Javed Jabbar
Language:
Urdu, Hindi (w/ English subtitles)
Genre:
Drama
Music:
Debajyoti Mishra

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Just because you?re a member of the AARP doesn?t mean you have to stop fighting.

In the tune of nursery rhymes and musicals, veteran director Pam Walton (Liberty: 3 Stories About Life and Death, Call to Witness) presents Raging Grannies, a group who uses quirky street theater to protest causes dear to them. From women?s rights to anti-military recruiting, the antics of these grannies will surely pique your curiosity.

Season:
2009
Premiere status:
World Premiere
Director:
Pam Walton
Cinematography:
Wah Ho Chan
Editor:
Pam Walton
Producer:
Pam Walton
Language:
English
Genre:
Documentary
Music:
Neil Panton
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