Independent distributor bringing exciting world cinema and alternate screen content to Australia and New Zealand
Dir. Michal Aviad, (female director) Israel 2018 | 93 min | Drama
Life at work becomes unbearable for Orna. Her boss appreciates and promotes her, while making inappropriate advances. Her husband struggles to keep his new restaurant afloat, and Orna becomes the main breadwinner for their three children. When her world is finally shattered, she must pull herself together to fight, in her own way, for her job and a sense of self-worth.
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Dir. Ash Mayfair | Vietnam. 2018. | 97 min | Drama | MA 15+
In 19th-century rural Vietnam, 14-year-old May becomes the third wife of wealthy landowner Hung. Soon, she learns that she can only gain status by asserting herself as a woman who can give birth to a male child. May’s hope to change her status turns into a real and tantalizing possibility when she gets pregnant. Faced with forbidden love and its devastating consequences, May finally comes to an understanding of the brutal truth: the options available to her are few and far between.
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Dir. Travis Beard | Australia 2017 | 90 min | Documentary | M
ROCKABUL by Melbourne based director Travis Beard, follows Afghanistan’s first rock band District Unknown in the war torn capital of Afghanistan, Kabul, where Rock music is forbidden by Islam.
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Dir. by Em Baker, Australia, 2019. 77 mins | Documentary. Women spend their lives receiving contradictory messages about marriage: an aspiration, a fantasy, a trap. An ancient institution, whose meaning has been fiercely debated the world over, it can be difficult to pin-point what marriage means to modern women.
To Benay, in Turkey, it means a new beginning and a new family, something she lost with the passing of her mother when she was a child. To honour this, she’s getting married on Mother’s Day. To Anna, in Australia, it means being made one with her partner and her God, and preparing to lose her virginity. To Luthanlu, in India, it means an opportunity to continue her Rongmei Naga culture, a tribal minority in the North-East of the country. And to Dalia, in Mexico, it means the validation of her relationship with her girlfriend, and hopefully, reconciliation with her conservative mother.
(M) Dir. by Annemarie Jacir, Palestine, France, Germany, Colombia, Norway, Qatar, United Arab Emirates, 2017. 96 min | Drama
Writer-director Annemarie Jacir’s multi-award winning comic drama explores the lives of Palestinians living in Israel, and stars real-life father and son Mohammad and Saleh Bakri. The title of Wajib translates as ‘duty’, and it’s duty that brings architect Shadi (Saleh Bakri) from Rome back to Nazareth, where his sister Amal (Maria Zriek) is to be married. Local tradition dictates that Shadi and his divorced dad, Abu Shadi (Mohammad Bakri), must drive around town delivering wedding invitations. Friction is in the air even before the duo clamber into Abu Shadi’s beloved and beaten-up old Volvo. Shadi thinks the exercise is outdated and meaningless. For his father, it’s about maintaining important community rituals. Bakri and son Saleh are terrific and earthily funny as the bickering duo who meet colourful characters on their cross-city travels. A Palestinian born in Bethlehem, raised in Saudi Arabia and educated in New York, Annemarie Jacir (Salt of this Sea, 2008; When I Saw You, 2012) brings a worldly, wise and witty eye to this hugely entertaining and illuminating slice of Palestinian life.
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Dir. by Naina Sen, Australia, 2017. 84 min | Documentary
Australia’s answer to The Buena Vista Social Club, The Song Keepers tells the inspiring story of an Aboriginal women’s choir and their first tour of Germany.
In the churches of remote Central Australia, a 140-year musical legacy of ancient Aboriginal languages, German sacred hymns and baroque music is being preserved by four generations of women that make up the Central Australian Aboriginal Women’s Choir. With their charismatic musical director Morris Stuart, the choir embarks on an historical tour of Germany, singing the baroque Lutheran hymns brought to their great grandparents by German missionaries in their own Western Arrarnta and Pitjantjatjara languages. Together these remarkable women take their music and stories of cultural survival, identity and cross-cultural collaboration to the world.
(M) Dir. by Marco del Fiol, Brazil, 2016. 87 min | Documentary
Marina Abramović travels through Brazil, in search of personal healing and artistic inspiration, experiencing sacred rituals and revealing her creative process. The route is comprised of poignant encounters with healers and sages from the Brazilian countryside, exploring the limits between art and spirituality. The film features healing sessions with the medium John of God in Abadiania, herb healers in Chapada dos Veadeiros, spiritual rituals at Vale do Amanhecer in Brasilia, the strength of religious syncretism in Bahia, ayahuasca in Chapada Diamantina, shamanic processes in Curitiba and energy of crystals in Minas Gerais. This external trip triggers in Marina a profound introspective journey through memories, pain and past experiences. A mixture between road movie and spiritual thriller, the documentary brings an unprecedented approach of the intimate creative process of one of the most important artists of our time.
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(MA) Dir. David Pulbrook, Australia , 2017. 90 min | Thriller
Carrie is in love with her new fiancé Vincent, a handsome and successful author. Vincent is besotted with Carrie, she’s everything he’s ever dreamed of. However, he’s harbouring a dark secret from his past and on top of that he’s experiencing a series of strange daily occurrences. It’s almost as if someone is following his every move. Who’s following him? And what do they want? When Vincent asks Carrie on a romantic weekend away to celebrate their engagement, cracks start appearing that threaten their happy and secure relationship. And maybe even their lives. Bad Blood stars Xavier Samuel and Morgan Griffin.
(PG) Dir. Orson Welles, USA, 1942. 88 min | Drama, Romance
35mm print available.
Orson Welles’ acclaimed drama follows two generations in a well-to-do Indianapolis family. Isabel Amberson receives a proposal from dashing Eugene, but opts instead to marry boring Wilbur. Time passes, and Wilbur and Isabel’s only son, George, is loathed as a controlling figure in the town. When Wilbur dies, Eugene again proposes to Isabel, but George threatens the union.
(G) Dir. Mark Sandrich, USA, 1935, 101 min | Comedy, Musical, Romance
They’re Dancing Cheek-To-Cheek Again! A delightful toe-tapping screwball comedy starring Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers. An American dancer comes to Britain and falls for a model whom he initially annoyed, but she mistakes him for his goofy producer.
(G) Dir. George Stevens, USA, 1936, 103 min | Comedy, Musical, Romance
35mm print available.
A rollicking toe-tapping musical extravaganza starring Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers. A performer and gambler travels to New York City to raise the $25,000 he needs to marry his fiancée, only to become entangled with a beautiful aspiring dancer.
(G) Dir. Mark Sandrich, USA, 1938, 83 min | Comedy, Musical, Romance
35mm print available.
Starring Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers. Dr. Tony Flagg’s friend, Steven, has problems in the relationship with his fiancée, Amanda, so he persuades her to visit Dr. Flagg. After some minor misunderstandings, she falls in love with Dr. Flagg.
(G) Dir. Mark Sandrich, USA, 1936, 110 min | Comedy, Musical, Romance
35mm print available.
Starring Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers. When the fleet puts in at San Francisco, sailor Bake Baker tries to rekindle the flame with his old dancing partner, Sherry Martin, while Bake’s buddy Bilge Smith romances Sherry’s sister Connie.
(G) Dir. William A. Seiter, 1935. 106 min | Comedy, Musical, Romance
35mm print available.
Starring Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers. Football player John Kent tags along as Huck Haines and the Wabash Indianans travel to an engagement in Paris, only to lose it immediately.
(G) Dir. Mark Sandrich, USA, 1934. 107 min | Comedy, Musical, Romance
35mm print available.
Starring Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers. Mimi Glossop wants a divorce so her Aunt Hortense hires a professional to play the correspondent in apparent infidelity. American dancer Guy Holden meets Mimi while visiting Brightbourne (Brighton) and she thinks he is the correspondent.
(G) Dir. Mark Sandrich, USA, 1937, 109 min | Comedy, Musical, Romance
35mm print available.
Starring Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers. A budding romance between a ballet master and a tap dancer becomes complicated when rumours surface that they’re already married.
