If someone stole your daughter, would you steal her back? In a moment of rage and despair, Harald does what he has long dreamt of but never dared: He kidnaps Lisa, the daughter he is banned from…
2003
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If someone stole your daughter, would you steal her back? In a moment of rage and despair, Harald does what he has long dreamt of but never dared: He kidnaps Lisa, the daughter he is banned from seeing. Suddenly, Harald has his hands full. Not only are the police and a terrified ex on his tail, but also seven-year-old Lisa turns out to be his toughest opponent. She doesn't understand why her parents have divorced or why she cannot see her mother anymore. She also has no desire for Harald's dream of a new life abroad.
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World Premiere - Brad Gottfred's The Movie Hero is a heartwarming and hilarious paean to movies, setting the perfect tone to kick off Cinequest 2003. The Movie Hero tells the story of a slightly off-kilter guy named Blake, who really believes his life is a movie, complete with a love-interest, sidekick, bad guy and, naturally, an audience, who he continuously talks to throughout the film.
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Closing out this year's Cinequest 2003 will be Brent Huff's raucous dark comedy, 100 Mile Rule, starring Michael McKean (Best in Show, This is Spinal Tap) and Maria Bello (Auto Focus). Exposing the dark side of life as a traveling salesman, 100 Mile Rule provides a twisted yet hilarious peek at a day in the life of a trio of conventioneers.
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Steph is expecting a baby. Steph wants all of her closest friends to share in her home-birth, whether they want to or not, and has invited them all to her 24-hour labor party. As the labor stalls, tension mounts, and this "touchy-feely " experience soon turns into the delivery from hell. Anita is a doctor, in addition to being Steph's domineering, self-absorbed older sister. Julia is Steph's midwife, a "New Age" type, who tries to maintain a sense of calm in a sea of turbulence. However, once Julia gets called away on a personal emergency, chaos rules supreme.
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The one who kills animals is known as a butcher, and the one who kills people is known as a killer. Dumitru is both of them... Dumitru has endured enough suffering for several lifetimes. Just released from a decade-long stint behind bars, he hopes to return to his old life as a butcher in his small Romanian town. His misfortunes start again, however, on the way home, as a simple game of cards turns unexpectedly deadly. Arriving home, he discovers his wife is pregnant with his brother's child.
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Poor Jack. Life is slipping away from his control. He struggles with sobriety. His wife has found a new man, fifteen years younger. He takes an interest in another woman, but she doesn't exactly have him in her sights. So Jack does what any man would do. He finds escape in his new detective novel-wherein he is the main character. But soon, Jack must determine who is real: the people in his life or the characters in his book. Patrick Coyle is a triple-threat in the mesmerizing noir Detective Fiction as director, writer, and actor, adapting his stage play for the big screen.
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Haixa works the fields in Yan'an, a poor village in remote China, where her parents, who were relocated to Yan'an during the Cultural Revolution, abandoned her as a newborn 28 years ago. Determined to find her parents, she enlists the help of Huang Yuing, an accused counter-revolutionary, who was also "sent down" to Yan'an. Huang Yuing, who has still not fully recovered from the painful experience of being denounced by the Red Guard, agrees to help Haixa on her journey to uncover the truth of her life.
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Life for Finnigan Jones (Joe Aaron) has reached the point where the first thing he does every morning is wonder whether or not he should blow out his brains. Approaching 40 and still living with his mother, stricken with heavy depression and bouts of Tourette's Syndrome, he just muddles past the world. Then he meets Syd (Francesca Catalano), a 12-year-old whose personality is as bright as her green-dyed curls. Unlike other people, Syd simply accepts Jones for who he is. Sensing a kindred spirit in the young girl, he is able to get a new grip on life.
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Sneak Premiere One week every year, a virtual city is erected on the surface of the Black Rock Desert in Nevada: Black Rock City, population 29,000, otherwise known as Burning Man. Un Su Lee and Paul Barnett's Confessions of a Burning Man offers an original and intimate, yet widely appealing, view of the Burning Man event as seen through the eyes of four of our contemporaries. Samantha Weaver, clearly in her element, builds a labyrinth as a means to find her place and create her communal identity.
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How can a man commit petty crimes, elude the police of several states, and still get top honors at Princeton? How does such a man become a track star almost overnight without a single person knowing his crimes? And most important-why did he do it? Con Man is the story of James Hogue, an incredibly intelligent serial imposter who reinvented his identity repeatedly, always with an intriguing and fabricated past. Poised for stunning success at Princeton: he'd not only been admitted, but he attained a scholarship, top honors, and became a track star for the university.