Tag: Priority 2

Bend Sinister (Nabokov)

Author: Vladimir Nabokov
Date: 1947
Genre: Dystopian
Country: USA

The first novel Nabokov wrote while living in America and the most overtly political novel he ever wrote, Bend Sinister is a modern classic. While it is filled with veiled puns and characteristically delightful wordplay, it is, first and foremost, a haunting and compelling narrative about a civilized man caught in the tyranny of a police state. It is first and foremost a compelling narrative about a civilized man and his child caught up in the tyranny of a police state. Professor Adam Krug, the country’s foremost philosopher, offers the only hope of resistance to Paduk, dictator and leader of the Party of the Average Man. In a folly of bureaucratic bungling and ineptitude, the government attempts to co-opt Krug’s support in order to validate the new regime.

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Flannery O’Connor: The Complete Stories (James)*

Author: Flannery O’Connor
Date: 1972
Genre: Short Stories
Country: USA

In these sly, laconic, and fiercely observed works, O’Connor does nothing less than elaborate a unique and new way of seeing the world. Contorting her sharply drawn characters through her Southern Gothic prism, she produces a panorama unequaled in its vision of the interplays of faith, evil, humor, violence, and compassion that embody American life.

These thirty-one chronologically ordered stories include twelve that do not appear in the only two story collections O’Connor put together in her short lifetime―Everything That Rises Must Converge and A Good Man Is Hard to Find.

Taken together, these stories reveal O’Connor’s abiding and visionary gift―one that has given us some of the most powerful and disturbing fiction of the twentieth century.

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Under Milk Wood (Thomas)*

Author: Dylan Thomas
Date: 1954
Genre: Radio Drama, Play
Country: UK

An omniscient narrator invites the audience to listen to the dreams and innermost thoughts of the inhabitants of the fictional small Welsh fishing town, Llareggub, (buggerall spelt backwards).

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Stories of Vladimir Nabokov, The (Nabokov)*

Author: Vladimir Nabokov
Date: 1996
Genre: Short Stories
Country: USA

Written between the 1920s and 1950s, these sixty-five tales–eleven of which have been translated into English for the first time–display all the shades of Nabokov’s imagination. They range from sprightly fables to bittersweet tales of loss, from claustrophobic exercises in horror to a connoisseur’s samplings of the table of human folly. Read as a whole, The Stories of Vladimir Nabokov offers and intoxicating draft of the master’s genius, his devious wit, and his ability to turn language into an instrument of ecstasy.

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It Can’t Happen Here (Lewis)

Author: Sinclair Lewis
Date: 1935
Genre: Political Fiction, Dystopian Fiction
Country: USA

It’s 1935 and discontent is rife in America. From the political margins appears Buzz Windrip, charismatic presidential candidate and ‘inspired guesser at what political doctrines the people would like’. Sweeping to power amid mass elation, he promises wealth for all and the dawn of a glorious new era. Small-town newspaper editor Doremus Jessup is worried, especially when the new regime becomes increasingly authoritarian. But what can one individual do to fight an all-powerful state? Sinclair Lewis’s terrifying cautionary tale pits liberal complacency against popular fascism and shows: yes, it really can happen here.

 

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Lost Illusions (Balzac)*

Author: Honoré de Balzac
Date: 1843
Genre: 
Country: France

It consists of three parts, starting in provincial France, thereafter moving to Paris, and finally returning to the provinces. The book resembles another of Balzac’s greatest novels, La Rabouilleuse (The Black Sheep, 1842), that is set in Paris and in the provinces. It forms part of the Scènes de la vie de province in La Comédie humaine.

 

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Black Boy (Wright)*

Author: Richard Wright
Date: 1945
Genre: Autobiography
Country: USA

A memoir by American author Richard Wright, detailing his upbringing. Wright describes his youth in the South: Mississippi, Arkansas and Tennessee, and his eventual move to Chicago, where he establishes his writing career and becomes involved with the Communist Party.

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Flaubert’s Parrot (Barnes)*

Author: Julian Barnes
Date: 1984
Genre: Postmodern
Country: UK

The novel follows Geoffrey Braithwaite, a widowed, retired English doctor, visiting France. While visiting sites related to Flaubert, Geoffrey discovers two museums claiming to display the stuffed parrot which sat atop Flaubert’s writing desk for a brief period while he wrote “Un Cœur Simple“. While trying to identify which is authentic, Braithwaite learns that Flaubert’s parrot could be any one of fifty (“Une cinquantaine de perroquets!”, p. 187) that had been held in the collection of the municipal museum.

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Sexing the Cherry (Winterson)*

Author: Jeanette Winterson
Date: 1989
Genre: Postmodern, Historical Fiction, Fantasy Fiction
Country: UK

Set in 17th century London, Sexing the Cherry is about the journeys of a mother, known as The Dog Woman, and her protégé, Jordan. They journey in a space-time flux: across the seas to find exotic fruits such as bananas and pineapples; and across time, with glimpses of “the present” and references to Charles I of England and Oliver Cromwell. The mother’s physical appearance is somewhat “grotesque”. She is a giant, wrapped in a skirt big enough to serve as a ship’s sail and strong enough to fling an elephant. She is also hideous, with smallpox scars in which fleas live, a flat nose and foul teeth. Her son, however, is proud of her, as no other mother can hold a good dozen oranges in her mouth all at once. Ultimately, their journey is a journey in search of The Self.

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Lily of the Valley, The (Balzac)*

Author: Honoré de Balzac
Date: 1835
Genre: Philosophy
Country: Ancient Greece

It primarily concerns the emotionally vibrant but never physically consummated affection between Félix de Vandenesse and Henriette de Mortsauf. It is part of his series of novels (or Roman-fleuve) known as La Comédie humaine (The Human Comedy), which parodies and depicts French society in the period of the Bourbon Restoration and the July Monarchy (1815–1848).

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Demian (Hesse)*

Author: Hermann Hesse
Date: 1919
Genre: Bildungsroman
Country: German

A young man awakens to selfhood and to a world of possibilities beyond the conventions of his upbringing in Nobel Prize winner Hermann Hesse’s beloved novel Demian. Emil Sinclair is a quiet boy drawn into a forbidden yet seductive realm of petty crime and defiance. His guide is his precocious, mysterious classmate Max Demian, who provokes in Emil a search for self-discovery and spiritual fulfillment.

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New York Trilogy (Auster)*

Author: Paul Auster
Date: 1987
Genre: Postmodern, Mystery
Country: USA

The New York Trilogy is a series of novels by American writer Paul Auster. Originally published sequentially as City of Glass (1985), Ghosts (1986) and The Locked Room (1986), it has since been collected into a single volume. The Trilogy is a postmodern interpretation of detective and mystery fiction, exploring various philosophical themes.

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Stroll in the Air & Frenzy for Two, or More, A (Ionesco)*

Author: Eugène Ionesco
Date: 1965
Genre: Absurdist, Play
Country: France

A Stroll in the Air concerns Monsieur Berenger who is the hero of many of Ionesco’s plays, including Rhinoceros. What happens to Berenger, his wife and daughter — a French family living for unstated reasons in England — is the source and substance of the play, for Berenger discovers one day he has the miraculous gift of freeing himself from the law of gravity. How the English react to this oddity also reveals Ionesco’s feelings about the insular people with whom he has been fascinated since his earliest plays.

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Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay, The (Chabon)*

Author: Michael Chabon
Date: 2000
Genre: Historical Fiction
Country: USA

A historical fiction novel, it follows the lives of two Jewish cousins, Josef “Joe” Kavalier, a Czech artist and magician who escapes Nazi-occupied Prague, and Sammy Clay, a Brooklyn-born writer. Together, they create The Escapist, a fictional superhero inspired by Joe’s desire to fight fascism and his struggle to rescue his family from Europe. In the story, Kavalier and Clay become major figures in the comics industry during its Golden Age.

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Robber Bride, The (Atwood)*

Author: Margaret Atwood
Date: 1993
Genre: Short Stories
Country: USA

Set in present-day Toronto, Ontario, the novel is about three women and their history with old friend and nemesis, Zenia. Roz, Charis, and Tony meet once a month in a restaurant to share a meal years after Zenia betrayed them and interfered with their romantic relationships. During one outing they spot Zenia, who they thought to be long-dead. The plot then travels back in time to explain how Zenia stole, one by one, their respective partners.

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Trust (Díaz)

Author: Hernán Díaz
Date: 2022
Genre: Metafiction
Country: USA

Set predominantly in New York City and focusing on the world of finance, the novel is a metafictional, fragmentary look at a secretive financier and his wife.

The book is composed of four fictional texts: a novel (Bonds), an incomplete autobiography (My Life), a completed memoir (A Memoir, Remembered), and a diary (Futures). While each book focuses on many of the same characters, the information included in each is often mutually exclusive, with it being left up to the reader to determine the truth.

 

 

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Jealousy (Robbe-Grillet)

Author: Alain Robbe-Grillet
Date: 1957
Genre: Nouveau Roman, Avant-Garde
Country: France

This novel is an avant-garde narrative that explores the concept of jealousy through a highly detailed and descriptive narrative. The story unfolds in a tropical banana plantation and is told from the perspective of an unnamed narrator who may or may not be present in the scenes described. The narrative is characterized by repetition and minute observation of details, creating a sense of obsessive jealousy. The story is ambiguous and leaves the reader questioning the reality of the events and the existence of the narrator.

 

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Magus, The (Fowles)

Author: John Fowles
Date: 1965
Genre: Postmodern
Country: UK

The novel is a psychological drama that follows a young Englishman, Nicholas Urfe, who takes a teaching post on a remote Greek island to escape his dull life and a failed relationship. There, he meets a wealthy, mysterious man who introduces him to psychological games that blend myth, reality, and illusion. As Nicholas falls deeper into these manipulative scenarios, he begins to question his own sanity and reality. The story is filled with existential themes, exploring the nature of personal freedom, love, and the blurred line between reality and fantasy.

 

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I’m Not Stiller (Frisch)

Author: Max Frisch
Date: 1954
Genre: Postmodern
Country: Switzerland

The book is a profound exploration of identity and the human condition, revolving around a man who is arrested upon his return to his home country, Switzerland, after spending time in America. Although he insists he is not the man, Stiller, that everyone believes him to be, his protests are ignored. The story unfolds as he writes in his prison cell, reflecting on his past life and relationships, and grappling with the question of who he truly is. It’s a thought-provoking narrative that challenges conventional notions of selfhood and personal identity.

 

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Cloud Cuckoo Land (Doerr)

Author: Anthony Doerr
Date: 2021
Genre: Historical Fiction, Science Fiction, Fantasy
Country: USA

The story of five characters spanning eight centuries, told in anachronic order. Their stories are bound by an Ancient Greek codex entitled Cloud Cuckoo Land that each of the five characters discover and find solace in. It is a fictional book written by real Greek novelist Antonius Diogenes in the second century, and tells the story of Aethon, a shepherd on a quest to find the fabled paradise in the sky. In his travels, he is transformed into a donkey, a sea bass, and finally a crow, which allows him to fly to the gates of the city in the clouds.

 

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My Brilliant Friend (Ferrante)

Author: Elena Ferrante
Date: 2011
Genre: Bildungsroman[
Country: Italy

Beginning in the 1950s in a poor but vibrant neighborhood on the outskirts of Naples, Elena Ferrante’s four-volume story spans almost sixty years, as its main characters, the fiery and unforgettable Lila and the bookish narrator, Elena, become women, wives, mothers, and leaders, all the while maintaining a complex and at times conflicted friendship. This first novel in the series follows Lila and Elena from their fateful meeting as ten-year-olds through their school years and adolescence.Through the lives of these two women, Ferrante tells the story of a neighborhood, a city, and a country as it is transformed in ways that, in turn, also transform the relationship between two women.

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Year of Wonders (Brooks)

Author: Geraldine Brooks
Date: 2001
Genre: Historical Fiction
Country: UK

The novel is written in the point of view of a housemaid named Anna Frith, on what she lives through when the plague hits her village. It is based on the history of the small Derbyshire village of Eyam that, when beset by the plague in 1666, quarantines itself in order to prevent the disease from spreading further. The plague that hit Eyam and other parts of Britain in 1665 and ’66 was one of many recurrences that had taken place since the Black Death of the 14th century.

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House of Leaves (Danielewski)

Author: Mark Z. Danielewski
Date: 2000
Genre: Horror, Metafiction, Postmodern
Country: USA

The novel is written as a work of epistolary fiction and metafiction focusing on a fictional documentary film titled The Navidson Record, presented as a story within a story discussed in a handwritten monograph recovered by the primary narrator, Johnny Truant. The narrative makes heavy use of multiperspectivity as Truant’s footnotes chronicle his efforts to transcribe the manuscript, which itself reveals The Navidson Record‘s supposed narrative through transcriptions and analysis depicting a story of a family who discovers a larger-on-the-inside labyrinth in their house.

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Namesake, The (Lahiri)

Author: Jhumpa Lahiri
Date: 2003
Genre: Magical Realism
Country: USA

In The Namesake, Lahiri enriches the themes that made her collection an international bestseller: the immigrant experience, the clash of cultures, the conflicts of assimilation, and, most poignantly, the tangled ties between generations. Here again Lahiri displays her deft touch for the perfect detail — the fleeting moment, the turn of phrase — that opens whole worlds of emotion.

The Namesake takes the Ganguli family from their tradition-bound life in Calcutta through their fraught transformation into Americans. On the heels of their arranged wedding, Ashoke and Ashima Ganguli settle together in Cambridge, Massachusetts. An engineer by training, Ashoke adapts far less warily than his wife, who resists all things American and pines for her family. When their son is born, the task of naming him betrays the vexed results of bringing old ways to the new world. Named for a Russian writer by his Indian parents in memory of a catastrophe years before, Gogol Ganguli knows only that he suffers the burden of his heritage as well as his odd, antic name.

Lahiri brings great empathy to Gogol as he stumbles along the first-generation path, strewn with conflicting loyalties, comic detours, and wrenching love affairs. With penetrating insight, she reveals not only the defining power of the names and expectations bestowed upon us by our parents, but also the means by which we slowly, sometimes painfully, come to define ourselves.

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Cloud Atlas (Mitchell)

Author: David Mitchell
Date: 2004
Genre: Historical Fiction, Metafiction, Science Fiction
Country: UK

The book combines metafiction, historical fiction, contemporary fiction and science fiction, with interconnected nested stories in different writing styles that take the reader from the remote South Pacific in the 19th century to the island of Hawaii in a distant post-apocalyptic future. Its title references a piece of music by Toshi Ichiyanagi.

The book consists of six nested stories; each is read or observed by the protagonist of the next, progressing in time through the central sixth story. The first five stories are each interrupted at a pivotal moment. After the sixth story, the others are resolved in reverse chronological order.

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Middlesex (Eugenides)

Author: Jeffrey Eugenides
Date: 2002
Genre: Family Saga, Bildungsroman
Country: USA

The astonishing tale of a gene that passes down through three generations of a Greek-American family and flowers in the body of a teenage girl.

In the spring of 1974, Calliope Stephanides, a student at a girls’ school in Grosse Pointe, finds herself drawn to a chain-smoking, strawberry blond classmate with a gift for acting. The passion that furtively develops between them–along with Callie’s failure to develop–leads Callie to suspect that she is not like other girls. In fact, she is not really a girl at all.

The explanation for this shocking state of affairs takes us out of suburbia- back before the Detroit race riots of 1967, before the rise of the Motor City and Prohibition, to 1922, when the Turks sacked Smyrna and Callie’s grandparents fled for their lives. Back to a tiny village in Asia Minor where two lovers, and one rare genetic mutation, set in motion the metamorphosis that will turn Callie into a being both mythical and perfectly a hermaphrodite.

Spanning eight decades–and one unusually awkward adolescence- Jeffrey Eugenides’s long-awaited second novel is a grand, utterly original fable of crossed bloodlines, the intricacies of gender, and the deep, untidy promptings of desire.

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Alias Grace (Atwood)

Author: Margaret Atwood
Date: 1996
Genre: Historical Fiction
Country: Canada

The story fictionalizes the notorious 1843 murders of Thomas Kinnear and his housekeeper Nancy Montgomery in Canada West. Two servants of the Kinnear household, Grace Marks and James McDermott, were convicted of the crime. McDermott was hanged and Marks was sentenced to life imprisonment.

Although the novel is based on factual events, Atwood constructs a narrative with a fictional doctor, Simon Jordan, who researches the case.

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Possession (Byatt)

Author: A. S. Byatt
Date: 1990
Genre: 
Country: UK

The novel explores the postmodern concerns of similar novels, which are often categorised as historiographic metafiction, a genre that blends approaches from both historical fiction and metafiction. The story follows two modern-day academics as they research the paper trail around the previously unknown love life between famous fictional poets Randolph Henry Ash and Christabel LaMotte.

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Sophie’s World (Gaarder)

Author: Jostein Gaarder
Date: 1991
Genre: Philosophical Novel
Country: Norway

It follows Sophie Amundsen, a Norwegian teenager, who is introduced to the history of philosophy as she is asked “Who are you?” “Where does this world come from?” in a letter from an unknown philosopher. The nonfictional content of the book roughly aligns with Bertrand Russell’s A History of Western Philosophy.

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Third Policeman, The (Pynchon)

Author: Flann O’Brien
Date: 1967
Genre: Comedy, Absurdist, Philosophical Novel
Country: Ireland

A surreal, dark comic novel following an unnamed narrator who murders a man for money to fund his study of a bizarre philosopher, de Selby. After the crime, he enters a nightmarish, dreamlike world where he interacts with eccentric policemen, encounters a “bicycle-human” theory, and discovers he is already dead.

 

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Stranger in a Strange Land (Heinlein)

Author: Robert A. Heinlein
Date: 1961
Genre: Science Fiction
Country: USA

It tells the story of Valentine Michael Smith, a human who comes to Earth in early adulthood after being born on the planet Mars and raised by Martians, and explores his interaction with and eventual transformation of Terran culture.

 

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Pedro Páramo (Rulfo)

Author: Juan Rulfo
Date: 1955
Genre:
Country: Mexico

As one enters Juan Rulfo’s legendary novel, one follows a dusty road to a town of death. Time shifts from one consciousness to another in a hypnotic flow of dreams, desires, and memories, a world of ghosts dominated by the figure of Pedro Páramo – lover, overlord, murderer.

Rulfo’s extraordinary mix of sensory images, violent passions, and unfathomable mysteries has been a profound influence on a whole generation of Latin American writers, including Carlos Fuentes, Mario Vargas Llosa, and Gabriel García Márquez. To read Pedro Páramo today is as overwhelming an experience as when it was first published in Mexico back in 1955.

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Childhood’s End (Clarke)

Author: Arthur C. Clarke
Date: 1953
Genre: Science Fiction
Country: UK

The story follows a peaceful alien invasion of Earth by mysterious Overlords, whose arrival begins decades of apparent utopia under indirect alien rule, at the cost of human identity and culture.

 

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Six Characters in Search of an Author and Other Plays (Pirandello)

Author: Luigi Pirandello
Date: 1921
Genre: Absurdist, Play, Metaplay
Country: Italy

Pirandello (1867-1936) is the founding architect of twentieth-century drama, brilliantly innovatory in his forms and themes, and in the combined energy, imagination and visual colours of his theatre. This volume of plays, translated from the Italian by Mark Musa, opens with Six Characters in Search of an Author, Pirandello’s most popular and controversial work in which six characters invade the stage and demand to be included in the play. The tragedy Henry IV dramatizes the lucid madness of a man who may be King. In So It Is (If You Think So) the townspeople exercise a morbid curiosity attempting to discover ‘the truth’ about the Ponza family. Each of these plays can lay claim to being Pirandello’s masterpiece, and in exploring the nature of human personality each one stretches the resources of drama to their limits.

 

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Delta of Venus (Nin)

Author: Anaïs Nin
Date: 1954
Genre: Short Stories, Erotica
Country: USA

In Delta of Venus Anaïs Nin conjures up a glittering cascade of sexual encounters. Creating her own ‘language of the senses’, she explores an area that was previously the domain of male writers and brings to it her own unique perceptions. Her vibrant and impassioned prose evokes the essence of female sexuality in a world where only love has meaning.

 

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This Side of Paradise (Fitzgerald)

Author: F. Scott Fitzgerald
Date: 1920
Genre: Bildungsroman
Country: USA

Amory Blaine, intent on rebelling against his staid, Midwestern upbringing, longs to acquire the patina of Eastern sophistication. In his quest for sexual and intellectual enlightenment, he progresses through a series of relationships, until he is cast out into the real world.

 

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Giovanni’s Room (Baldwin)

Author: James Baldwin
Date: 1956
Genre:
Country: USA

Considered an ‘audacious’ second novel, Giovanni’s Room is set in the 1950s Paris of American expatriates, liaisons, and violence. This now-classic story of a fated love triangle explores, with uncompromising clarity, the conflicts between desire, conventional morality and sexual identity.

 

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Beautiful and Damned, The (Fitzgerald)*

Author: F. Scott Fitzgerald
Date: 1922
Genre: Tragedy
Country: USA

Anthony and Gloria are the essence of Jazz Age glamour. A brilliant and magnetic couple, they fling themselves at life with an energy that is thrilling. New York is a playground where they dance and drink for days on end. Their marriage is a passionate theatrical performance; they are young, rich, alive and lovely and they intend to inherit the earth.

But as money becomes tight, their marriage becomes impossible. And with their inheritance still distant, Anthony and Gloria must grow up and face reality; they may be beautiful but they are also damned.

 

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Castle, The (Kafka)

Author: Franz Kafka
Date: 1926
Genre: Absurdist Fiction, Political Fiction
Country: Germany

The Castle is the story of K., the unwanted Land Surveyor who is never to be admitted to the Castle nor accepted in the village, and yet cannot go home. As he encounters dualities of certainty and doubt, hope and fear, and reason and nonsense, K.’s struggles in the absurd, labyrinthine world where he finds himself seem to reveal an inexplicable truth about the nature of existence. Kafka began The Castle in 1922 and it was never finished, yet this, the last of his three great novels, draws fascinating conclusions that make it feel strangely complete.

 

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Speak, Memory (Nabokov)

Author: Vladimir Nabokov
Date: 1951
Genre: Memoir, Essays
Country: USA

‘Speak, memory’, said Vladimir Nabokov. And immediately there came flooding back to him a host of enchanting recollections – of his comfortable childhood and adolescence, of his rich, liberal-minded father, his beautiful mother, an army of relations and family hangers-on and of grand old houses in St Petersburg and the surrounding countryside in pre-Revolutionary Russia. Young love, butterflies, tutors and a multitude of other themes thread together to weave an autobiography, which is itself a work of art.

 

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It Can’t Happen Here (Lewis)

Author: Sinclair Lewis
Date: 1935
Genre: Political Fiction, Dystopian Fiction
Country: USA

It’s 1935 and discontent is rife in America. From the political margins appears Buzz Windrip, charismatic presidential candidate and ‘inspired guesser at what political doctrines the people would like’. Sweeping to power amid mass elation, he promises wealth for all and the dawn of a glorious new era. Small-town newspaper editor Doremus Jessup is worried, especially when the new regime becomes increasingly authoritarian. But what can one individual do to fight an all-powerful state? Sinclair Lewis’s terrifying cautionary tale pits liberal complacency against popular fascism and shows: yes, it really can happen here.

 

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Real Life of Sebastian Knight, The (Nabokov)*

Author: Vladimir Nabokov
Date: 1941
Genre:
Country: USA

Spurred on by admiration for his novelist half-brother and irritation at the biography written about him by Mr Goodman (‘his slapdash and very misleading book’), the narrator, V, sets out to record Sebastian Knight’s life as he understands it. But buried amid the extensive quoting, digressions, seeming explanations and digs, Sebastian’s erratic and troubled persona remains as elusive as ever.

Nabokov’s first novel written in English, The Real Life of Sebastian Knight is a nuanced, enigmatic portrayal of the conflict between the real and the unreal, and the futile quest for human truth.

 

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Nausea (Sartre)

Author: Jean-Paul Sartre
Date: 1938
Genre: Philosophical Novel
Country: France

Nausea is both the story of the troubled life of a young writer, Antoine Roquentin, and an exposition of one of the most influential and significant philosophical attitudes of modern times – existentialism. The book chronicles his struggle with the realization that he is an entirely free agent in a world devoid of meaning; a world in which he must find his own purpose and then take total responsibility for his choices. A seminal work of contemporary literary philosophy, Nausea evokes and examines the dizzying angst that can come from simply trying to live.

 

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Ark Sakura, The (Abe)

Author: Kōbō Abe
Date: 1984
Genre: Science Fiction
Country: Japan

A recluse known as ‘Mole’ retreats to a vast underground bunker, only to find that strange guests, booby traps and a giant toilet may prove even greater obstacles than nuclear disaster. A science-fiction classic from acclaimed Japanese novelist Kobo Abe, The Ark Sakura‘s Kafkaesque embrace of nuclear disaster and ecological catastrophe is at turns both hilarious and desperate.

 

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Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman, The (Sterne)

Author: Laurence Sterne
Date: 1759
Genre:
Country: UK

The novel purports to be a memoir, but the titular Tristram is an effusive and digressive narrator who begins the story with his conception and doesn’t reach a description of his birth until the third volume. While attempting to explain four accidents in his early life which have doomed him to an unhappy future, Tristram describes domestic conflicts between his irritable father Walter and his gentle Uncle Toby, and inserts humorous discourses on a range of intellectual topics.

 

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At Swim-Two-Birds (O’Brien)

Author: Flann O’Brien
Date: 1939
Genre: Postmodern
Country: Ireland

It is widely considered to be O’Brien’s masterpiece, and one of the most sophisticated examples of metafiction. At Swim-Two-Birds presents itself as a first-person story by an unnamed Irish student of literature. The student believes that “one beginning and one ending for a book was a thing I did not agree with”, and he accordingly sets three apparently quite separate stories in motion.

 

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Recognitions, The (Gaddis)

Author: William Gaddis
Date: 1955
Genre: Postmodern
Country: UK

The Recognitions follows Wyatt Gwyon, a talented painter who turns to forging 15th-century Flemish masters in New York City after failing to find artistic authenticity. Amid a satirical backdrop of a shallow, modern art world, Wyatt deals with a shady dealer (Recktall Brown), moral decay, and his own disillusionment before fleeing to Spain to seek true artistic and personal integrity.

 

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Villette (Brontë)

Author: Charlotte Brontë
Date: 1853
Genre: Romance, Psychological Novel
Country: UK

There she struggles to retain her self-possession in the face of unruly pupils, an initially suspicious headmaster and her own complex feelings, first for the school’s English doctor and then for the dictatorial professor Paul Emmanuel. Drawing on her own deeply unhappy experiences as a governess in Brussels, Charlotte Brontë’s last and most autobiographical novel is a powerfully moving study of isolation and the pain of unrequited love, narrated by a heroine determined to preserve an independent spirit in the face of adverse circumstances.

 

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Julius Caesar (Shakespeare)*

Author: William Shakespeare
Date: 1599
Genre: Play, Historical Tragedy
Country: UK

Fearful that Caesar will become a tyrant, his friends plot to assassinate him in order to save Rome. But the conspirators’ high principles clash with personal malice and ambition, and as they vie to manipulate the mob, the nation is plunged into bloody civil war. A taut, profound drama exploring power and betrayal, Julius Caesar exposes the chasm between public appearance, political rhetoric and bitter reality.

 

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Measure for Measure (Shakespeare)*

Author: William Shakespeare
Date: 1623
Genre: Play, Comedy
Country: UK

A young man is condemned to death for breaking a law forbidding sex outside marriage. When his sister pleads with the Lord Angelo to save him, he offers her a bargain – her brother’s life in exchange for her virginity. One of Shakespeare’s most enigmatic plays, Measure for Measure is a morally complex drama of intricate moves and countermoves that explores falsehood, justice and humanity’s best and basest instincts.

 

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King Lear (Shakespeare)*

Author: William Shakespeare
Date: c. 1606
Genre: Play, Tragedy
Country: UK

Shakespeare’s bleak and brutal tragedy begins when an ageing king, seeking a successor, rejects the young daughter who loves him and misplaces his trust in her malevolent sisters. In return they strip him of his power and condemn him to a wretched wasteland of horror and insanity. Set in a pitiless universe, King Lear is a towering, elemental masterpiece of fierce poetry and vast imaginative scope.

 

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Tenant of Wildfell Hall, The (Brontë)

Author: Anne Brontë
Date: 1848
Genre: Epistolary Novel, Social Criticism
Country: UK

Gilbert Markham is deeply intrigued by Helen Graham, a beautiful and secretive young woman who has moved into nearby Wildfell Hall with her young son. He is quick to offer Helen his friendship, but when her reclusive behaviour becomes the subject of local gossip and speculation, Gilbert begins to wonder whether his trust in her has been misplaced. It is only when she allows Gilbert to read her diary that the truth is revealed and the shocking details of the disastrous marriage she has left behind emerge. Told with great immediacy, combined with wit and irony, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall is a powerful depiction of a woman’s fight for domestic independence and creative freedom.

 

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Daphnis and Chloe (Longus)

Author: Longus
Date: c. 2nd century CE
Genre: Pastoral Novel
Country: Ancient Greece

A tender novel describing eager and inept young love, Daphnis and Chloe tells the story of a baby boy and girl who are discovered separately, two years apart, alone and exposed on a Greek mountainside. Taken in by a goatherd and a shepherd respectively, and raised near the town of Mytilene, they grow to maturity unaware of one another’s existence – until the mischievous god of love, Eros, creates in them a sudden overpowering desire for one another. A masterpiece among early Greek romances, attracting both high praise and moral disapproval, this work has proved an enduringly fertile source of inspiration for musicians, writers and artists from Henry Fielding to Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot and Maurice Ravel. Longus transforms familiar themes from the romance genre – including pirates, dreams, and the supernatural – into a virtuoso love story that is rich in insight, humorous and ironical in its treatment of human sexual experience.

 

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Return of the Native, The (Hardy)

Author: Thomas Hardy
Date: 1878
Genre:
Country: UK

Tempestuous Eustacia Vye passes her days dreaming of passionate love and the escape it may bring from the small community of Egdon Heath. Hearing that Clym Yeobright is to return from Paris, she sets her heart on marrying him, believing that through him she can leave rural life and find fulfilment elsewhere. But she is to be disappointed, for Clym has dreams of his own, and they have little in common with Eustacia’s. Their unhappy marriage causes havoc in the lives of those close to them, in particular Damon Wildeve, Eustacia’s former lover, Clym’s mother and his cousin Thomasin. The Return of the Native illustrates the tragic potential of romantic illusion and how its protagonists fail to recognize their opportunities to control their own destinies.

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Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, The (Stevenson)

Author: Robert Louis Stevenson
Date: 1886
Genre: Gothic, Horror, Detective Fiction
Country: UK

Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde have become synonymous with the idea of a split personality. More than a morality tale, this dark psychological fantasy is also a product of its time, drawing on contemporary theories of class, evolution, criminality, and secret lives. Also in this volume are “The Body Snatcher,” which charts the murky underside of Victorian medical practice, and “Olalla,” a tale of vampirism and “the beast within,” with a beautiful woman at its center.

 

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Tess of the d’Urbervilles (Hardy)*

Author: Thomas Hardy
Date: 1891
Genre: Tragedy, Social Novel
Country: UK

When Tess Durbeyfield is driven by family poverty to claim kinship with the wealthy D’Urbervilles and seek a portion of their family fortune, meeting her ‘cousin’ Alec proves to be her downfall. A very different man, Angel Clare, seems to offer her love and salvation, but Tess must choose whether to reveal her past or remain silent in the hope of a peaceful future. With its sensitive depiction of the wronged Tess and powerful criticism of social convention, Tess of the D’Urbervilles, subtitled “A Pure Woman,” is one of the most moving and poetic of Hardy’s novels.

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Little Women (Alcott)

Author: Louisa May Alcott
Date: 1868
Genre: Bildungsroman, Children’s Literature
Country: USA

Lovely Meg, talented Jo, frail Beth, spoiled Amy: these are hard lessons of poverty and of growing up in New England during the Civil War. Through their dreams, plays, pranks, letters, illnesses, and courtships, women of all ages have become a part of this remarkable family and have felt the deep sadness when Meg leaves the circle of sisters to be married at the end of Part I. Part II, chronicles Meg’s joys and mishaps as a young wife and mother, Jo’s struggle to become a writer, Beth’s tragedy, and Amy’s artistic pursuits and unexpected romance. Based on Louisa May Alcott’s childhood, this lively portrait of nineteenth- century family life possesses a lasting vitality that has endeared it to generations of readers.

 

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Atonement (McEwan)*

Author: Ian McEwan
Date: 2001
Genre: Metafiction
Country: UK

Set in three time periods, 1935 England, Second World War England and France, and present-day England, it covers an upper-class girl’s half-innocent mistake that ruins lives, her adulthood in the shadow of that mistake, and a reflection on the nature of writing.

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Absalom, Absalom! (Faulkner)

Author: William Faulkner
Date: 1936
Genre: Southern Gothic
Country: USA

Published in 1936, Absalom, Absalom! is considered by many to be William Faulkner’s masterpiece. Although the novel’s complex and fragmented structure poses considerable difficulty to readers, the book’s literary merits place it squarely in the ranks of America’s finest novels. The story concerns Thomas Sutpen, a poor man who finds wealth and then marries into a respectable family. His ambition and extreme need for control bring about his ruin and the ruin of his family. Sutpen’s story is told by several narrators, allowing the reader to observe variations in the saga as it is recounted by different speakers. This unusual technique spotlights one of the novel’s central questions: To what extent can people know the truth about the past?

 

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Fall, The (Camus)

Author: Albert Camus
Date: 1956
Genre: Philosophical novel
Country: France

Jean-Baptiste Clamence is a soul in turmoil. Over several drunken nights in an Amsterdam bar, he regales a chance acquaintance with his story. From this successful former lawyer and seemingly model citizen a compelling, self-loathing catalogue of guilt, hypocrisy and alienation pours forth.

 

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Light in August (Faulkner)*

Author: William Faulkner
Date: 1932
Genre: Southern Gothic, Modernist
Country: USA

Light in August, a novel that contrasts stark tragedy with hopeful perseverance in the face of mortality, which features some of Faulkner’s most memorable characters: guileless, dauntless Lena Grove, in search of the father of her unborn child; Reverend Gail Hightower, a lonely outcast haunted by visions of Confederate glory; and Joe Christmas, a desperate, enigmatic drifter consumed by his mixed ancestry.

 

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Sister Carrie (Dreiser)

Author: Theodore Dreiser
Date: 1900
Genre: Literary Realism
Country: USA

Published by Doubleday in 1900, it gained a reputation as a shocker, for Dreiser had dared to give the public a heroine whose “cosmopolitan standard of virtue” brings her from Wisconsin, with four dollars in her purse, to a suite at the Waldorf and glittering fame as an actress. With Sister Carrie, the original manuscript of which is in the New York Public Library collections, Dreiser told a tale not “sufficiently delicate” for many of its first readers and critics, but

 

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Macbeth (Shakespeare)*

Author: William Shakespeare
Date: c. 1606
Genre: Play, Tragedy
Country: UK

One night on the heath, the brave and respected general Macbeth encounters three witches who foretell that he will become king of Scotland. At first skeptical, he’s urged on by the ruthless, single-minded ambitions of Lady Macbeth, who suffers none of her husband’s doubt. But seeing the prophecy through to the bloody end leads them both spiraling into paranoia, tyranny, madness, and murder.

 

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Othello (Shakespeare)*

Author: William Shakespeare
Date: c. 1603
Genre: Play, Tragedy
Country: UK

In Othello, Shakespeare creates a powerful drama of a marriage that begins with fascination (between the exotic Moor Othello and the Venetian lady Desdemona), with elopement, and with intense mutual devotion and that ends precipitately with jealous rage and violent deaths. He sets this story in the romantic world of the Mediterranean, moving the action from Venice to the island of Cyprus and giving it an even more exotic coloring with stories of Othello’s African past. Shakespeare builds so many differences into his hero and heroine—differences of race, of age, of cultural background—that one should not, perhaps, be surprised that the marriage ends disastrously. But most people who see or read the play feel that the love that the play presents between Othello and Desdemona is so strong that it would have overcome all these differences were it not for the words and actions of Othello’s standard-bearer, Iago, who hates Othello and sets out to destroy him by destroying his love for Desdemona. As Othello succumbs to Iago’s insinuations that Desdemona is unfaithful, fascination—which dominates the early acts of the play—turns to horror, especially for the audience. We are confronted by spectacles of a generous and trusting Othello in the grip of Iago’s schemes; of an innocent Desdemona, who has given herself up entirely to her love for Othello only to be subjected to his horrifying verbal and physical assaults, the outcome of Othello’s mistaken convictions about her faithlessness.

 

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Faust (Goethe)

Author: Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Date: 1825–1832
Genre: Play, Tragedy
Country: Germany

Goethe’s Faust reworks the late medieval myth of a brilliant scholar so disillusioned he resolves to make a contract with Mephistopheles. The devil will do all he asks on Earth and seeks to grant him a moment in life so glorious that he will wish it to last forever. But if Faust does bid the moment stay, he falls to Mephistopheles and must serve him after death. In this first part of Goethe’s great work, the embittered thinker and Mephistopheles enter into their agreement, and soon Faust is living a rejuvenated life and winning the love of the beautiful Gretchen. But in this compelling tragedy of arrogance, unfulfilled desire, and self-delusion, Faust heads inexorably toward an infernal destruction.

 

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Lady Chatterley’s Lover (Lawrence)*

Author: D. H. Lawrence
Date: 1932
Genre: Erotic Romance
Country: USA

With her soft brown hair, lithe figure and big, wondering eyes, Constance Chatterley is possessed of a certain vitality. Yet she is deeply unhappy; married to an invalid, she is almost as inwardly paralyzed as her husband Clifford is paralyzed below the waist. It is not until she finds refuge in the arms of Mellors the game-keeper, a solitary man of a class apart, that she feels regenerated. Together they move from an outer world of chaos towards an inner world of fulfillment.

 

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Beowulf (Unknown)

Author: Unknown
Date: c. 700–1000 AD
Genre: Epic Poetry
Country: UK

Beowulf, a hero of the Geats, comes to the aid of Hrothgar, the king of the Danes, whose mead hall Heorot has been under attack by the monster Grendel for twelve years. After Beowulf slays him, Grendel’s mother tries to take revenge and is in turn defeated. Victorious, Beowulf goes home to Geatland and becomes king of the Geats. Fifty years later, Beowulf defeats a dragon, but is mortally wounded in the battle. After his death, his attendants cremate his body and erect a barrow on a headland in his memory.

 

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Awakening, The (Chopin)

Author: Kate Chopin
Date: 1899
Genre: Feminist Literature
Country: USA

Set in New Orleans and on the Louisiana Gulf coast at the end of the 19th century, the plot centers on Edna Pontellier and her struggle between her increasingly unorthodox views on femininity and motherhood with the prevailing social attitudes of the turn-of-the-century American South.

 

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Heart Is a Lonely Hunter, The (McCullers)*

Author: Carson McCullers
Date: 1940
Genre: Frame Story, Short Stories
Country: Italy

At its center is the deaf-mute John Singer, who becomes the confidant for various types of misfits in a Georgia mill town during the 1930s. Each one yearns for escape from small town life. When Singer’s mute companion goes insane, Singer moves into the Kelly house, where Mick Kelly, the book’s heroine (and loosely based on McCullers), finds solace in her music. Wonderfully attuned to the spiritual isolation that underlies the human condition, and with a deft sense for racial tensions in the South, McCullers spins a haunting, unforgettable story that gives voice to the rejected, the forgotten, and the mistreated — and, through Mick Kelly, gives voice to the quiet, intensely personal search for beauty.

 

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Canterbury Tales, The (Chaucer)*

Author: Geoffrey Chaucer
Date: c. 1400
Genre: Short Stories
Country: UK

Lively, absorbing, often outrageously funny, Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales is a work of genius, an undisputed classic that has held a special appeal for each generation of readers. The Tales gathers twenty-nine of literature’s most enduring (and endearing) characters in a vivid group portrait that captures the full spectrum of medieval society, from the exalted Knight to the humble Plowman.

 

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Importance of Being Earnest, The (Wilde)

Author: Oscar Wilde
Date: 1895
Genre: Play, Drawing-Room
Country: UK

Oscar Wilde’s madcap farce about mistaken identities, secret engagements, and lovers entanglements still delights readers more than a century after its 1895 publication and premiere performance. The rapid-fire wit and eccentric characters of The Importance of Being Earnest have made it a mainstay of the high school curriculum for decades.

 

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Hamlet (Shakespeare)

Author: William Shakespeare
Date: c. 1599 – 1601
Genre: Play, Tragedy
Country: UK

Among Shakespeare’s plays, “Hamlet” is considered by many his masterpiece. Among actors, the role of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, is considered the jewel in the crown of a triumphant theatrical career. Now Kenneth Branagh plays the leading role and co-directs a brillant ensemble performance. Three generations of legendary leading actors, many of whom first assembled for the Oscar-winning film “Henry V”, gather here to perform the rarely heard complete version of the play. This clear, subtly nuanced, stunning dramatization, presented by The Renaissance Theatre Company in association with “Bbc” Broadcasting, features such luminaries as Sir John Gielgud, Derek Jacobi, Emma Thompson and Christopher Ravenscroft. It combines a full cast with stirring music and sound effects to bring this magnificent Shakespearen classic vividly to life. Revealing new riches with each listening, this production of “Hamlet” is an invaluable aid for students, teachers and all true lovers of Shakespeare – a recording to be treasured for decades to come.

 

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Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, The (Murakami)

Author: Haruki Murakami
Date: 1997
Genre: 
Country: Japan

A man’s search for his wife’s missing cat evolves into a surreal journey through Tokyo’s underbelly, where he encounters a bizarre collection of characters with strange stories and peculiar obsessions. As he delves deeper, he finds himself entangled in a web of dreamlike scenarios, historical digressions, and metaphysical investigations. His reality becomes increasingly intertwined with the dream world as he grapples with themes of fate, identity, and the dark side of the human psyche.

 

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Hopscotch (Shikibu)

Author: Julio Cortázar
Date: 1963
Genre: Stream of Consciousness, Avant Garde
Country: Argentina

This avant-garde novel invites readers into a non-linear narrative that can be read in two different orders, following the life of Horacio Oliveira, an Argentine intellectual living in Paris with his lover, La Maga. The story explores philosophical and metaphysical themes, delving into the nature of reality and the human condition, while also examining the struggles of intellectual and emotional life. The second part of the novel takes place in Buenos Aires, where Horacio returns after La Maga disappears, and where he grapples with his past, his identity, and his place in the world.

 

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Oedipus Rex (Sophocles)

Author: Sophocles
Date: c. 429 BCE
Genre: Play, Tragedy
Country: Ancient Greece

“Oedipus the King” is a tragic play that revolves around the life of Oedipus, the king of Thebes, who is prophesied to kill his father and marry his mother. Despite his attempts to avoid this fate, Oedipus unknowingly fulfills the prophecy. When he discovers the truth about his actions, he blinds himself in despair. The play explores themes of fate, free will, and the quest for truth, highlighting the tragic consequences of human hubris and ignorance.

 

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All Quiet on the Western Front (Remarque)

Original Title: Im Westen nichts Neues
Author: Erich Maria Remarque
Date: 1928
Genre: War
Country: German

The novel tells the story of a young German soldier, Paul Bäumer, and his experiences during World War I. The narrative explores the physical and emotional toll of war, the camaraderie between soldiers, and the disillusionment of a generation thrown into a brutal conflict. The protagonist and his friends grapple with survival, fear, and the loss of innocence, providing a stark and poignant critique of the futility and destructiveness of war.

 

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Midnight’s Children (Rushdie)*

Author: Salman Rushdie
Date: 1981
Genre: Magical Realism, Historical
Country: UK

The novel tells the story of Saleem Sinai, who was born at the exact moment when India gained its independence. As a result, he shares a mystical connection with other children born at the same time, all of whom possess unique, magical abilities. As Saleem grows up, his life mirrors the political and cultural changes happening in his country, from the partition of India and Pakistan, to the Bangladesh War of Independence. The story is a blend of historical fiction and magical realism, exploring themes of identity, fate, and the power of storytelling.

 

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Aeneid, The (Virgil)

Author: Virgil
Date: c. 29 and 19 BCE
Genre: Epic Poetry
Country: Ancient Greece

This epic poem tells the story of Aeneas, a Trojan who travels to Italy, where he becomes the ancestor of the Romans. It includes a series of prophecies about Rome’s future and the deeds of heroic individuals, and is divided into two sections, the first illustrating the hero’s journey and the second detailing the wars and battles that ensue as Aeneas attempts to establish a new home in Italy. The narrative is deeply imbued with themes of duty, fate, and divine intervention.

 

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Things Fall Apart (Achebe)*

Author: Chinua Achebe
Date: 1958
Genre: Historical
Country: UK

This novel explores the life of Okonkwo, a respected warrior in the Umuofia clan of the Igbo tribe in Nigeria during the late 1800s. Okonkwo’s world is disrupted by the arrival of European missionaries and the subsequent clash of cultures. The story examines the effects of colonialism on African societies, the clash between tradition and change, and the struggle between individual and society. Despite his efforts to resist the changes, Okonkwo’s life, like his society, falls apart.

 

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Invisible Man (Ellison)

Author: Ralph Ellison
Date: 1952
Genre: Bildungsroman, African American
Country: USA

The novel is a poignant exploration of a young African-American man’s journey through life, where he grapples with issues of race, identity, and individuality in mid-20th-century America. The protagonist, who remains unnamed throughout the story, considers himself socially invisible due to his race. The narrative follows his experiences from the South to the North, from being a student to a worker, and his involvement in the Brotherhood, a political organization. The book is a profound critique of societal norms and racial prejudice, highlighting the protagonist’s struggle to assert his identity in a world that refuses to see him.

 

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Mrs. Dalloway (Woolf)

Author: Virginia Woolf
Date: 1925
Genre: 
Country: UK

The novel chronicles a day in the life of Clarissa Dalloway, a high-society woman in post-World War I England, as she prepares for a party she is hosting that evening. Throughout the day, she encounters various characters from her past, including a former suitor and a shell-shocked war veteran. The narrative jumps back and forth in time and in and out of different characters’ minds, exploring themes of mental illness, existentialism, and the nature of time.

 

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Middlemarch (Eliot)

Author: George Eliot
Date: 1871
Genre:
Country: UK

Set in the fictitious English town of Middlemarch during the early 19th century, the novel explores the complex web of relationships in a close-knit society. It follows the lives of several characters, primarily Dorothea Brooke, a young woman of idealistic fervor, and Tertius Lydgate, an ambitious young doctor, who both grapple with societal expectations, personal desires, and moral dilemmas. Their stories intertwine with a rich tapestry of other townsfolk, reflecting themes of love, marriage, ambition, and reform, making a profound commentary on the human condition.

 

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Divine Comedy, The (Alighieri)

Author: Dante Alighieri
Date: c. 1321
Genre: Narrative Poem
Country: Italy

In this epic poem, the protagonist embarks on an extraordinary journey through Hell (Inferno), Purgatory (Purgatorio), and Paradise (Paradiso). Guided by the ancient Roman poet Virgil and his beloved Beatrice, he encounters various historical and mythological figures in each realm, witnessing the eternal consequences of earthly sins and virtues. The journey serves as an allegory for the soul’s progression towards God, offering profound insights into the nature of good and evil, free will, and divine justice.

 

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Diary of a Young Girl, The (Frank)

Author: Anne Frank
Date: 1947
Genre: Autobiography
Country: Netherlands

Discovered in the attic where she spent the final years of her life, Anne Frank’s Diary has become a timeless classic; a powerful reminder of the horrors of war and a moving testament to the resilience of the human spirit.

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Pride and Prejudice (Austen)

Author: Jane Austen
Date: 1813
Genre: Romance
Country: UK

The romantic clash between the opinionated Elizabeth and her proud beau, Mr. Darcy, is a splendid performance of civilized sparring. And Jane Austen’s radiant wit sparkles as her characters dance a delicate quadrille of flirtation and intrigue, making this book the most superb comedy of manners of Regency England.

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Egyptian Book of the Dead (Anonymous)

Author: Various
Date: c. 1550 BC
Genre: Funerary Text
Country: Ancient Egypt

Embodying a ritual to be performed for the dead, with detailed instructions for the behavior of the disembodied spirit in the Land of the Gods, it served as the most important repository of religious authority for some three thousand years. Chapters were carved on the pyramids of the ancient 5th Dynasty, texts were written in papyrus, and selections were painted on mummy cases well into the Christian Era. In a certain sense it stood behind all Egyptian civilization.

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Poems (Sappho)

Author: Sappho
Date: c. 630 – c. 570 BCE
Genre: Lyric Poetry
Country: Ancient Greece

Sappho is known for her lyric poetry, written to be sung while accompanied by music. In ancient times, Sappho was widely regarded as one of the greatest lyric poets and was given names such as the “Tenth Muse” and “The Poetess”. Most of Sappho’s poetry is now lost, and what is not has mostly survived in fragmentary form; only the Ode to Aphrodite is certainly complete.

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I Love Boosters (Riley)

Director: Boots Riley
Stars: Keke Palmer, Naomi Ackie, Taylour Paige
Genre: Comedy, Science Fiction
Country: USA

A crew of professional shoplifters known as The Velvet Gang take aim at a cutthroat fashion maven.

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Arco (Bienvenu)

Director: Ugo Bienvenu
Stars: Margot Ringard Oldra, Oscar Tresanini, Nathanaël Perrot
Genre: Animation, Science Fiction
Country: France, UK, USA

10-year-old Arco lives in a far future. During his first flight in his rainbow suit, he loses control and falls into the past. Iris, a girl his age from 2075, comes to his rescue and tries by all means to help send him back to his era.

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Paul McCartney: Man on the Run (Neville)

Director: Morgan Neville
Stars: Paul McCartney, Linda McCartney, Denny Laine
Genre: Documentary
Country: UK, USA

Paul McCartney forms new band Wings after Beatles breakup. Archival home footage shows his life with Linda, who influenced his music. The film follows Wings from formation through the 1970s, during which McCartney wrote hit songs.

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Leviticus (Chiarella)

Director: Adrian Chiarella
Stars: Joe Bird, Stacy Clausen, Mia Wasikowska
Genre: Horror
Country: USA, Australia

Two teenage boys must escape a violent entity that takes the form of the person they desire most — each other.

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Invite, The (Wilde)

Director: Olivia Wilde
Stars: Olivia Wilde, Seth Rogen, Penélope Cruz, Edward Norton
Genre: Comedy, Drama
Country: USA

Joe and Angela’s marriage is on thin ice. When they invite their enigmatic upstairs neighbors for a dinner party, the night spirals into unexpected places.

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Josephine (de Araújo)

Director: Beth de Araújo
Stars: Mason Reeves, Channing Tatum, Gemma Chan
Genre: Crime, Thriller, Drama
Country: USA

After eight-year-old Josephine accidentally witnesses a crime in Golden Gate Park, she begins to act out violently to protect herself. This emotional trauma leads to conflicts between her parents as they search for justice, and a way to feel safe again.

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Blue Heron (Romvari)

Director: Sophy Romvari
Stars: Eylul Guven, Amy Zimmer, Iringó Réti
Genre: Drama
Country: Canada, Hungary, USA

In the late 1990s, a family of six settles into their new home on Vancouver Island, as internal dynamics are slowly revealed through the experiences of the youngest child, Sasha. Their fresh start is interrupted by the increasingly dangerous behavior of Jeremy, the family’s oldest child.

 

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Happyend (Sora)

Director: Neo Sora
Stars: Hayato Kurihara, Yukito Hidaka, Yuta Hayashi
Genre: Sci Fi, Fantasy, Drama
Country: Japan, USA, UK, Singapore

In a near-future Japanese city bracing for a devastating earthquake, a group of teenage friends navigate personal struggles and fractured bonds amid rising tension.

 

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Sister Midnight (Kandhari)

Director: Karan Kandhari
Stars: Radhika Apte, Ashok Pathak, Chhaya Kadam
Genre: Comedy, Drama
Country: India, UK, Sweden

In Mumbai, an arranged marriage spirals into darkness as the spineless husband watches his wife morph into a ruthless, feral force within their marital confines.

 

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Vulcanizadora (Potrykus)

Director: Joel Potrykus
Stars: Joshua Burge, Joel Potrykus, Sherryl Despres
Genre: Thriller, Drama, Comedy
Country: USA

Two friends trudge through a Michigan forest with the intention of following through on a disturbing pact. Once their plan goes shockingly awry, the haunting consequences of their failure can’t stay hidden for long.

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Riefenstahl (Veiel)

Director: Andres Veiel
Stars: Leni Riefenstahl, Horst Kettner, Adolf Hitler
Genre: Documentary
Country: Germany, Italy

Explores Leni Riefenstahl’s artistic legacy and her complex ties to the Nazi regime, juxtaposing her self-portrayal with evidence suggesting awareness of the regime’s atrocities.

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I’m Still Here (Salles)

Director: Walter Salles
Stars: Fernanda Torres, Fernanda Montenegro, Selton Mello
Genre: Biography, Drama
Country: Brazil, France

Brazil, 1971: a country in the tightening grip of a military dictatorship. A mother is forced to reinvent herself when her family’s life is shattered by an act of arbitrary violence. Based on Marcelo Rubens Paiva’s best-selling memoir.

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Little Prayer, A (MacLachlan)

Director: Angus MacLachlan
Stars: Jane Levy, Will Pullen, David Strathairn
Genre: Drama
Country: USA

A loving father grapples with how to protect his daughter-in-law when he discovers that his son is having an affair in a sensitive and searching portrait of a Southern family.

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Familiar Touch (Friedland)

Director: Sarah Friedland
Stars: Kathleen Chalfant, Caroline Michelle Smith, Andy McQueen, H. Jon Benjamin
Genre: Drama
Country: USA

An octogenarian woman transitions to life in assisted living as she contends with her conflicting relationship to herself and her caregivers amidst her shifting memory, age identity, and desires.

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Young Mothers (Dardenne, Dardenne)

Director: Luc Dardenne, Jean-Pierre Dardenne
Stars: Lucie Laruelle, Babette Verbeek, Elsa Houben
Genre: Drama
Country: Belgium, France

Five young mothers living in a shelter strive for a better future for themselves and kids amidst challenging upbringings.

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Obex (Birney)

Director: Albert Birney
Stars: Albert Birney, Callie Hernandez, Frank Mosley
Genre: Fantasy, Horror, Sci Fi
Country: USA

Conor Marsh’s secluded life is disrupted when he plays the OBEX game. His dog Sandy disappears, blurring reality and game. Conor enters the OBEX world to rescue Sandy, navigating its strange realms.

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Orwell: 2+2=5 (Peck)

Director: Raoul Peck
Stars: N/A
Genre: Documentary, Biography
Country: USA, France

An investigation into the life, work, and enduring influence of the writer George Orwell, connecting his ideas to the contemporary world.

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Influencers (Harder)

Director: Kurtis David Harder
Stars: Cassandra Naud, Emily Tennant, Georgina Campbell
Genre: Horror, Thriller
Country: USA, Canada

In Southern France, a young woman’s chilling fascination with murder and identity theft sends her life into a whirlwind of chaos.

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Late Shift (Volpe)

Director: Petra Volpe
Stars: Leonie Benesch, Sonja Riesen, Selma Aldin
Genre: Thriller, Drama
Country: Switzerland, Germany

Floria, a dedicated nurse, tirelessly serves in an understaffed hospital ward. However, today her shift becomes a tense and urgent race against the clock.

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Stranger, The (Haffad, Ozon)

Director: Khaled Haffad, François Ozon
Stars: Benjamin Voisin, Rebecca Marder, Pierre Lottin
Genre: Crime, Drama
Country: France

In 1930s Algeria, the daily life of an indifferent Frenchman is shaken by the death of his mother and a fateful encounter on a beach.

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Sound of Falling (Schilinski)

Director: Mascha Schilinski
Stars: Hanna Heckt, Lena Urzendowsky, Laeni Geiseler
Genre: Drama, War
Country: Germany

A remote German farm harbors generations of secrets. Four women, separated by decades but united by trauma, uncover the truth behind its weathered walls.

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Chronology of Water, The (Stewart)

Director: Kristen Stewart
Stars: Imogen Poots, Thora Birch, Susannah Flood
Genre: Biography, Drama, Romance
Country: France, Latvia, UK, USA

A woman, after an abusive childhood, escapes into competitive swimming, sexual experimentation, toxic relationships, and addiction before finding her voice through writing.

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Lurker (Russell)

Director: Alex Russell
Stars: Théodore Pellerin, Archie Madekwe, Zack Fox
Genre: Crime, Drama, Music
Country: USA

A retail employee infiltrates the inner circle of an artist on the verge of stardom. As he gets closer to the budding music star, access and proximity become a matter of life and death.

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Kokuho (Sang-il)

Director: Lee Sang-il
Stars: Ryo Yoshizawa, Ryusei Yokohama, Mitsuki Takahata
Genre: Drama
Country: Japan

In post-war Japan’s economic boom, gangster family-born Kikuo Tachibana finds himself adopted by a kabuki actor. Despite life’s challenges, he develops into a gifted performer.

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Splitsville (Covino)

Director: Michael Angelo Covino
Stars: Emily Korteweg, Michael Angelo Covino, Kyle Marvin
Genre: Comedy
Country: USA

When Ashley asks for a divorce, the good-natured Carey runs to his friends, Julie and Paul, for support. Their secret to happiness is an open marriage; that is, until Carey crosses the line and throws all of their relationships into chaos.

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Obsession (Barker)

Director: Curry Barker
Stars: Michael Johnston, Inde Navarrette, Cooper Tomlinson
Genre: Horror
Country: USA

After breaking the mysterious “One Wish Willow” to win his crush’s heart, a hopeless romantic finds himself getting exactly what he asked for but soon discovers that some desires come at a dark, sinister price.

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Perfect Neighbor, The (Gandbhir)

Director: Geeta Gandbhir
Stars: N/A
Genre: Documentary
Country: USA

A minor disagreement between neighbors in Florida takes a lethal turn, with police body camera footage and interviews probing the aftermath of the state’s controversial “stand your ground” laws.

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Mastermind, The (Reichardt)

Director: Kaouther Ben Hania
Stars: Josh O’Connor, Alana Haim, Hope Davis
Genre: Crime
Country: UK, USA

In 1970, failed architect James Blaine Mooney and cohorts wander into a museum in broad daylight and steal four paintings. When holding onto the art proves more difficult than stealing them, Mooney is relegated to a life on the run.

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Warfare (Mendoza, Garland)

Director: May Mendoza, Alex Garland
Stars: D’Pharaoh Woon-A-Tai, Will Poulter, Cosmo Jarvis
Genre: Action, Drama, War
Country: USA, UK

A platoon of Navy SEALs embark on a dangerous mission in Ramadi, Iraq, with the chaos and brotherhood of war retold through their memories of the event.

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Plague, The (Polinger)

Director: Charlie Polinger
Stars: Everett Blunck, Kayo Martin, Kenny Rasmussen
Genre: Drama, Thriller
Country: USA, Romania

A socially awkward tween endures the ruthless hierarchy at a water polo camp, his anxiety spiraling into psychological turmoil over the summer.

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Redux Redux (McManus, McManus)

Director: Kevin McManus, Matthew McManus
Stars: Michaela McManus
Genre: Crime, Action, Adventure
Country: USA

Irene Kelly travels through parallel universes, repeatedly killing her daughter’s murderer. As she becomes consumed by vengeance, her humanity hangs in the balance.

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Sirāt (Laxe)

Director: Óliver Laxe
Stars: Sergi López, Bruno Núñez Arjona, Richard Bellamy
Genre: Drama, Action, Adventure
Country: Spain, France

A father, accompanied by his son, goes looking for his missing daughter in North Africa.

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Pillion (Lighton)

Director: Harry Lighton
Stars: Harry Melling, Alexander Skarsgård, Douglas Hodge
Genre: Romance, Drama, Comedy
Country: UK, Ireland

A directionless man is swept off his feet when an enigmatic, impossibly handsome biker takes him on as his submissive.

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More Than Ever (Atef)

Director: Emily Atef
Stars: Vicky Krieps, Gaspard Ulliel, Bjørn Floberg, Sophie Langevin
Genre: Drama, Romance
Country: France, Germany, Luxembourg, Norway

Hélène, a 33-year-old woman from Bordeaux, France, lives happily as a couple with Mathieu, her husband of many years. Her life turns upside down the day she learns she has a rare lung disease. Thanks to a blog, she discovers Norway and decides to follow her instinct. Despite all the love she has for her life partner Mathieu, who is very supportive through her illness, she leaves him behind in France and will cross all Europe to Norway alone in search of a new path and to meet a blogger named Mister that she found on the internet.

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Rimini (Seidl)

Director: Ulrich Seidl
Stars: Michael Thomas, Tessa Göttlicher, Hans-Michael Rehberg
Genre: Drama
Country: Austria, France, Germany

Richie Bravo, once upon a time a successful pop star, chases after his faded fame in wintry Rimini. Trapped between permanent intoxication and concerts for busloads of tourists, his world starts to collapse when his adult daughter breaks into his life.

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Enys Men (Jenkin)

Director: Mark Jenkin
Stars: Mary Woodvine, Edward Rowe, Flo Crowe, John Woodvine
Genre: Drama, Horror
Country: UK

A wildlife volunteer on an uninhabited island off the British coast descends into a terrifying madness that challenges her grip on reality and pushes her into a living nightmare.

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Godland (Pálmason)

Director: Hlynur Pálmason
Stars: Elliott Crosset Hove, Vic Carmen Sonne, Ingvar E. Sigurðsson
Genre: Drama
Country: Denmark, France, Iceland, Sweden

In the late 19th century, a young Danish priest travels to a remote part of Iceland to build a church and photograph its people. But the deeper he goes into the unforgiving landscape, the more he strays from his purpose, the mission and morality.

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Hundreds of Beavers (Cheslik)

Director: Mike Cheslik
Stars: Ryland Brickson Cole Tews, Olivia Graves, Doug Mancheski
Genre: Adventure, Comedy, Action
Country: USA

In the 19th century, a drunken applejack salesman must go from zero to hero and become North America’s greatest fur trapper by defeating hundreds of beavers.

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Vesper (Buožytė, Samper)

Director: Kristina Buožytė, Bruno Samper
Stars: Raffiella Chapman, Eddie Marsan, Rosy McEwen
Genre: Science Fiction, Drama, Adventure, Fantasy
Country: Belgium, France, Lithuania

After the collapse of Earth’s ecosystem, Vesper, a 13-year-old girl struggling to survive with her paralyzed Father, meets a mysterious Woman with a secret that forces Vesper to use her wits, strength and bio-hacking abilities to fight for the possibility of a future.

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Eternal Spring (Loftus)

Director: Jason Loftus
Stars: Daxiong, Jin Xuezhe, Lan Lihua, Wang Jianmin
Genre: Animation, History, Documentary
Country: Canada

In March 2002, a state TV signal in China gets hacked by members of the banned spiritual group Falun Gong. Their goal is to counter the government narrative about their practice. In the aftermath, police raids sweep Changchun City, and comic book illustrator Daxiong (Justice League, Star Wars), a Falun Gong practitioner, is forced to flee. He arrives in North America, blaming the hijacking for worsening an already violent repression. But his views are challenged when he meets the lone surviving participant to have escaped China, now living in Seoul, South Korea.

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Watcher (Okuno)

Director: Chloe Okuno
Stars: Maika Monroe, Karl Glusman, Burn Gorman, Mãdãlina Anea
Genre: Thriller, Mystery, Horror
Country: United Arab Emirates, USA

As a serial killer stalks the city, Julia — a young actress who just moved to town with her husband — notices a mysterious stranger watching her from across the street.

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Hatching (Bergholm)

Director: Hanna Bergholm
Stars: Siiri Solalinna, Sophia Heikkilä, Jani Volanen, Reino Nordin
Genre: Fantasy, Horror, Drama
Country: Belgium, Finland, Norway, Sweden

12 year old Tinja is desperate to please her mother, a woman obsessed with presenting the image of a perfect family. One night, Tinja finds a strange egg. What hatches is beyond belief.

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Wounded Fawn, A (Stevens)

Director: Travis Stevens
Stars: Josh Ruben, Sarah Lind, Malin Barr, Katie Kuang
Genre: Horror
Country: USA

A local museum curator who is dipping her toe back into the dating pool is targeted by a charming serial killer. When a fateful romantic getaway between the two becomes a tense game of cat and mouse, both must confront the madness within him.

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All Quiet on the Western Front (Berger)

Director: Edward Berger
Stars: Felix Kammerer, Albrecht Schuch, Aaron Hilmer
Genre: History, Drama, War
Country: Germany

Paul Baumer and his friends Albert and Muller, egged on by romantic dreams of heroism, voluntarily enlist in the German army. Full of excitement and patriotic fervour, the boys enthusiastically march into a war they believe in. But once on the Western Front, they discover the soul-destroying horror of World War I.

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Till (Chukwu)

Director: Chinonye Chukwu
Stars: Danielle Deadwyler, Jalyn Hall, Frankie Faison
Genre: Drama, History
Country: USA, UK

The true story of Mamie Till Mobley’s relentless pursuit of justice for her 14 year old son, Emmett Till, who, in 1955, was lynched while visiting his cousins in Mississippi.

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Girl Picture (Haapasalo)

Director: Alli Haapasalo
Stars: Aamu Milonoff, Eleonoora Kauhanen, Linnea Leino
Genre: Drama, Romance
Country: Finland

Best friends Mimmi and Rönkkö support each other unconditionally. They want to live adventurous lives, loaded with experiences and passion. Emma on the contrary has given her whole life to figure skating. Nothing gets between her and success. But when the girls meet, life opens whole new paths, and they all rocket in new directions. While Mimmi and Emma experience the earth moving effects of first love, Rönkkö is on a quest to find pleasure. Three Fridays is all it takes to turn their worlds upside down.

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Living (Hermanus)

Director: Oliver Hermanus
Stars: Bill Nighy, Aimee Lou Wood, Alex Sharp, Tom Burke
Genre: Drama
Country: Japan, Sweden, UK

London, 1953. Mr. Williams, a veteran civil servant, is an important cog within the city’s bureaucracy as it struggles to rebuild in the aftermath of World War II. Buried under paperwork at the office and lonely at home, his life has long felt empty and meaningless. Then a devastating medical diagnosis forces him to take stock, and to try and grasp some fulfilment before it passes permanently beyond reach.

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Benediction (Davies)

Director: Terence Davies
Stars: Jack Lowden, Peter Capaldi, Simon Russell Beale
Genre: Drama, History, War
Country: USA, UK

Poet Siegfried Sassoon survived the horrors of fighting in the First World War and was decorated for his bravery, but became a vocal critic of the government’s continuation of the war when he returned from service. Adored by members of the aristocracy as well as stars of London’s literary and stage world, he embarked on affairs with several men as he attempted to come to terms with his homosexuality.

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Hero, A (Farhadi)

Director: Asghar Farhadi
Stars: Amir Jadidi, Mohsen Tanabandeh, Fereshteh Sadr Orafaee
Genre: Drama
Country: France, Iran

Rahim is in prison because of a debt he was unable to repay. During a two-day leave, he tries to convince his creditor to withdraw his complaint against the payment of part of the sum. But things don’t go as planned. Is he truly a hero?

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You Won’t Be Alone (Stolevski)

Director: Goran Stolevski
Stars: Sara Klimoska, Anamaria Marinca, Alice Englert
Genre: Drama, Horror
Country: Australia, UK

In an isolated mountain village in 19th century Macedonia, a young feral witch accidentally kills a peasant. She assumes the peasant’s shape to see what life is like in her skin, igniting a deep seated curiosity to experience life inside the bodies of others.

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Fabelmans, The (Spielberg)

Director: Steven Spielberg
Stars: Gabriel LaBelle, Michelle Williams, Paul Dano, Seth Rogen
Genre: Drama
Country: USA

Growing up in post-World War II era Arizona, young Sammy Fabelman aspires to become a filmmaker as he reaches adolescence, but soon discovers a shattering family secret and explores how the power of films can help him see the truth.

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Bad Press (Landsberry-Baker, Peeler)

Director: Rebecca Landsberry-Baker, Joe Peeler
Stars: N/A
Genre: Documentary
Country: UK

When the Muscogee Nation suddenly begins censoring its free press, a rogue reporter fights to expose her government’s corruption in a historic battle that will have ramifications for all of Indian country.

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Chicken for Linda! (Malta, Laudenbach)

Director: Chiara Malta, Sébastien Laudenbach
Stars: Mélinée Leclerc, Clotilde Hesme, Laetitia Dosch, Estéban
Genre: Animation
Country: France, Italy

Single mother Paulette decides to make up for her mistake by cooking a chicken with peppers for her daughter — only she can’t cook and shopkeepers are on strike.

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Housekeeping for Beginners (Stolevski)

Director: Goran Stolevski
Stars: Anamaria Marinca, Alina Serban, Samson Selim
Genre: Drama, Comedy
Country: Australia, Croatia, Kosovo, North Macedonia, Poland, Serbia, Sweden, USA

Dita, who, despite never aspiring to be a mother, finds herself compelled to raise her girlfriend’s two daughters—Mia, a tiny troublemaker, and Vanesa, a rebellious teenager. As their individual wills clash, a heartwarming story unfolds about an unlikely family’s struggle to stay together.

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All Dirt Roads Taste of Salt (Jackson)

Director: Raven Jackson
Stars: Kaylee Nicole Johnson, Chris Chalk, Jayah Henry
Genre: Drama
Country: USA

Tender caresses and enveloping embraces are portals into the life of Mack, a Black woman in Mississippi. Winding through the anticipation, love, and heartbreak she experiences from childhood to adulthood, the expressionist journey is an ode to connection — with loved ones and with place.

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Terrestrial Verses (Asgari, Khatami)

Director: Ali Asgari, Alireza Khatami
Stars: Majid Salehi, Gohar Kheyrandish, Farzin Mohades
Genre: Drama, Comedy
Country: Iran

A satirical take on the mundane absurdities of life in modern-day Iran, these nine vignettes illuminate the lighter side of enduring under authoritarian rule. Whether choosing a name for a newborn, graduating from grade school, getting a driver’s license, applying for a job, or seeking approval for a film script, if you live in Iran, you best come fluent in Orwellian discourse. Progressing along a rough timeline from birth to death, each story is shot in a static camera angle as a single petitioner negotiates with an authority figure hovering just outside of frame, who is practiced in the language of doublespeak.

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Limbo (Sen)

Director: Ivan Sen
Stars: Simon Baker, Rob Collins, Natasha Wanganeen
Genre: Mystery, Crime, Thriller, Drama
Country: Australia

Travis, a jaded detective, arrives in the remote outback town of Limbo to investigate the cold case murder of local Indigenous girl Charlotte Hayes 20 years ago. As truths about the murder begin to unfold, the detective gains a new insight into the unsolved case.

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Eternal Memory, The (Alberdi)

Director: Maite Alberdi
Stars: Paulina Urrutia, Augusto Góngora, Gustavo Cerati
Genre: Documentary
Country: Chile, USA

Augusto and Paulina have been together for 25 years. Eight years ago, he was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease. Both fear the day he no longer recognizes her.

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Beyond Utopia (Gavin)

Director: Madeleine Gavin
Stars: Barbara Demick, Kim Sung-eun, Lee Hyeon-seo, Lee So-yeon
Genre: Documentary, History
Country: USA

A courageous pastor uses his underground network to rescue and aid North Korean families as they risk their lives to embrace freedom.

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Mars Express (Périn)

Director: Jérémie Périn
Stars: Léa Drucker, Mathieu Amalric, Daniel Njo Lobé
Genre: Animation, Mystery, Action, Science Fiction
Country: France

In 2200, private detective Aline Ruby and her android partner Carlos Rivera are hired by a wealthy businessman to track down a notorious hacker. On Mars, they descend deep into the underbelly of the planet’s capital city where they uncover a darker story of brain farms, corruption, and a missing girl who holds a secret about the robots that threatens to change the face of the universe.

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Red Rooms (Plante)

Director: Pascal Plante
Stars: Juliette Gariépy, Laurie Babin, Élisabeth Locas
Genre: Crime, Drama, Thriller
Country: Canada

The high-profile case of serial killer Ludovic Chevalier has just gone to trial, and Kelly-Anne is obsessed. When reality blurs with her morbid fantasies, she goes down a dark path to seek the final piece of the case’s puzzle.

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Sing Sing (Kwedar)

Director: Greg Kwedar
Stars: Colman Domingo, Clarence Maclin, Sean San Jose
Genre: Drama
Country: USA

Divine G, imprisoned at Sing Sing for a crime he didn’t commit, finds purpose by acting in a theatre group alongside other incarcerated men in this story of resilience, humanity, and the transformative power of art.

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Rye Lane (Allen-Miller)

Director: Raine Allen-Miller
Stars: David Jonsson, Vivian Oparah, Poppy Allen-Quarmby
Genre: Comedy, Romance
Country: USA, UK

Two twenty-somethings, both reeling from bad break-ups, connect over the course of an eventful day in South London – helping each other deal with their nightmare exes, and potentially restoring their faith in romance.

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There’s Still Tomorrow (Cortellesi)

Director: Paola Cortellesi
Stars: Paola Cortellesi, Valerio Mastandrea, Romana Maggiora Vergano
Genre: History, War, Comedy, Drama
Country: Italy, UK

In this moving comedic drama set in postwar Rome, a working-class woman dreams of a better future for herself and her daughter while facing abuse at the hands of her domineering husband. When a mysterious letter arrives, she discovers the courage to change the circumstances of her life. An Italian box office phenomenon and winner of six Italian Academy Awards.

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Teachers’ Lounge, The (Çatak)

Director: İlker Çatak
Stars: Leonie Benesch, Eva Löbau, Michael Klammer
Genre: Drama
Country: German

When one of her students is suspected of theft, teacher Carla Nowak decides to get to the bottom of the matter. Caught between her ideals and the school system, the consequences of her actions threaten to break her.

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When Evil Lurks (Rugna)

Director: Demián Rugna
Stars: Ezequiel Rodríguez, Demián Salomón, Silvina Sabater
Genre: Horror, Thriller
Country: Argentina, USA

Residents of a small rural town discover that a demon is about to be born among them. They desperately try to escape before the evil is born, but it may be too late.

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All Shall Be Well (Yeung)

Director: Ray Yeung
Stars: Patra Au Ga-Man, Maggie Li Lin-Lin, Hui So-Ying, Tai Bo
Genre: Drama
Country: Hong Kong, China

When her partner Pat unexpectedly dies, Angie is left to worry about the flat in which the couple lived together for over 30 years. Supported by her chosen family, Angie begins a later-life journey into emancipation.

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Beatles ’64 (Tedeschi)

Director: David Tedeschi
Stars: N/A
Genre: Documentary
Country: USA, UK

Featuring never-before-seen footage of the band and the legions of young fans who helped fuel their ascendance, follow McCartney, John Lennon, George Harrison and Starr as they land in New York City in February 1964 and solidify their status as the biggest band in the world.

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Wolf Children (Hosoda)

Director: Mamoru Hosoda
Stars: Haru Kuroki, Yukito Nishii, Aoi Miyazaki, Takao Osawa
Genre: Animation, Anime
Country: Japan

After her werewolf lover unexpectedly dies in an accident, a woman must find a way to raise the son and daughter that she had with him. However, their inheritance of their father’s traits prove to be a challenge for her.

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Stemple Pass (Benning)

Director: James Benning
Stars: N/A
Genre: Documentary
Country: USA

Four landscape shots containing a replica of Ted Kaczynski’s cabin, one shot per season. On the soundtrack, Benning reads extracts from Kaczynski’s journals from the early 1970s, recording his progress at hunting and gathering, and his connection to the Montana wilderness.

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Enemy, The (Villeneuve)

Director: Denis Villeneuve
Stars: Jake Gyllenhaal, Mélanie Laurent, Sarah Gadon, Isabella Rossellini
Genre: Thriller, Mystery
Country: Canada, France, Spain

A mild-mannered college professor discovers a look-alike actor and delves into the other man’s private affairs.

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Double, The (Ayoade)

Director: Richard Ayoade
Stars: Robin Wright, Harvey Keitel, Jon Hamm, Danny Huston
Genre: Thriller, Drama
Country: UK

An awkward office drone becomes increasingly unhinged after a charismatic and confident look-alike takes a job at his workplace and seduces the woman he desires.

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Knight of Cups (Malick)

Director: Terrence Malick
Stars: Christian Bale, Cate Blanchett, Natalie Portman
Genre: Drama, Romance
Country: USA

Rick is a screenwriter living in Los Angeles. While successful in his career, his life feels empty. Haunted and confused, he finds temporary solace in the decadent Hollywood excess that defines his existence. Women provide a distraction to his daily pain, and every encounter brings him closer to finding his place in the world.

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Night Is Short, Walk On Girl (Yuasa)

Director: Masaaki Yuasa
Stars: Gen Hoshino, Kana Hanazawa, Ami Koshimizu, Aoi Yuki
Genre: Animation, Anime
Country: Japan

As a group of university students go out for a night on the town, a sophomore known only as “The Girl with Black Hair” experiences a series of surreal encounters with the local nightlife – all the while unaware of the romantic longings of “Senpai”, a senior student who has been creating increasingly fantastic and contrived reasons to run into her in an effort to win her heart.

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Climax (Noé)

Director: Gaspar Noé
Stars: Sofia Boutella, Romain Guillermic, Souheila Yacoub
Genre: Horror, Drama
Country: Belgium, France, USA

When a dance troupe is lured to an empty school, a bowl of drug-laced sangria causes their jubilant rehearsal to descend into a dark and explosive nightmare as they try to survive the night—and find who’s responsible—before it’s too late.

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Varda by Agnès (Varda)

Director: Agnès Varda
Stars: N/A
Genre: Documentary
Country: France

An unpredictable documentary from a fascinating storyteller, Agnès Varda’s last film sheds light on her experience as a director, bringing a personal insight to what she calls “cine-writing,” traveling from Rue Daguerre in Paris to Los Angeles and Beijing.

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Beats (Welsh)

Director: Brian Welsh
Stars: Lorn Macdonald, Laura Fraser, Brian Ferguson, Ross Mann
Genre: Comedy
Country: UK

Summer 1994, Scotland. Johnno and Spanner are best mates, but Johnno’s family are moving him to a new town and a better life, leaving Spanner behind to face a precarious future. In pursuit of adventure and escape they head out on one last night to an illegal rave before parting ways indefinitely.

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Pieces of a Woman (Mundruczó)

Director: Kornél Mundruczó
Stars: Vanessa Kirby, Shia LaBeouf, Ellen Burstyn, Sarah Snook
Genre: Drama
Country: Canada, Hungary, USA

When a young mother’s home birth ends in unfathomable tragedy, she begins a year-long odyssey of mourning that fractures relationships with loved ones in this deeply personal story of a woman learning to live alongside her loss.

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Hit the Road (Panahi)

Director: Panah Panahi
Stars: Hasan Ma’juni, Pantea Panahiha, Rayan Sarlak, Amin Simiar
Genre: Drama, Comedy
Country: Iran

A chaotic family is on a road trip across a rugged landscape. In the back seat, Dad has a broken leg, Mom tries to laugh when she’s not holding back tears, and the youngest keeps exploding into car karaoke. Only the older brother is quiet.

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After Yang (Kogonada)

Director: Kogonada
Stars: Justin H. Min, Malea Emma Tjandrawidjaja, Colin Farrell
Genre: Drama, Science Fiction
Country: USA

When his young daughter’s beloved companion — an android named Yang — malfunctions, Jake searches for a way to repair him. In the process, Jake discovers the life that has been passing in front of him, reconnecting with his wife and daughter across a distance he didn’t know was there.

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Train Again (Tscherkassky)

Director: Peter Tscherkassky
Stars: N/A
Genre: Art Film, Experimental, Documentary
Country: Austria

Peter Tscherkassky condenses the long history of railways in the movies into a rousing blast for the senses in a heartfelt tribute to another legend of experimental cinema Kurt Kren.

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Ear for Eye (Green)

Director: Debbie Tucker Green
Stars: Lashana Lynch, Tosin Cole, Danny Sapani, Carmen Munroe
Genre: Drama
Country: USA, UK

From front rooms, Black families, friends, students and older generations navigate British and American society today.

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Saint Omer (Diop)

Director: Alice Diop
Stars: Kayije Kagame, Guslagie Malanda, Aurélia Petit
Genre: Crime, Drama
Country: France

A novelist attends the trial of a woman accused of killing her 15-month-old daughter by abandoning her to the rising tide on a beach in northern France. But as the trial continues, her own family history, doubts, and fears about motherhood are steadily dislodged as the life story of the accused is gradually revealed.

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Decision to Leave (Chan-wook)

Director: Park Chan-wook
Stars: Tang Wei, Park Hae-il, Lee Jung-hyun, Go Kyung-pyo
Genre: Mystery, Romance, Thriller
Country: South Korea

From a mountain peak in South Korea, a man plummets to his death. Did he jump, or was he pushed? When detective Hae-joon arrives on the scene, he begins to suspect the dead man’s wife Seo-rae. But as he digs deeper into the investigation, he finds himself trapped in a web of deception and desire.

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One Fine Morning (Hansen-Løve)

Director: Mia Hansen-Løve
Stars: Léa Seydoux, Pascal Greggory, Melvil Poupaud
Genre: Drama, Romance
Country: France, Germany, UK

With a father suffering from neurodegenerative disease, a young woman lives with her eight-year-old daughter. While struggling to secure a decent nursing home, she runs into an unavailable friend with whom she embarks on an affair.

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Return to Seoul (Chou)

Director: Davy Chou
Stars: Park Ji-Min, Oh Kwang-rok, Guka Han, Kim Sun-young
Genre: Drama
Country: Belgium, Cambodia, France, Germany, Romania, South Korea

After an impulsive travel decision to visit friends, Freddie, 25, returns to South Korea for the first time, where she was born before being adopted and raised in France. Freddie suddenly finds herself embarking on an unexpected journey in a country she knows so little about, taking her life in new and unexpected directions. Based on the true story of Laure Badufle.

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Moonage Daydream (Morgen)

Director: Brett Morgen
Stars: N/A
Genre: Documentary, Music Documentary
Country: Germany, USA

At an institute devoted to culinary and alimentary performance, a collective finds themselves embroiled in power struggles, artistic vendettas and gastrointestinal disorders.

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Flux Gourmet (Strickland)

Director: Peter Strickland
Stars: Asa Butterfield, Gwendoline Christie, Ariane Labed
Genre: Horror, Drama, Comedy
Country: UK, USA

At an institute devoted to culinary and alimentary performance, a collective finds themselves embroiled in power struggles, artistic vendettas and gastrointestinal disorders.

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Robot Dreams (Berger)

Director: Pablo Berger
Stars: Ivan Labanda, Tito Trifol, Rafa Calvo, José García Tos
Genre: Comedy, Science Fiction, Animation, Drama
Country: France, Spain

A lonely dog’s friendship with his robot companion takes a sad turn when an unexpected malfunction forces him to abandon Robot at the beach. Will Dog ever meet Robot again?

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Fallen Leaves (Kaurismäki)

Director: Aki Kaurismäki
Stars: Alma Pöysti, Jussi Vatanen, Janne Hyytiäinen, Nuppu Koivu
Genre: Drama, Comedy, Romance
Country: Finland, Germany

In modern-day Helsinki, two lonely souls in search of love meet by chance in a karaoke bar. However, their path to happiness is beset by obstacles – from lost phone numbers to mistaken addresses, alcoholism, and a charming stray dog.

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Do Not Expect Too Much from the End of the World (Jude)

Director: Radu Jude
Stars: Ilinca Manolache, Ovidiu Pîrșan, Nina Hoss, Dorina Lazăr
Genre: Drama, Comedy
Country: Croatia, France, Luxembourg, Romania

On behalf of a multinational company, a production assistant drives around the Romanian city of Bucharest, interviewing various citizens who have been injured due to work accidents to cast one of them in a “safety at work” video.

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Past Lives (Song)

Director: Celine Song
Stars: Greta Lee, Teo Yoo, John Magaro, Moon Seung-ah
Genre: Drama, Romance
Country: South Korea, USA

Nora and Hae Sung, two childhood friends, are reunited in New York for one fateful week as they confront notions of destiny, love, and the choices that make a life.

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Close Your Eyes (Erice)

Director: Víctor Erice
Stars: Manolo Solo, Jose Coronado, Ana Torrent, Petra Martínez
Genre: Drama, Mystery
Country: Argentina, Spain

Years after his mysterious disappearance, Julio Arenas, a famous Spanish actor, is back in the news thanks to a television program.

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Passages (Sachs)

Director: Ira Sachs
Stars: Franz Rogowski, Ben Whishaw, Adèle Exarchopoulos
Genre: Drama, Romance
Country: France

Tomas and Martin are a gay couple living in Paris whose marriage is thrown into crisis when Tomas impulsively begins a passionate affair with young schoolteacher Agathe. But when Martin begins an affair of his own, Tomas must confront life decisions he may be unprepared—or unwilling—to deal with.

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Our Body (Simon)

Director: Claire Simon
Stars: N/A
Genre: Documentary
Country: France

In a Parisian public hospital, Claire Simon questions what it means to live in women’s bodies, filming their diversity, singularity and their beauty in all stages throughout life. Unique stories of desires, fears and struggles unfold, including the one of the filmmaker herself.

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Here (Devos)

Director: Bas Devos
Stars: Stefan Gota, Liyo Gong, Cédric Luvuezo, Teodor Corban
Genre: Drama, Romance
Country: Belgium

Stefan, a migrant construction worker living in Brussels, is planning a trip home to his mother in Romania. In preparing for his voyage, he reconnects with local family members over gifted bowls of homemade soup, interacts with strangers, and discovers a revivifying commune with nature. This leads him to an unexpected connection with Shuxiu, a Chinese-Belgian bryologist studying the local moss.

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Tótem (Avilés)

Director: Lila Avilés
Stars: Naíma Sentíes, Montserrat Marañon, Marisol Gasé
Genre: Drama, Comedy
Country: Denmark, France, Mexico

In a bustling Mexican household, seven-year-old Sol is swept up in a whirlwind of preparations for the birthday party for her father, Tona, led by her mother, aunts, and other relatives. As the day goes on, building to an event both anticipated and dreaded, Sol begins to understand the gravity of the celebration this year and watches as her family does the same.

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Evil Does Not Exist (Hamaguchi)

Director: Ryūsuke Hamaguchi
Stars: Hitoshi Omika, Ryo Nishikawa, Ryuji Osaka
Genre: Drama
Country: Japan

Takumi and his daughter Hana live in Mizubiki Village, close to Tokyo. One day, the village inhabitants become aware of a plan to build a camping site near Takumi’s house offering city residents a comfortable “escape” to nature.

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Rotting in the Sun (Silva)

Director: Sebastián Silva
Stars: Sebastián Silva, Jordan Firstman, Catalina Saavedra
Genre: Thriller, Comedy, Mystery
Country: USA, Mexico

A filmmaker facing an existential crisis goes on a vacation to a Mexican gay nudist beach, where he meets a social media celebrity who convinces him to collaborate with him on his new TV show. But one disappears and another embarks on a wild journey through Mexico City to find him.

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Daughters of Fire, The (Costa)

Director: Pedro Costa
Stars: Elizabeth Pinard, Alice Costa, Karyna Gomes
Genre: Drama
Country: Portugal

The story of three young Cape Verdean sisters upon their arrival at a foreign European port, in an attempt to escape another devastating eruption of the volcano Fogo. In this unknown country, they roam, hand in hand, evoking their secret fears through music and singing.

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Other Way Around, The (Trueba)

Director: Jonás Trueba
Stars: Itsaso Arana, Vito Sanz, Fernando Trueba, Andrés Gertrúdix
Genre: Drama, Comedy
Country: France | Spain

After 15 years together, Ale and Alex have an idea that might seem absurd: to organize a party to celebrate their breakup. This announcement leaves their loved ones perplexed, but they remain firm in their decision to separate. Or maybe not?

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Misericordia (Guiraudie)

Director: Alain Guiraudie
Stars: Félix Kysyl, Catherine Frot, Jean-Baptiste Durand
Genre: Drama, Comedy
Country: France | Portugal | Spain

Jérémie returns to his hometown for an old friend’s funeral. In this village where so much goes unsaid, he must contend with rumours and suspicion, until he commits an irreparable act and finds himself at the centre of a police investigation.

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Outrun, The (Fingscheidt)

Director: Nora Fingscheidt
Stars: Saoirse Ronan, Paapa Essiedu, Nabil Elouahabi, Izuka Hoyle
Genre: Drama
Country: Germany | UK | France | USA

Fresh out of rehab, Rona returns to the Orkney Islands—a place both wild and beautiful, right off the Scottish coast. Now 29 and after more than a decade of living life on the edge in London, where she both found and lost love, Rona attempts to come to terms with her troubled past. As she reconnects with the dramatic landscape where she grew up, memories of her traumatic childhood merge with more recent challenging events that have set her on the path to recovery.

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Girl with the Needle, The (von Horn)

Director: Magnus von Horn
Stars: Vic Carmen Sonne, Trine Dyrholm, Besir Zeciri
Genre: Drama, Thriller
Country: Denmark| Poland | Sweden

Struggling to survive in post-WWI Copenhagen, a newly unemployed and pregnant young woman is taken in by a charismatic elder to help run an underground adoption agency. The two form an unexpected bond, until a sudden discovery changes everything.

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Conclave (Berger)

Director: Edward Berger
Stars: Ralph Fiennes, Stanley Tucci, John Lithgow, Isabella Rossellini
Genre: Drama, Mystery, Thriller
Country: UK | USA

After the unexpected death of the Pope, Cardinal Lawrence is tasked with managing the covert and ancient ritual of electing a new one. Sequestered in the Vatican with the Catholic Church’s most powerful leaders until the process is complete, Lawrence finds himself at the center of a conspiracy that could lead to its downfall.

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Seed of the Sacred Fig, The (Rasoulof)

Director: Mohammad Rasoulof
Stars: Misagh Zare, Soheila Golestani, Mahsa Rostami
Genre: Thriller, Crime, Drama
Country: France | Germany | Iran

Investigating judge Iman grapples with paranoia amid political unrest in Tehran. When his gun vanishes, he suspects his wife and daughters, imposing draconian measures that strain family ties as societal rules crumble.

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Memoir of a Snail (Elliot)

Director: Adam Elliot
Stars: Sarah Snook, Kodi Smit-McPhee, Jacki Weaver
Genre: Animation, Drama, Comedy
Country: Australia

Forcibly separated from her twin brother when they are orphaned, a melancholic misfit learns how to find confidence within herself amid the clutter of misfortunes and everyday life.

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Say Nothing (Lennox, Nighy, Byrne, Seabright)

Director: Michael Lennox, Mary Nighy, Anthony Byrne, Alice Seabright
Stars: Lola Petticrew, Maxine Peake, Hazel Doupe, Anthony Boyle
Genre: Crime, Drama
Country: USA

Through the eyes of various Irish Republican Army (IRA) members, explore the extremes some people will go to in the name of their beliefs, the way a deeply divided society can suddenly tip over into armed conflict, the long shadow of radical violence for both victims and perpetrators, and the emotional and psychological costs of a code of silence.

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Wild Robot, The (Sanders)

Director: Chris Sanders
Stars: Lupita Nyong’o, Pedro Pascal, Kit Connor, Bill Nighy
Genre: Animation
Country: USA

After a shipwreck, an intelligent robot called Roz is stranded on an uninhabited island. To survive the harsh environment, Roz bonds with the island’s animals and cares for an orphaned baby goose.

 

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No Other Land (Szor, Ballal, more)

Director: Walter Salles
Stars: Rachel Szor, Hamdan Ballal, Yuval Abraham, Basel Adra
Genre: Documentary
Country: Norway, State of Palestine

This film made by a Palestinian-Israeli collective shows the destruction of the occupied West Bank’s Masafer Yatta by Israeli soldiers and the alliance which develops between the Palestinian activist Basel and Israeli journalist Yuval.

 

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I’m Still Here (Salles)

Director: Walter Salles
Stars: Fernanda Torres, Selton Mello, Fernanda Montenegro
Genre: Drama
Country: Brazil, France

In the early 1970s, the military dictatorship in Brazil reaches its height. The Paiva family – Rubens, Eunice, and their five children – live in a beachside house in Rio, open to all their friends. One day, Rubens is taken for questioning and does not return.

 

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After Death (Bauer)

Director: Yevgeny Bauer
Stars: Vitold Polonsky, Olga Rakhmanova, Vera Karalli, Mariya Khalatova
Genre: Drama, Horror, Silent
Country: Russia

Andrei lives a secluded life with his aunt, studying and thinking about his now-deceased mother. His friend Tsenin is concerned, and tries to get Andrei to accompany him to social events. After watching the actress Zoya Kadmina perform, Andrei is fascinated with her, and is then astounded to receive a note from her. He has only one brief meeting with her, and then three months later he is shocked to learn of her death. He now becomes obsessed with her memory, and he decides that he must find out all that he can about her.

 

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Visit to the Seaside, A (Smith)

Director: George Albert Smith
Stars: N/A
Genre: Documentary, Short, Silent
Country: UK

The first successful motion picture in natural color, filmed with Kinemacolor. It is an 8 minute short film directed by George Albert Smith of Brighton, showing people doing everyday activities. It is ranked of high historical importance. Kinemacolor later influenced and replaced by Technicolor, which was used from 1916 to 1952.

 

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Kingdom of the Fairies, The (Méliès)

Director: Georges Méliès
Stars: Georges Méliès, Marguerite Thévenard, Bleuette Bernon, André Deed
Genre: Adventure, Fantasy, Short, Silent
Country: France

In this spectacular free adaptation of the popular theatre play “La Biche au Bois”, the valiant Prince Bel-Azor pursues a baleful old witch to her impregnable castle, to save the beautiful young Princess Azurine.

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Bewitched Inn, The (Méliès)

Director: Georges Méliès
Stars: Georges Méliès
Genre: Fantasy, Short, Silent
Country: France

A weary traveler stops at an inn along the way to get a good night’s sleep, but his rest is interrupted by odd happenings when he gets to his room–beds vanishing and re-appearing, candles exploding, pants flying through the air and his shoes walking away by themselves.

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Pillar of Fire, The (Méliès)

Director: Georges Méliès
Stars: Jehanne d’Alcy, Georges Méliès
Genre: Fantasy, Short, Silent
Country: France

A devil wearing bat-like wings and brandishing a trident dances around a giant pot, conjuring forth flame from his trident to lit a fire beneath the pot. After the devil works the fire with bellows, an angelic woman emerges from the pot.

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Devil in a Convent, The (Méliès)

Director: Georges Méliès
Stars: N/A
Genre: Comedy, Horror, Fantasy, Short, Silent
Country: France

A priest is officiating at a convent, when suddenly he is transformed into the devil, who frightens away the nuns and turns the place into a outlet of Pandemonium.

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Cinderella (Méliès)

Director: Georges Méliès
Stars: Georges Méliès, Barral, Bleuette Bernon, Carmelli
Genre: Romance, Family, Drama, Fantasy, Short, Silent
Country: France

A fairy godmother magically turns Cinderella’s rags to a beautiful dress, and a pumpkin into a coach. Cinderella goes to the ball, where she meets the Prince – but will she remember to leave before the magic runs out? Méliès based the art direction on engravings by Gustave Doré. First known example of a fairy-tale adapted to film, and the first film to use dissolves to go from one scene to another.

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L’affaire Dreyfus (Méliès)

Director: Georges Méliès
Stars: Georges Méliès
Genre: Short, Drama, Silent
Country: France

The first movie ever censored for political reasons. The title refers to the then contemporaneous Dreyfus affair in which a Jewish military officer was falsely convicted of treason, and it was alleged that he was framed due to anti-semitism.

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New-York (Svenska Biografteatern)

Director:Svenska Biografteatern
Stars: N/A
Genre: Short, Documentary
Country: Sweden

Old film of New York City in the year 1911. This film was taken by the Swedish company Svenska Biografteatern on a trip to the United States. It was released two years later.

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Zola (Bravo)

Director: Janicza Bravo
Stars: Taylour Paige, Riley Keough, Nicholas Braun, Ari’el Stachel
Genre: Comedy, Crime, Drama
Country: USA

A stripper named Zola embarks on a wild road trip to Florida.

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One Second (Zhang)

Director: Yimou Zhang
Stars: Yi Zhang, Haocun Liu, Wei Fan, Yan Li
Genre: Comedy, Drama, History
Country: China, Hong Kong

A movie fan in a remote farmland strikes a relationship with a homeless female vagabond.

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Wildfire (Brady)

Director: Cathy Brady
Stars: Nora-Jane Noone, Nika McGuigan, Kate Dickie, Martin McCann
Genre: Drama
Country: UK, Ireland

The story of two sisters who grew up on the fractious Irish border. When one of them, who has been missing, finally returns home, the intense bond with her sister is re-ignited.

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Undine (Petzold)

Director: Christian Petzold
Stars: Paula Beer, Franz Rogowski, Maryam Zaree, Jacob Matschenz
Genre: Drama, Fantasy, Mystery
Country: Germany, France

Undine works as a historian lecturing on Berlin’s urban development. But when the man she loves leaves her, the ancient myth catches up with her. Undine has to kill the man who betrays her and return to the water.

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Time (Bradley)

Director: Garrett Bradley
Stars: Sibll Fox Richardson, Robert G. Richardson, Mahlik Richardson, Remington B. Richardson
Genre: Documentary, Biography
Country: USA

Fox Rich fights for the release of her husband, Rob, who is serving a 60-year sentence in prison.

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Reason I Jump, The (Rothwell)

Director: Jerry Rothwell
Stars: Donna Budway, Emma Budway, Jeremy Dear, Joss Dear
Genre: Documentary, Drama
Country: UK, USA

Based on the book by Naoki Higashida, this immersive film explores the experiences of non-speaking autistic people around the world.

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Killing of Kenneth Chamberlain, The (Midell)

Director: David Midell
Stars: Frankie Faison, Steve O’Connell, Enrico Natale, Ben Marten
Genre: Drama, Thriller
Country: USA

Based on the true story of the events that led to the death of Kenneth Chamberlain Sr., an elderly African American veteran with bipolar disorder, who was killed during a conflict with police officers who were dispatched to check on him.

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Dissident, The (Fogel)

Director: Bryan Fogel
Stars: Omar Abdulaziz, Irfan Fidan, Recep Kiliç, Wadah Khanfar
Genre: Documentary, Crime, Thriller
Country: USA

When Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi disappears in Istanbul, his fiancée and dissidents around the world piece together the clues to a murder and expose a global cover up.

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Sweet Thing (Rockwell)

Director: Alexandre Rockwell
Stars: Lana Rockwell, Nico Rockwell, Will Patton, Karyn Parsons
Genre: Drama
Country: USA

The story revolves around two siblings and their struggle to find solid ground in the homes of their alcoholic father and negligent mother. The children ultimately run away and find a temporary life for themselves.

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Wife of a Spy (Kurosawa)

Director: Kiyoshi Kurosawa
Stars: Yû Aoi, Issey Takahashi, Masahiro Higashide, Ryôta Bandô
Genre: Drama, History, War
Country: Japan

A Japanese merchant who leaves his wife behind in order to travel to Manchuria, where he witnesses an act of barbarism. His subsequent actions cause misunderstanding, jealousy and legal problems for his wife.

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Little Girl (Lifshitz)

Director: Sébastien Lifshitz
Stars: Sasha
Genre: Documentary
Country: France, Denmark

The touching portrait of eight-year-old Sasha, who questions her gender and in doing so, evokes the sometimes disturbing reactions of a society that is still invested in a biological boy-girl way of thinking.

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Mogul Mowgli (Tariq)

Director: Bassam Tariq
Stars: Riz Ahmed, Aiysha Hart, Anjana Vasan, Nabhaan Rizwan
Genre: Drama
Country: UK, USA

A British Pakistani rapper is on the cusp of his first world tour, but is struck down by an illness that threatens to derail his big break.

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Apples (Nikou)

Director: Christos Nikou
Stars: Aris Servetalis, Sofia Georgovassili, Anna Kalaitzidou, Argyris Bakirtzis
Genre: Comedy, Drama
Country: Greece, Poland, Australia, Slovenia

Amidst a worldwide pandemic that causes sudden amnesia, middle-aged Aris finds himself enrolled in a recovery program designed to help unclaimed patients build new identities.

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MLK/FBI (Pollard)

Director: Sam Pollard
Stars: Martin Luther King, J. Edgar Hoover, David Garrow, Clarence B. Jones
Genre: Documentary, History
Country: USA

Based on newly declassified files, Sam Pollard’s resonant film explores the US government’s surveillance and harassment of Martin Luther King, Jr.

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Limbo (Sharrock)

Director: Ben Sharrock
Stars: Sidse Babett Knudsen, Kenneth Collard, Amir El-Masry, Vikash Bhai
Genre: Drama
Country: UK

Omar is a promising young musician. Separated from his Syrian family, he is stuck on a remote Scottish island awaiting the fate of his asylum request.

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Last and First Men (Jóhannsson)

Director: Jóhann Jóhannsson
Stars: Tilda Swinton
Genre: Fantasy, Mystery, Sci-Fi
Country: Iceland

Two billion years ahead of us, a future race of humans finds itself on the verge of extinction. Almost all that is left in the world are lone and surreal monuments, beaming their message into the wilderness.

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Derek DelGaudio’s In & Of Itself (Oz)

Director: Frank Oz
Stars: Derek DelGaudio, Hal Schulman, Jason England, Robert Herritt
Genre: Documentary
Country: USA

Storyteller and Conceptual Magician Derek DelGaudio attempts to understand the illusory nature of identity and answer the deceptively simple question ‘Who am I?’

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Hamilton (Kail)

Director: Thomas Kail
Stars: Lin-Manuel Miranda, Phillipa Soo, Leslie Odom Jr., Renée Elise Goldsberry
Genre: Biography, Drama, History
Country: USA

The real life of one of America’s foremost founding fathers and first Secretary of the Treasury, Alexander Hamilton. Captured live on Broadway from the Richard Rodgers Theater with the original Broadway cast.

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Disclosure (Feder)

Director: Sam Feder
Stars: Laverne Cox, Bianca Leigh, Jen Richards, Alexandra Billings
Genre: Documentary
Country: USA

An in-depth look at Hollywood’s depiction of transgender people and the impact of those stories on transgender lives and American culture.

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Dinner in America (Rehmeier)

Director: Adam Rehmeier
Stars: Kyle Gallner, Yancey Fuqua, Jennifer Kincer, Hannah Marks
Genre: Comedy, Drama, Music
Country: USA

An on-the-lam punk rocker and a young woman obsessed with his band unexpectedly fall in love and go on an epic journey together through America’s decaying Midwestern suburbs.

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Beastie Boys Story (Jonze)

Director: Spike Jonze
Stars: Beastie Boys, Mike D, Adam Horovitz, Adam Yauch
Genre: Documentary, Biography, Music
Country: USA

Here’s a little story they’re about to tell… Michael Diamond and Adam Horovitz share the story of the band, Beastie Boys, and 40 years of friendship in a live documentary experience directed by friend and collaborator, Spike Jonze.

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Cryptozoo (Shaw)

Director: Dash Shaw
Stars: Lake Bell, Michael Cera, Alex Karpovsky, Zoe Kazan
Genre: Animation, Fantasy
Country: USA

Cryptozookeepers try to capture a Baku, a dream-eating hybrid creature of legend, and start wondering if they should display these beasts or keep them hidden and unknown.

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In Front of Your Face (Sang-soo)

Director: Hong Sang-soo
Stars: Yunhee Cho, Lee Hye-yeong, Hae-hyo Kwon
Genre: Drama
Country: South Korea

She manages her daily life with a sense of mindfulness while keeping a grave secret to herself, and she decides to meet with a younger director who asked her to join his project, and after they meet there is sudden rainfall and thunder.

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I’m Your Man (Schrader)

Director: Maria Schrader
Stars: Maren Eggert, Dan Stevens, Sandra Hüller, Jürgen Tarrach
Genre: Comedy, Drama, Romance
Country: Germany

In order to obtain research funds for her studies, a scientist accepts an offer to participate in an extraordinary experiment: for three weeks, she is to live with a humanoid robot, created to make her happy.

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Lost Illusions (Giannoli)

Director: Xavier Giannoli
Stars: Benjamin Voisin, Cécile de France, Vincent Lacoste, Xavier Dolan
Genre: Drama, History, Romance
Country: France, Belgium

Story of the rise and the fall of a young man in Paris who dreamed to be a writer and became a journalist.

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Happening (Diwan)

Director: Audrey Diwan
Stars: Anamaria Vartolomei, Kacey Mottet Klein, Luàna Bajrami, Louise Orry-Diquéro
Genre: Drama
Country: France

An adaptation of Annie Ernaux’s novel of the same name, looking back on her experience with abortion when it was still illegal in France in the 1960s.

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Paris, 13th District (Audiard)

Director: Jacques Audiard
Stars: Lucie Zhang, Makita Samba, Noémie Merlant, Jehnny Beth
Genre: Comedy, Drama, Romance
Country: France

Émilie meets Camille who is attracted to Nora, who crosses paths with Amber. Three girls and a boy – They’re friends, sometimes lovers and often both.

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Mr. Bachmann and His Class (Speth)

Director: Maria Speth
Stars: Dieter Bachmann, Aynur Bal, Önder Cavdar
Genre: Documentary
Country: Germany

Where does one feel at home? In Stadtallendorf, a German city with a complex history of both excluding and integrating foreigners, genial teacher Dieter Bachmann offers his pupils the key to at least feeling as if they are at home.

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Nightmare Alley (del Toro)

Director: Guillermo del Toro
Stars: Bradley Cooper, Cate Blanchett, Toni Collette, Willem Dafoe
Genre: Crime, Drama, Thriller
Country: USA, Mexico, Canada

A grifter working his way up from low-ranking carnival worker to lauded psychic medium matches wits with a psychiatrist bent on exposing him.

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Passing (Hall)

Director: Rebecca Hall
Stars: Tessa Thompson, Ruth Negga, André Holland, Bill Camp
Genre: Drama
Country: USA, UK, Canada

“Passing” follows the unexpected reunion of two high school friends, whose renewed acquaintance ignites a mutual obsession that threatens both of their carefully constructed realities.

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Pray Away (Stolakis)

Director: Kristine Stolakis
Stars: Michael Bussee, Alan Chambers, Ricky Chelette, James Dobson
Genre: Documentary
Country: USA

Former leaders of the “pray the gay away” movement contend with the aftermath unleashed by their actions, while a survivor seeks healing and acceptance from more than a decade of trauma.

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Spencer (Larraín)

Director: Marilyn Agrelo
Stars: Kristen Stewart, Timothy Spall, Sally Hawkins, Jack Nielen
Genre: Biography, Drama
Country: USA, UK, Germany, Chile

Diana Spencer, struggling with mental-health problems during her Christmas holidays with the Royal Family at their Sandringham estate in Norfolk, England, decides to end her decade-long marriage to Prince Charles.

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Lost Leonardo, The (Koefoed)

Director: Andreas Koefoed
Stars: Mohammad Bin Salman, Robert K. Wittman, Jerry Saltz, Dianne Dwyer Modestini
Genre: Documentary, Mystery
Country: Denmark, France

The mystery surrounding the Salvator Mundi, the first painting by Leonardo da Vinci to be discovered for more than a century, which has now seemingly gone missing.

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Sparks Brothers, The (Wright)

Director: Edgar Wright
Stars: Ron Mael, Russell Mael, Beck, Jane Wiedlin
Genre: Documentary, Music, Biography
Country: UK, USA

A musical odyssey through five weird and wonderful decades with Ron and Russell Mael celebrating the inspiring legacy of Sparks.

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Velvet Underground, The (Haynes)

Director: Todd Haynes
Stars: John Waters, Mary Woronov, Barbara Walters, Lou Reed
Genre: Documentary, Music
Country: USA

The Velvet Underground explores the multiple threads that converged to bring together one of the most influential bands in rock and roll.

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Titane (Ducournau)

Director: Julia Ducournau
Stars: Vincent Lindon, Agathe Rousselle, Garance Marillier, Laïs Salameh
Genre: Drama, Horror, Science Fiction
Country: France, Belgium

Alex Lowe’s ill-fated climb and his son’s arduous journey to return to the spot where his father perished.

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Playground (Wandel)

Director: Laura Wandel
Stars: Maya Vanderbeque, Günter Duret, Lena Girard Voss, Simon Caudry
Genre: Drama
Country: Belgium

When Nora witnesses Abel being bullied by other kids, she rushes to protect him. But Abel forces her to remain silent. Caught in a conflict of loyalty, Nora tries to find her place, torn between children’s and adult’s worlds.

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Vortex (Noé)

Director: Gaspar Noé
Stars: Dario Argento, Françoise Lebrun, Alex Lutz, Kylian Dheret
Genre: Drama
Country: France, Belgium, Monaco

The last days of an elderly couple stricken by dementia.

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Who We Are: A Chronicle of Racism in America (Kunstler)

Director: Emily Kunstler, Sarah Kunstler
Stars: Josephine Bolling McCall, Gwen Carr, Tiffany Crutcher, Carolyn Payne
Genre: Documentary
Country: USA

Interweaving lecture, personal anecdotes, interviews, and shocking revelations, lawyer Jeffery Robinson draws a stark timeline of anti-Black racism in the United States, from slavery to the modern myth of a post-racial America.

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Cave, The (Fayyad)

Director: Feras Fayyad
Stars: Amani Ballour, Samaher, Alaa
Genre: Documentary, War
Country: Denmark | Germany | France | UK | USA | Qatar | Syria

Amidst air strikes and bombings, a group of female doctors in Ghouta, Syria struggle with systemic sexism while trying to care for the injured using limited resources.

 

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Proxima (Winocour)

Director: Alice Winocour
Stars: Eva Green, Zélie Boulant, Matt Dillon
Genre: Action, Drama
Country: France | Germany

An astronaut prepares for a one-year mission aboard the International Space Station.

 

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Ghost Tropic (Devos)

Director: Bas Devos
Stars: Saadia Bentaïeb, Laurent Kumba, Jovial Mbenga
Genre: Drama
Country: Belgium | Netherlands

After a long day at work, Khadija falls asleep on the last subway train. When she wakes up at the end of the line, she has no choice but to make her way home on foot.

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I Lost My Body (Clapin)

Director: Jérémy Clapin
Stars: Hakim Faris, Victoire Du Bois, Patrick d’Assumçao
Genre: Animation, Drama, Fantasy
Country: France

A story of Naoufel, a young man who is in love with Gabrielle. In another part of town, a severed hand escapes from a dissection lab, determined to find its body again.

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Hidden Life, A (Malick)

Director: Terrence Malick
Stars: August Diehl, Valerie Pachner, Maria Simon
Genre: Biography, Drama, Romance
Country: USA | UK | Germany

The Austrian Franz Jägerstätter, a conscientious objector, refuses to fight for the Nazis in World War II.

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Divine Love (Mascaro)

Director: Gabriel Mascaro
Stars: Dira Paes, Julio Machado, Antonio Pastich
Genre: Drama, Sci-Fi
Country: Brazil | Uruguay | Denmark | Norway | Chile | Sweden

A woman uses her bureaucratic job to convince divorcing couples to stay together is utterly committed to getting pregnant by her husband in a future of dance parties, ritualistic orgies and fundamentalist Christianity.

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Toy Story 4 (Cooley)

Director: Josh Cooley
Stars: Tom Hanks, Tim Allen, Annie Potts
Genre: Animation, Adventure, Comedy
Country: USA

When a new toy called “Forky” joins Woody and the gang, a road trip alongside old and new friends reveals how big the world can be for a toy.

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About Endlessness (Andersson)

Director: Roy Andersson
Stars: Bengt Bergius, Anja Broms, Marie Burman
Genre: Drama
Country: Sweden | Germany | Norway | France

With ABOUT ENDLESSNESS, Roy Andersson adds to his cinematic oeuvre with a reflection on human life in all its beauty and cruelty, its splendour and banality.

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Zana (Kastrati)

Director: Antoneta Kastrati
Stars: Adriana Matoshi, Astrit Kabashi, Fatmire Sahiti
Genre: Drama, Mystery
Country: Kosovo | Albania

Haunted by her long suppressed past and pressured by family to seek treatment from mystical healers for her infertility, a Kosovar woman struggles to reconcile the expectations of motherhood with a legacy of wartime brutality.

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Farewell, The (Wang)

Director: Lulu Wang
Stars: Shuzhen Zhao, Awkwafina, X Mayo
Genre: Comedy, Drama
Country: USA | China

A Chinese family discovers their grandmother has only a short while left to live and decide to keep her in the dark, scheduling a wedding to gather before she dies.

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Making Waves: The Art of Cinematic Sound (Costin)

Director: Midge Costin
Stars: Erik Aadahl, Ioan Allen, Richard L. Anderson
Genre: Documentary
Country: USA

An exploration of the history and emotional power of cinema sound, as revealed by legendary sound designers and visionary directors, via interviews, clips from movies, and a look at their actual process of creation and discovery.

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One Child Nation (Wang, Zhang)

Director: Nanfu Wang, Jialing Zhang
Stars: Nanfu Wang, Zaodi Wang, Zhimei Wang
Genre: Documentary, History
Country: USA

After becoming a mother, a filmmaker uncovers the untold history of China’s one-child policy and the generations of parents and children forever shaped by this social experiment.

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Nomad: In the Footsteps of Bruce Chatwin (Herzog)

Director: Werner Herzog
Stars: Werner Herzog, Bruce Chatwin, Karin Eberhard
Genre: Documentary, Biography
Country: UK

A journey where the viewer can see Werner Herzog’s creative and personal vision which was share with iconic travel writer Bruce Chatwin, the prolific author of ‘In Patagonia’ and a champion of the nomadic life.

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Vitalina Varela (Costa)

Director: Pedro Costa
Stars: Vitalina Varela, Ventura, Manuel Tavares Almeida
Genre: Drama
Country: Portugal

A Cape Verdean woman navigates her way through Lisbon, following the scanty physical traces her deceased husband left behind and discovering his secret, illicit life.

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Funan (Do)

Director: Denis Do
Stars: Bérénice Bejo, Louis Garrel, Colette Kieffer
Genre: Animation, War
Country: France | Belgium | Luxembourg | Cambodia | Reunion

The survival and the struggle of a young mother during the Khmer Rouge revolution, to find her 4-year-old son, torn from his family by the regime.

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Burning (Lee)

Director: Chang-dong Lee
Stars: Ah-In Yoo, Steven Yeun, Jong-seo Jun
Genre: Drama, Mystery
Country: South Korea | Japan

Jong-su bumps into a girl who used to live in the same neighborhood, who asks him to look after her cat while she’s on a trip to Africa. When back, she introduces Ben, a mysterious guy she met there, who confesses his secret hobby.

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Mirai (Hosoda)

Director: Mamoru Hosoda
Stars: Rebecca Hall, John Cho, Daniel Dae Kim
Genre: Animation, Adventure, Drama
Country: Japan

A young boy encounters a magical garden which enables him to travel through time and meet his relatives from different eras, with guidance by his younger sister from the future.

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Genesis (Lesage)

Director: Philippe Lesage
Stars: Noée Abita, Théodore Pellerin, Pier-Luc Funk
Genre: Drama
Country: Canada

Three teenagers are shaken up by their first loves in the turmoil of their youth. At a time when others are conforming, they stand their ground and assert their right to love and be free.

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Mandy (Cosmatos)

Director: Panos Cosmatos
Stars: Nicolas Cage, Andrea Riseborough, Linus Roache
Genre: Action, Fantasy, Horror
Country: UK | Belgium

The enchanted lives of a couple in a secluded forest are brutally shattered by a nightmarish hippie cult and their demon-biker henchmen, propelling a man into a spiraling, surreal rampage of vengeance.

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Raft, The (Lindeen)

Director: Marcus Lindeen
Stars: Daniel Giménez Cacho, Fe Seymour, Maria Björnstam
Genre: Documentary
Country: Sweden | Denmark | Germany | USA

In 1973, five men and six women drifted across the Atlantic on a raft as part of a scientific experiment studying the sociology of violence, aggression and sexual attraction in human behavior. Although the project became known in the press as ‘The Sex Raft’, nobody expected what ultimately took place on that three month journey. Through extraordinary archive material and a reunion of the surviving members of the expedition on a full scale replica of the raft, this film tells the hidden story behind what has been described as ‘one of the strangest group experiments of all time.’

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Minding the Gap (Liu)

Director: Bing Liu
Stars: Keire Johnson, Bing Liu, Zack Mulligan
Genre: Documentary
Country: USA

Three young men bond together to escape volatile families in their Rust-Belt hometown. As they face adult responsibilities, unexpected revelations threaten their decade-long friendship.

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All is Well (Trobisch)

Director: Eva Trobisch
Stars: Aenne Schwarz, Andreas Döhler, Hans Löw
Genre: Drama
Country: Germany

Janne’s new boss’s brother-in-law rapes her, but she doesn’t report the incident and continues her way of life as usual. But her silence has consequences, not only for her but also for the love that she feels for her friend Piet.

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Non-Fiction (Assayas)

Director: Olivier Assayas
Stars: Guillaume Canet, Juliette Binoche, Vincent Macaigne
Genre: Comedy, Drama, Romance
Country: France

Set in the Parisian publishing world, an editor and an author find themselves in over their heads, as they cope with a middle-age crisis, the changing industry and their wives.

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Cold War (Pawlikowski)

Director: Pawel Pawlikowski
Stars: Joanna Kulig, Tomasz Kot, Borys Szyc
Genre: Drama, History, Music
Country: Poland | UK | France | Belgium

In the 1950s, a music director falls in love with a singer and tries to persuade her to flee communist Poland for France.

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Sunday’s Illness (Salazar)

Director: Ramón Salazar
Stars: Bárbara Lennie, Susi Sánchez, Greta Fernández
Genre: Drama
Country: Spain

A high-class old lady receives the unexpected visit of her long-time stranded daughter that she had left over thirty years ago, asking a strange request: to spend ten days the two together.

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Woman at War (Erlingsson)

Director: Benedikt Erlingsson
Stars: Halldóra Geirharðsdóttir, Jóhann Sigurðarson, Juan Camilo Román Estrada
Genre: Adventure, Comedy, Drama
Country: Iceland | France | Ukraine

Halla becomes a determined environmental activist, but this threatens a long-held hope of hers.

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By the Grace of God (Ozon)

Director: François Ozon
Stars: Melvil Poupaud, Denis Ménochet, Swann Arlaud
Genre: Crime, Drama
Country: France | Belgium

Three men, abused by the same priest during their childhood, engage in a fight for justice that will expose their personal experiences and question their life with their wife, family, and colleagues.

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Crime + Punishment (Maing)

Director: Stephen T. Maing
Stars: Manuel ‘Manny’ Gomez, Sandy Gonzales, Rukia Lumumba
Genre: Documentary
Country: USA

A group of brave NYPD officers risk it all to expose the truth about illegal quota practices in police departments.

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Wild Pear Tree, The (Ceylan)

Director: Nuri Bilge Ceylan
Stars: Dogu Demirkol, Murat Cemcir, Bennu Yildirimlar
Genre: Drama
Country: Turkey | Republic of North Macedonia | France | Germany | Bosnia and Herzegovina | Bulgaria | Sweden | Qatar

An unpublished writer returns to his hometown after graduating, where he seeks sponsors to publish his book while dealing with his father’s deteriorating indulgence into gambling.

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Sisters Brothers, The (Audiard)

Director: Jacques Audiard
Stars: John C. Reilly, Joaquin Phoenix, Jake Gyllenhaal
Genre: Crime, Drama, Western
Country: France | Spain | Romania | Belgium | USA

In 1850s Oregon, the infamous duo of assassins, Eli Sisters (John C. Reilly) and Charlie Sisters (Joaquin Phoenix), chase a gold prospector and his unexpected ally.

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Bread Factory, Part One, A (Wang)

Director: Patrick Wang
Stars: Tyne Daly, Elisabeth Henry, James Marsters
Genre: Comedy, Drama
Country: USA

After 40 years of running their community arts space, The Bread Factory, Dorothea and Greta are suddenly fighting for survival when a celebrity couple–performance artists from China–come to Checkford and build an enormous complex down the street catapulting big changes in their small town.

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Roll Red Roll (Schwartzman)

Director: Nancy Schwartzman
Stars: Mark Cole, Anthony Craig, Rachel Dissell
Genre: Documentary, Crime
Country: USA

An account of a notable sexual assault that took place in Steubenville, Ohio in 2012, and the role that social media played in the crime and on the community.

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Wolf House, The (Cociña, León)

Director: Joaquín Cociña, Cristóbal León
Stars: Amalia Kassai, Rainer Krause
Genre: Animation, Drama, Horror
Country: Chile | Germany

Tells the story of Maria, a young woman who takes refuge in a house in southern Chile after escaping from a German colony.

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At Eternity’s Gate (Schnabel)

Director: Julian Schnabel
Stars: Willem Dafoe, Rupert Friend, Oscar Isaac
Genre: Biography, Drama
Country: Ireland | Switzerland | UK | France | USA

A look at the life of painter Vincent van Gogh during the time he lived in Arles and Auvers-sur-Oise, France.

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Lucky (Lynch)

Director: John Carroll Lynch
Stars: Harry Dean Stanton, David Lynch, Ron Livingston
Genre: Comedy, Drama
Country: USA

Lucky follows the spiritual journey of a 90-year-old atheist and the quirky characters that inhabit his off the map desert town.

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Foxtrot (Maoz)

Director: Samuel Maoz
Stars: Lior Ashkenazi, Sarah Adler, Yonaton Shiray
Genre: Drama
Country: Israel | Switzerland | Germany | France

A troubled family must face the facts when something goes terribly wrong at their son’s desolate military post.

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Ava (Foroughi)

Director: Sadaf Foroughi
Stars: Vahid Aghapoor, Parnian Akhtari, Sarah Alimardani
Genre: Drama
Country: Iran | Canada | Qatar

The life of a high school girl in Iran becomes more complicated after her mother catches her in an act of rebellion.

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Quest (Olshefski)

Director: Jonathan Olshefski
Stars: Christopher Rainey, Christine’a Rainey, P.J. Rainey
Genre: Documentary, Family, Music
Country: USA

A husband and wife live in an impoverished neighborhood in north Philadelphia while they raise their daughter and run a recording studio in their basement.

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Thelma (Trier)

Director: Joachim Trier
Stars: Eili Harboe, Kaya Wilkins, Henrik Rafaelsen
Genre: Drama, Fantasy, Horror
Country: Norway | France | Denmark | Sweden

A confused religious girl tries to deny her feelings for a female friend who’s in love with her. This causes her suppressed subconsciously-controlled psychokinetic powers to reemerge with devastating results.

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Strong Island (Ford)

Director: Yance Ford
Stars: Yance Ford, Harvey Walker, Kevin Myers
Genre: Documentary
Country: USA | Denmark

When filmmaker Yance Ford investigates the 1992 murder of a young black man, it becomes an achingly personal journey since the victim, 24-year-old William Ford Jr., was the filmmaker’s brother.

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Loveless (Zvyagintsev)

Director: Andrey Zvyagintsev
Stars: Maryana Spivak, Aleksey Rozin, Matvey Novikov
Genre: Drama
Country: Russia | France | Germany | Belgium

A couple going through a divorce must team up to find their son who has disappeared during one of their bitter arguments.

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Happy End (Haneke)

Director: Michael Haneke
Stars: Isabelle Huppert, Jean-Louis Trintignant, Mathieu Kassovitz
Genre: Drama
Country: France | Austria | Germany

A well-to-do French family deals with a series of setbacks and crises.

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Summer 1993 (Simón)

Director: Carla Simón
Stars: Laia Artigas, Paula Robles, Bruna Cusí
Genre: Drama, Family
Country: Spain

After her mother’s death, six-year-old Frida is sent to her uncle’s family to live with them in the countryside. But Frida finds it hard to forget her mother and adapt to her new life.

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Let the Sunshine In (Denis)

Director: Claire Denis
Stars: Juliette Binoche, Xavier Beauvois, Philippe Katerine
Genre: Comedy, Drama, Romance
Country: France | Belgium

Two upper-class teenage girls in suburban Connecticut rekindle their unlikely friendship after years of growing apart. Together, they hatch a plan to solve both of their problems-no matter what the cost.

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Claire’s Camera (Hong)

Director: Sang-soo Hong
Stars: Isabelle Huppert, Min-hee Kim, Mi-hee Chang
Genre: Drama
Country: South Korea | France

The story of female friendship as Frenchwoman Claire helps the subject of her photograph, Min-Hee, discover why she was fired without apparent cause.

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Tigers Are Not Afraid (López)

Director: Issa López
Stars: Paola Lara, Juan Ramón López, Nery Arredondo
Genre: Fantasy, Horror, Mystery
Country: Mexico

A dark fairy tale about a gang of five children trying to survive the horrific violence of the cartels and the ghosts created every day by the drug war.

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Breadwinner, The (Twomey)

Director: Nora Twomey
Stars: Saara Chaudry, Soma Chhaya, Noorin Gulamgaus
Genre: Animation, Drama, Family
Country: Ireland | Canada | Luxembourg | USA | UK | Philippines | India

In 2001, Afghanistan is under the control of the Taliban. When her father is captured, a determined young girl disguises herself as a boy in order to provide for her family.

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What Lies Upstream (Hoback)

Director: Cullen Hoback
Stars: Erin Brockovich-Ellis, Marc Edwards, Rahul Gupta
Genre: Documentary, Mystery
Country: USA

In this scandalous political thriller, an investigation into a chemical spill spirals into an indictment of the entire system meant to protect drinking water, revealing cover-ups at the highest levels of government.

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Neruda (Larraín)

Director: Pablo Larraín
Stars: Gael García Bernal, Luis Gnecco, Mercedes Morán
Genre: Biography, Crime, Drama
Country: Chile | Argentina | France | Spain | USA

An inspector hunts down Nobel Prize-winning Chilean poet, Pablo Neruda, who becomes a fugitive in his home country in the late 1940s for joining the Communist Party.

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Elle (Verhoeven)

Director: Paul Verhoeven
Stars: Isabelle Huppert, Laurent Lafitte, Anne Consigny
Genre: Crime, Drama, Thriller
Country: France | Germany | Belgium

A successful businesswoman gets caught up in a game of cat and mouse as she tracks down the unknown man who raped her.

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Aquarius (Filho)

Director: Kleber Mendonça Filho
Stars: Sônia Braga, Maeve Jinkings, Irandhir Santos
Genre: Drama
Country: Brazil | France

Clara, 65, lives her life to the fullest with her family and friends. A construction company wants her Recife oceanfront condo, as they’ve already bought all the other in the 3 story building. Clara’s staying.

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Wailing, The (Na)

Director: Hong-jin Na
Stars: Jun Kunimura, Jung-min Hwang, Do-won Kwak
Genre: Horror, Mystery, Thriller
Country: South Korea | USA

Soon after a stranger arrives in a little village, a mysterious sickness starts spreading. A policeman, drawn into the incident, is forced to solve the mystery in order to save his daughter.

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Sieranevada (Puiu)

Director: Cristi Puiu
Stars: Mara Elena Andrei, Mirela Apostu, Eugenia Bosânceanu
Genre: Comedy, Drama
Country: Romania | France | Bosnia and Herzegovina | Croatia | Republic of North Macedonia

Centers around a family gathering on the anniversary of a patriarch’s recent death.

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Graduation (Mungiu)

Director: Cristian Mungiu
Stars: Adrian Titieni, Maria Dragus, Lia Bugnar
Genre: Crime, Drama
Country: Romania | France | Belgium

A film about compromises and the implications of the parent’s role.

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Komunia (Zamecka)

Director: Anna Zamecka
Stars: Ola Kaczanowski
Genre: Documentary, Drama
Country: Poland

‘Communion’ reveals the beauty of the rejected, the strength of the weak and the need for change when change seems impossible. This crash course in growing up teaches us that no failure is final. Especially when love is in question.

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Little Men (Sachs)

Director: Ira Sachs
Stars: Greg Kinnear, Jennifer Ehle, Paulina García
Genre: Drama
Country: USA | Greece | Brazil

A new pair of best friends have their bond tested by their parents’ battle over a dress shop lease.

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Death of Louis XIV, The (Serra)

Director: Albert Serra
Stars: Jean-Pierre Léaud, Patrick d’Assumçao, Marc Susini
Genre: Biography, Drama, History
Country: France | Spain | Portugal

Upon returning from a hunting expedition, King Louis XIV feels a sharp pain in his leg. He begins to die, surrounded by loyal followers in the royal chambers.

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After the Storm (Koreeda)

Director: Fabien Delage
Stars: Hiroshi Abe, Yôko Maki, Satomi Kobayashi
Genre: Comedy, Drama
Country: Japan

After the death of his father, a private detective struggles to find child support money and reconnect with his son and ex-wife.

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Fury of the Demon (Delage)

Director: Fabien Delage
Stars: Alexandre Aja, Dave Alexander, Jean-Jacques Bernard
Genre: Documentary, Fantasy, Horror
Country: France

A documentary investigation on the rarest and most controversial French movie in the history of early cinema: a fascinating, lost and dangerous short film which causes violent reactions to those who watch it.

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Things to Come (Hansen-Løve)

Director: Mia Hansen-Løve
Stars: Isabelle Huppert, André Marcon, Roman Kolinka
Genre: Drama
Country: France | Germany

A philosophy teacher soldiers through the death of her mother, losing her book deal, and dealing with a husband who is cheating on her.

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Tower (Maitland)

Director: Keith Maitland
Stars: Violett Beane, Louie Arnette, Blair Jackson
Genre: Documentary, Animation, Crime
Country: USA

Animation, testimony, and archival footage combine to relate the events of August 1, 1966 when a gunman opened fire from the University of Texas clock tower, killing 16 people.

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Under the Shadow (Anvari)

Director: Babak Anvari
Stars: Narges Rashidi, Avin Manshadi, Bobby Naderi
Genre: Drama, Horror, Thriller
Country: UK | Jordan | Qatar | Iran

As a mother and daughter struggle to cope with the terrors of the post-revolution, war-torn Tehran of the 1980s, a mysterious evil begins to haunt their home.

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I, Daniel Blake (Loach, Obiols)

Director: Ken Loach, Laura Obiols
Stars: Dave Johns, Hayley Squires, Sharon Percy
Genre: Drama
Country: UK | France | Belgium

After having suffered a heart-attack, a 59-year-old carpenter must fight the bureaucratic forces of the system in order to receive Employment and Support Allowance.

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Handmaiden, The (Park)

Director: Chan-wook Park
Stars: Min-hee Kim, Jung-woo Ha, Jin-woong Cho
Genre: Drama, Romance, Thriller
Country: South Korea

A woman is hired as a handmaiden to a Japanese heiress, but secretly she is involved in a plot to defraud her.

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Girl Without Hands, The (Laudenbach)

Director: Sébastien Laudenbach
Stars: Anaïs Demoustier, Jérémie Elkaïm, Philippe Laudenbach
Genre: Animation, Drama, Fantasy
Country: France

In hard times, a miller sells his daughter to the Devil. Protected by her purity, she escapes but is deprived of her hands. Walking away from her family, she encounters the goddess of water, a gentle gardener and the prince in his castle. A long journey towards the light…

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Fits, The (Holmer)

Director: Anna Rose Holmer
Stars: Royalty Hightower, Alexis Neblett, Da’Sean Minor
Genre: Drama, Music
Country: USA

While training at the gym 11-year-old tomboy Toni becomes entranced with a dance troupe. As she struggles to fit in she finds herself caught up in danger as the group begins to suffer from fainting spells and other violent fits.

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Son of Saul (Nemes)

Director: László Nemes
Stars: Géza Röhrig, Levente Molnár, Urs Rechn
Genre: Drama, War
Country: Hungary

A Jewish-Hungarian concentration camp prisoner sets out to give a child he mistook for his son a proper burial.

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Under the Sun (Manskiy)

Director: Vitaliy Manskiy
Stars: Lee Zin-Mi, Yu-Yong, Hye-Yong
Genre: Documentary
Country: Czech Republic | Russia | Germany | Latvia | North Korea

A propaganda documentary about North Korea that reveals a few hidden facts because the director continues filming between the scripted scenes.

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Victoria (Schipper)

Director: Sebastian Schipper
Stars: Laia Costa, Frederick Lau, Franz Rogowski
Genre: Crime, Drama, Romance
Country: Germany

A young Spanish woman who has recently moved to Berlin finds her flirtation with a local guy turn potentially deadly as their night out with his friends reveals a dangerous secret.

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Land of Mine (Zandvliet)

Director: Martin Zandvliet
Stars: Roland Møller, Louis Hofmann, Joel Basman
Genre: Drama, History, War
Country: Denmark | Germany

In post-World War II Denmark, a group of young German POWs are forced to clear a beach of thousands of land mines under the watch of a Danish Sergeant who slowly learns to appreciate their plight.

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Timbuktu (Sissako)

Director: Abderrahmane Sissako
Stars: Ibrahim Ahmed, Abel Jafri, Toulou Kiki
Genre: Drama, War
Country: Mauritania | France | Qatar

A cattle herder and his family who reside in the dunes of Timbuktu find their quiet lives — which are typically free of the Jihadists determined to control their faith — abruptly disturbed.

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Girlhood (Sciamma)

Director: Céline Sciamma
Stars: Karidja Touré, Assa Sylla, Lindsay Karamoh
Genre: Drama
Country: France

A girl with few real prospects joins a gang, reinventing herself and gaining a sense of self confidence in the process. However, she soon finds that this new life does not necessarily make her any happier.

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Winter Sleep (Ceylan)

Director: Nuri Bilge Ceylan
Stars: Haluk Bilginer, Melisa Sözen, Demet Akbag
Genre: Drama
Country: Turkey | France | Germany

A hotel owner and landlord in a remote Turkish village deals with conflicts within his family and a tenant behind on his rent.

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Princess (Shalom-Ezer)

Director: Tali Shalom-Ezer
Stars: Shira Haas, Keren Mor, Ori Pfeffer
Genre: Drama
Country: Israel

While her mother is away from home, 12-year-old Adar’s role-playing games with her stepfather move into dangerous territory. Seeking an escape, Adar finds Alan-an ethereal boy who joins her on a dark journey between reality and fantasy.

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Watchers of the Sky (Belzberg)

Director: Edet Belzberg
Stars: Benjamin Ferencz, Raphael Lemkin, Matt Mitler
Genre: Documentary, Biography, History
Country: USA | Netherlands | France | Chad | Rwanda

Four modern stories of remarkable courage while setting out to uncover the forgotten life of Raphael Lemkin, the man who coined the term ‘genocide’. Inspired by Samantha Power’s Pulitzer Prize-winning book, ‘A Problem From Hell’, ‘Watchers of the Sky’ traverses time and continents to explore genocide and the cycle of violence.

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Leviathan (Zvyagintsev)

Director: Andrey Zvyagintsev
Stars: Aleksey Serebryakov, Elena Lyadova, Roman Madyanov
Genre: Crime, Drama
Country: Russia

In a Russian coastal town, Kolya is forced to fight the corrupt mayor when he is told that his house will be demolished. He recruits a lawyer friend to help, but the man’s arrival brings further misfortune for Kolya and his family.

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Goodnight Mommy (Fiala, Franz)

Director: Severin Fiala, Veronika Franz
Stars: Lukas Schwarz, Elias Schwarz, Susanne Wuest
Genre: Horror, Mystery, Thriller
Country: Austria

Twin boys move to a new home with their mother after she has face changing cosmetic surgery, but under her bandages is someone the children don’t recognize.

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Two Days, One Night (Dardenne, Dardenne)

Director: Jean-Pierre Dardenne, Luc Dardenne
Stars: Marion Cotillard, Fabrizio Rongione, Catherine Salée
Genre: Drama
Country: Belgium | France | Italy

Liège, Belgium. Sandra is a factory worker who discovers that her workmates have opted for a EUR1,000 bonus in exchange for her dismissal. She has only a weekend to convince her colleagues to give up their bonuses in order to keep her job.

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Locke (Knight)

Director: Steven Knight
Stars: Tom Hardy, Olivia Colman, Ruth Wilson
Genre: Drama
Country: UK | USA

Ivan Locke, a dedicated family man and successful construction manager, receives a phone call on the eve of the biggest challenge of his career that sets in motion a series of events that threaten his carefully cultivated existence.

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Great Beauty, The (Sorrentino)

Director: Paolo Sorrentino
Stars: Toni Servillo, Carlo Verdone, Sabrina Ferilli
Genre: Drama
Country: Italy | France | Belgium

Jep Gambardella has seduced his way through the lavish nightlife of Rome for decades, but after his 65th birthday and a shock from the past, Jep looks past the nightclubs and parties to find a timeless landscape of absurd, exquisite beauty.

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Tale of The Princess Kaguya, The (Takahata)

Director: Isao Takahata
Stars: Chloë Grace Moretz, James Caan, Mary Steenburgen
Genre: Animation, Adventure, Drama
Country: Japan

Found inside a shining stalk of bamboo by an old bamboo cutter and his wife, a tiny girl grows rapidly into an exquisite young lady. The mysterious young princess enthralls all who encounter her, but ultimately she must confront her fate, the punishment for her crime.

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Elena (Costa)

Director: Petra Costa
Stars: Li An, Elena Andrade, Petra Costa
Genre: Documentary, Biography, Drama
Country: Brazil | USA

Elena, a young Brazilian woman, travels to New York with the same dream as her mother, to become a movie actress. She leaves behind her childhood spent in hiding during the years of the military dictatorship. She also leaves Petra, her seven year old sister. Two decades later, Petra also becomes an actress and goes to New York in search of Elena. She only has a few clues about her: home movies, newspaper clippings, a diary and letters. At any moment Petra hopes to find Elena walking in the streets in a silk blouse. Gradually, the features of the two sisters are confused; we no longer know one from the other. When Petra finally finds Elena in an unexpected place, she has to learn to let her go.

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Viola (Piñeiro)

Director: Matías Piñeiro
Stars: María Villar, Alessio Rigo de Righi, Agustina Muñoz
Genre: Drama
Country: María Villar, Alessio Rigo de Righi, Agustina Muñoz

A group of actresses performing in a production of Shakespeare’s “Twelfth Night” get caught up in a web of romantic intrigue and revelation.

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Tropicália (Machado)

Director: Marcelo Machado
Stars: Gilberto Gil, Caetano Veloso
Genre: Documentary, Music
Country: Brazil | USA | UK

Set against the turbulent atmosphere of the 1960s, Tropicália is a feature length documentary exploring the Brazilian artistic movement known as tropicália, and the struggle its artists endured to protect their right to freely express revolutionary thought against the traditional brazilian music of that time.

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First Cousin Once Removed (Berliner)

Director: Alan Berliner
Stars: Eli Berliner, Stuart Blazer, Susan Brown
Genre: Documentary
Country: USA

Acclaimed filmmaker Alan Berliner chronicles the deeply personal story of his mother’s first cousin–well-known poet/translator/professor Edwin Honig–on his journey into the depths of Alzheimer’s disease. Shot over the course of five years, the film presents an unflinching portrait of Edwin’s work and life while documenting his slow mental deterioration through visits and interviews with Edwin and his friends, former students, and others, along with archival footage and more.

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Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry (Klayman)

Director: Alison Klayman
Stars: Weiwei Ai, Dan Ai, Lao Ai
Genre: Documentary
Country: USA

A documentary that chronicles artist and activist Ai Weiwei as he prepares for a series of exhibitions and gets into an increasing number of clashes with the Chinese government.

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Unspeakable Act, The (Sallitt)

Director: Dan Sallitt
Stars: Tallie Medel, Sky Hirschkron, Aundrea Fares
Genre: Drama
Country: USA

17-year-old Jackie is in distress as her older brother Matthew gets his first girlfriend and prepares for college. Though Matthew does not share her incestuous desire, Jackie fights the intrusion of reality on her idyllic childhood world.

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Out of the Clear Blue Sky (Gardner)

Director: Danielle Gardner
Stars: Michael Santosusso, Chad Anthony Miller, Sandra Palmeri
Genre: Documentary
Country: USA | UK

A documentary that explores the effects of 9/11 on the firm Cantor Fitzgerald, whose offices on the top five floors of the North Tower of the World Trade Center were destroyed in the attacks, killing 658 out of their 960 employees.

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Band Called Death, A (Covino, Howlett)

Director: Mark Christopher Covino, Jeff Howlett
Stars: Bobby Hackney, David Hackney, Dannis Hackney
Genre: Documentary, Biography, Music
Country: USA | Netherlands | UK | Denmark

Before Bad Brains, the Sex Pistols or even the Ramones, there was a band called Death. Punk before punk existed, three teenage brothers in the early ’70s formed a band in their spare bedroom, began playing a few local gigs and even pressed a single in the hoped of getting signed. But this was the era of Motown and emerging disco. Record companies found Death’s music – and band name – too intimidating, and the group were never given a fair shot, disbanding before they even completed one album. Equal parts electrifying rockumentary and epic family love story, A Band Called Death chronicles the incredible fairy-tale journey of what happened almost three decades later, when a dusty 1974 demo tape made it way out of the attic and found an audience several generations younger.

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Queen of Versailles, The (Greenfield)

Director: Lauren Greenfield
Stars: Jaqueline Siegel, David Siegel, Lorraine Barrett
Genre: Documentary
Country: USA | Netherlands | UK | Denmark

A documentary that follows a billionaire couple as they begin construction on a mansion inspired by Versailles. During the next two years, their empire, fueled by the real estate bubble and cheap money, falters due to the economic crisis.

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Beasts of the Southern Wild (Zeitlin)

Director: Benh Zeitlin
Stars: Quvenzhané Wallis, Dwight Henry, Levy Easterly
Genre: Adventure, Drama, Fantasy
Country: USA

Faced with both her hot-tempered father’s fading health and melting ice-caps that flood her ramshackle bayou community and unleash ancient aurochs, six-year-old Hushpuppy must learn the ways of courage and love.

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Project Nim (Marsh)

Director: James Marsh
Stars: Nim Chimpsky, Stephanie LaFarge, Herbert Terrace
Genre: Documentary
Country: UK | USA

Tells the story of a chimpanzee taken from its mother at birth and raised like a human child by a family in a brownstone on the upper West Side in the 1970s.

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Artist, The (Hazanavicius)

Director: Michel Hazanavicius
Stars: Jean Dujardin, Bérénice Bejo, John Goodman
Genre: Comedy, Drama, Romance
Country: France | Belgium | USA

An egomaniacal film star develops a relationship with a young dancer against the backdrop of Hollywood’s silent era.

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Almayer’s Folly (Akerman)

Director: Chantal Akerman
Stars: Stanislas Merhar, Marc Barbé, Aurora Marion
Genre: Drama
Country: Belgium | France

A tale of an occidental merchant, Kaspar Almayer, whose dreams of riches for his beloved daughter, Nina, collapse under the weight of his own greed and prejudice.

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Skin I Live In, The (Almodóvar)

Director: Pedro Almodóvar
Stars: Antonio Banderas, Elena Anaya, Jan Cornet
Genre: Drama, Horror, Thriller
Country: Spain

A brilliant plastic surgeon, haunted by past tragedies, creates a type of synthetic skin that withstands any kind of damage. His guinea pig: a mysterious and volatile woman who holds the key to his obsession.

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Goodbye First Love (Hansen-Løve)

Director: Mia Hansen-Løve
Stars: Lola Créton, Sebastian Urzendowsky, Magne-Håvard Brekke
Genre: Drama, Romance
Country: France | Germany

A chronicle of the romance between Camille and Sullivan, which begins during their adolescence and picks up after Sullivan’s 8-year absence from exploring the world.

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This Is Not a Film (Mirtahmasb, Panahi)

Director: Mojtaba Mirtahmasb, Jafar Panahi
Stars: Jafar Panahi, Igi, Mrs. Gheirat
Genre: Documentary
Country: Iran

It’s been months since Jafar Panahi, stuck in jail, has been awaiting a verdict by the appeals court. By depicting a day in his life, Panahi and Mojtaba Mirtahmasb try to portray the deprivations looming in contemporary Iranian cinema.

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We Were Here (Weissman, Weber)

Director: David Weissman, Bill Weber
Stars: Ed Wolf, Daniel Goldstein, Guy Clark
Genre: Documentary, Biography, History
Country: USA

A deep and reflective look at the arrival and impact of AIDS in San Francisco and how individuals rose to the occasion during the first years of this unimaginable crisis.

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These Amazing Shadows (Mariano, Norton)

Director: Paul Mariano, Kurt Norton
Stars: Jeff Adachi, James H. Billington, Robin Blaetz
Genre: Documentary
Country: USA

Tells the history and importance of The National Film Registry, a roll call of American cinema treasures that reflects the diversity of film, and indeed the American experience itself.

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Kid with a Bike, The (Dardenne, Dardenne)

Director: Jean-Pierre Dardenne, Luc Dardenne
Stars: Thomas Doret, Cécile de France, Jérémie Renier
Genre: Drama, Family
Country: Belgium | France | Italy

Abandoned by his father, a young boy is left in a state-run youth farm. In a random act of kindness, the town hair-dresser agrees to foster him on week-ends.

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Illusionist, The (Chomet)

Director: Sylvain Chomet
Stars: Jean-Claude Donda, Eilidh Rankin, Duncan MacNeil
Genre: Animation, Drama, Family
Country: France | UK

A French illusionist finds himself out of work and travels to Scotland, where he meets a young woman. Their ensuing adventure changes both their lives forever.

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Film socialisme (Godard)

Director: Jean-Luc Godard
Stars: Jean-Marc Stehlé, Agatha Couture, Mathias Domahidy
Genre: Drama
Country: Switzerland | France

A symphony in three movements. Things such as a Mediterranean cruise, numerous conversations, in numerous languages, between the passengers, almost all of whom are on holiday… Our Europe. At night, a sister and her younger brother have summoned their parents to appear before the court of their childhood. The children demand serious explanations of the themes of Liberty, Equality and Fraternity. Our humanities. Visits to six sites of true or false myths: Egypt, Palestine, Odessa, Hellas, Naples and Barcelona.

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King’s Speech, The (Hooper)

Director: Tom Hooper
Stars: Colin Firth, Geoffrey Rush, Helena Bonham Carter
Genre: Biography, Drama, History
Country: UK | USA | Australia

The story of King George VI, his impromptu ascension to the throne of the British Empire in 1936, and the speech therapist who helped the unsure monarch overcome his stammer.

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Mother (Ho)

Director: Bong Joon Ho
Stars: Hye-ja Kim, Won Bin, Goo Jin
Genre: Crime, Drama, Thriller
Country: South Korea

A mother desperately searches for the killer who framed her son for a girl’s horrific murder.

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Maid, The (Silva)

Director: Sebastián Silva
Stars: Catalina Saavedra, Claudia Celedón, Mariana Loyola
Genre: Comedy, Drama
Country: Chile | Mexico

A drama centered on a maid trying to hold on to her position after having served a family for 23 years.

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Precious (Daniels)

Director: Lee Daniels
Stars: Gabourey Sidibe, Mo’Nique, Paula Patton
Genre: Drama
Country: USA

In New York City’s Harlem circa 1987, an overweight, abused, illiterate teen who is pregnant with her second child is invited to enroll in an alternative school in hopes that her life can head in a new direction.

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About Elly (Farhadi)

Director: Asghar Farhadi
Stars: Golshifteh Farahani, Shahab Hosseini, Taraneh Alidoosti
Genre: Drama, Mystery, Thriller
Country: Iran | France

The mysterious disappearance of a kindergarten teacher during a picnic in the north of Iran is followed by a series of misadventures for her fellow travelers.

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Mary and Max (Elliot)

Director: Adam Elliot
Stars: Toni Collette, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Eric Bana
Genre: Animation, Comedy, Drama
Country: Australia

A tale of friendship between two unlikely pen pals: Mary, a lonely, eight-year-old girl living in the suburbs of Melbourne, and Max, a forty-four-year old, severely obese man living in New York.

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Dogtooth (Lanthimos)

Director: Yorgos Lanthimos
Stars: Christos Stergioglou, Michele Valley, Angeliki Papoulia
Genre: Drama, Thriller
Country: Greece

Three teenagers live isolated, without leaving their house, because their over-protective parents say they can only leave when their dogtooth falls out.

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City of Life and Death (Lu)

Director: Chuan Lu
Stars: Ye Liu, Wei Fan, Hideo Nakaizumi
Genre: Drama, History, War
Country: China | Hong Kong

In 1937, Japan occupied Nanjing, the Chinese capital. There was a battle and subsequent atrocities against the inhabitants, especially those who took refuge in the International Security Zone.

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Mademoiselle Chambon (Brizé)

Director: Stéphane Brizé
Stars: Vincent Lindon, Sandrine Kiberlain, Aure Atika
Genre: Drama, Romance
Country: France

Jean, his loving wife and son live a simple, happy life. At his son’s homeroom teacher Madamoiselle Chambon’s request, he volunteers as substitute teacher and starts to fall for her delicate and elegant charm. His ordinary life between family and work starts to falter.

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Broken Embraces (Almodóvar)

Director: Pedro Almodóvar
Stars: Penélope Cruz, Lluís Homar, Blanca Portillo
Genre: Drama, Romance, Thriller
Country: Spain

Harry Caine, a blind writer, reaches this moment in time when he has to heal his wounds from 14 years back. He was then still known by his real name, Mateo Blanco, and directing his last movie.

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In a Dream (Zagar)

Director: Jeremiah Zagar
Stars: Isaiah Zagar, Julia Zagar, Ezekiel Zagar
Genre: Documentary
Country: USA

The story of Julia Zagar and her husband Isaiah, a renowned mosaic artist, who for the past 30 years has covered more than 40,000 square feet of Philadelphia top to bottom with tile, mirror, paint, and concrete.

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Ballast (Hammer)

Director: Lance Hammer
Stars: Micheal J. Smith Sr., JimMyron Ross, Tarra Riggs
Genre: Drama
Country: USA

A drama set in the Mississippi delta, where one man’s suicide affects three people’s lives.

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Gomorrah (Garrone)

Director: Matteo Garrone
Stars: Gianfelice Imparato, Salvatore Abbruzzese, Toni Servillo
Genre: Crime, Drama
Country: Italy

Scampia Vele is the corbusian architecture which has become a stronghold for Mafia of Naples, Italy.

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Love Exposure (Sono)

Director: Sion Sono
Stars: Takahiro Nishijima, Hikari Mitsushima, Sakura Andô
Genre: Action, Comedy, Drama
Country: Japan

A bizarre love triangle forms between a young Catholic upskirt photographer, a misandric girl and a manipulative cultist.

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Revanche (Spielmann)

Director: Götz Spielmann
Stars: Johannes Krisch, Irina Potapenko, Andreas Lust
Genre: Crime, Drama, Romance
Country: Austria

Ex-con Alex plans to flee to the South with his girl after a robbery. But something terrible happens and revenge seems inevitable.

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Lorna’s Silence (Dardenne, Dardenne)

Director: Jean-Pierre Dardenne, Luc Dardenne
Stars: Arta Dobroshi, Jérémie Renier, Fabrizio Rongione
Genre: Drama
Country: Belgium | France | Italy | Germany

Sokol and Lorna, two Albanian emigrants in Belgium, dream of leaving their dreary jobs to set up a snack bar. They need money, and a permanent resident status. Claudy is a junkie – he needs money to satisfy his addiction. Andrei, the cigarette smuggler, must hold up for a while outside Russia; he has loads of money. Fabio, the Italian taxi driver and aspiring gang boss, elaborates a clever scheme: he will pay Claudy to marry Lorna so that she acquires a Belgian citizenship. Then she is to re-marry Andrei, who will in this way obtain the coveted EU passport – and pay a hefty price to Fabio and Lorna for the service. Like all plans, this one will not survive the contact with reality.

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Breaking the Maya Code (Lebrun)

Director: David Lebrun
Stars: Michael D. Coe, Ian Graham, Nikolai Grube
Genre: Documentary, Mystery
Country: USA

The complex and beautiful hieroglyphic script of the ancient Maya was until recently one of the last great untranslated writing systems. Based on the best-selling book by Michael Coe, called by the New York Times “one of the great stories of 20th century scientific discovery”, Breaking the Maya Code traces the epic quest to unlock the secrets of the script across 200 years, nine countries and three continents.

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Lynch (Jason S.)

Director: Jason S.
Stars: Jay Aaseng, Jeremy Alter, David Lynch
Genre: Documentary
Country: USA

Compiled from over two years of footage, the film is an intimate portrait of David Lynch’s creative process as he completes his latest film, Inland Empire (2006). We follow Lynch as he discovers beauty in ideas, leading us on a journey through the abstract which ultimately unveils his cinematic vision. The director of the documentary immersed himself in David Lynch’s world; living and working at Lynch’s home. His unobtrusive style has captured a personal side of David Lynch not seen before.

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Control (Corbijn)

Director: Anton Corbijn
Stars: Sam Riley, Samantha Morton, Craig Parkinson
Genre: Biography, Drama, Music
Country: UK | USA | Australia | Japan | France

A profile of Ian Curtis, the enigmatic singer of Joy Division whose personal, professional, and romantic troubles led him to commit suicide at the age of 23.

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Atonement (Wright)

Director: Joe Wright
Stars: Keira Knightley, James McAvoy, Brenda Blethyn
Genre: Drama, Mystery, Romance
Country: UK | France | USA

Thirteen-year-old fledgling writer Briony Tallis irrevocably changes the course of several lives when she accuses her older sister’s lover of a crime he did not commit.

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Playing (Coutinho)

Director: Eduardo Coutinho
Stars: Marília Pêra, Andrea Beltrão, Fernanda Torres
Genre: Documentary, Drama
Country: Brazil

Following a newspaper ad, ordinary women tell part of their life stories to director Eduardo Coutinho, which are then re-enacted by actresses, blurring the barriers between truth, fiction and interpretation.

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Alexandra (Sokurov)

Director: Aleksandr Sokurov
Stars: Galina Vishnevskaya, Vasily Shevtsov, Raisa Gichaeva
Genre: Drama, War
Country: Russia | France

An elderly woman takes a train trip to visit her grandson at his army camp inside Chechnya.

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You, the Living (Andersson)

Director: Roy Andersson
Stars: Elisabeth Helander, Jörgen Nohall, Jan Wikbladh
Genre: Comedy, Drama, Music
Country: Sweden | Germany | France | Denmark | Norway | Japan

You, the Living is a film about humankind, its greatness and its baseness, joy and sorrow, its self-confidence and anxiety, its desire to love and be loved.

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My Winnipeg (Maddin)

Director: Guy Maddin
Stars: Darcy Fehr, Ann Savage, Louis Negin
Genre: Documentary, Comedy, Drama
Country: Canada

Fact, fantasy and memory are woven seamlessly together in this portrait of film-maker Guy Maddin’s home town of Winnipeg, Manitoba.

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Duchess of Langeais, The (Rivette)

Director: Jacques Rivette
Stars: Jeanne Balibar, Guillaume Depardieu, Bulle Ogier
Genre: Drama, Music, Romance
Country: France | Italy

In Majorca, in 1823, a French general, Armand de Montriveau, overhears a cloistered nun singing in a chapel; he insists on speaking to her. She is Antoinette, for five years he has searched for her. Flash back to their meeting in Paris, he recently returned from Africa, she married and part of the highest society. She flirts with him, and soon he’s captivated. His behavior is possessive, insistent. Then, it is her turn to become obsessed. Letters, balls, scandal, a kidnapping, and an ultimatum bring her to the cloister and him to melancholy. Whose steel proved sharper? Is it tragic or grotesque?

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Queen, The (Frears)

Director: Stephen Frears
Stars: Helen Mirren, Michael Sheen, James Cromwell
Genre: Biography, Drama, History
Country: UK | USA | France | Italy

Diana, the “People’s Princess” has died in a car accident in Paris. The Queen (Dame Helen Mirren) and her family decide that for the best, they should remain hidden behind the closed doors of Balmoral Castle. The heartbroken public do not understand and request that the Queen comforts her people. This also puts pressure on newly elected Tony Blair (Michael Sheen), who constantly tries to convince the monarchy to address the public.

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After the Wedding (Bier)

Director: Susanne Bier
Stars: Mads Mikkelsen, Sidse Babett Knudsen, Rolf Lassgård
Genre: Drama
Country: Denmark | Sweden | UK | Norway

A manager of an orphanage in India is sent to Copenhagen, Denmark, where he discovers a life-altering family secret.

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Day I Bought a Star, The (Miyazaki)

Director: Hayao Miyazaki
Stars: Ryûnosuke Kamiki, Kyôka Suzuki, Genzô Wakayama
Genre: Animation, Short, Fantasy
Country: Japan

A young boy is tired of the city and escapes into the country. Two strangers trade him a strange seed. The boy accepts and the seed sprouts into a miniature planet, which continues to grow.

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Letters from Iwo Jima (Eastwood)

Director: Clint Eastwood
Stars: Ken Watanabe, Kazunari Ninomiya, Tsuyoshi Ihara
Genre: Action, Adventure, Drama
Country: USA | Japan

The story of the battle of Iwo Jima between the United States and Imperial Japan during World War II, as told from the perspective of the Japanese who fought it.

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Jonestown: The Life and Death of Peoples Temple (Nelson)

Director: Stanley Nelson
Stars: Rebecca Moore, Janet Shular, Tim Carter
Genre: Documentary, History
Country: USA

Featuring never-before-seen footage, this documentary delivers a startling new look at the Peoples Temple, headed by preacher Jim Jones who, in 1978, led more than 900 members to Guyana, where he orchestrated a mass suicide via tainted punch.

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Wind That Shakes the Barley, The (Loach)

Director: Ken Loach
Stars: Cillian Murphy, Pádraic Delaney, Liam Cunningham
Genre: Drama, War
Country: Ireland | UK | Germany | Italy | Spain | France | Belgium | Switzerland | Netherlands

Against the backdrop of the Irish War of Independence, two brothers fight a guerrilla war against British forces.

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C.R.A.Z.Y. (Vallée)

Director: Jean-Marc Vallée
Stars: Michel Côté, Marc-André Grondin, Danielle Proulx
Genre: Comedy, Drama
Country: Canada

A young French-Canadian, growing up in the 1960s and 1970s, struggles to reconcile his emerging homosexuality with his father’s conservative values and his own Catholic beliefs.

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Street Fight (Curry)

Director: Marshall Curry
Stars: Jen Bluestein, Cory Booker, Bill Bradley
Genre: Documentary
Country: USA

This documentary follows the 2002 mayoral campaign in Newark, New Jersey in which a City Councilman, Cory Booker, attempted to unseat longtime mayor Sharpe James.

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Munich (Spielberg)

Director: Steven Spielberg
Stars: Eric Bana, Daniel Craig, Marie-Josée Croze
Genre: Action, Drama, History
Country: France | Canada | USA

Based on the true story of the Black September aftermath, about the five men chosen to eliminate the ones responsible for that fateful day.

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Our Daily Bread (Geyrhalter)

Director: Nikolaus Geyrhalter
Stars: Claus Hansen Petz, Arkadiusz Rydellek, Barbara Hinz
Genre: Documentary
Country: Germany | Austria

OUR DAILY BREAD is a wide-screen tableau of a feast which isn’t always easy to digest – and in which we all take part. A pure, meticulous and high-end film experience that enables the audience to form their own ideas.

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51 Birch Street (Block)

Director: Doug Block
Stars: Carol Block, Doug Block, Ellen Block
Genre: Documentary
Country: Germany | USA

Documentary filmmaker Doug Block had every reason to believe his parents’ 54-year marriage was a good one. But when his mother dies unexpectedly and his father swiftly marries his former secretary, he discovers two parents who are far more complex and troubled than he ever imagined. 51 Birch Street is a riveting personal documentary that explores a universal human question: how much about your parents do you really want to know?

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49 Up (Apted, Almond)

Director: Michael Apted, Paul Almond
Stars: Bruce Balden, Jacqueline Bassett, Symon Basterfield
Genre: Documentary, Biography
Country: UK

In 1964, to explore the adage “Give me a child until he is seven and I will give you the man,” World in Action filmed seven-year-olds. Every seven years, Michael Apted visits them. At 49, 12 agree to talk about family, work, their hopes, and the series. We also see footage from previous interviews. Some marriages seem stronger; some have ended. Being a parent or a grandparent dominates life’s pleasures. Simon has found responsibility; John’s charity work flourishes. Neil remains in politics, against all odds. Jackie leads the critique of a more deliberately-present Apted and the series’ intrusiveness. None enjoy participating; all are reflective; several surpass expectations.

 

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Child, The (Dardenne, Dardenne)

Director: Jean-Pierre Dardenne, Luc Dardenne
Stars: Jérémie Renier, Déborah François, Jérémie Segard
Genre: Crime, Drama, Romance
Country: Belgium | France

Bruno and Sonia, a young couple living off her benefit and the thefts committed by his gang, have a new source of money: their newborn son.

 

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Head-On (Akin)

Director: Fatih Akin
Stars: Birol Ünel, Sibel Kekili, Güven Kiraç
Genre: Drama, Romance
Country: Germany | Turkey

With the intention to break free from the strict familial restrictions, a suicidal young woman sets up a marriage of convenience with a forty-year-old addict, an act that will lead to an outburst of envious love.

 

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Cinévardaphoto (Varda)

Director: Agnès Varda
Stars: n/a
Genre: Documentary
Country: France

From legendary French New Wave director Agnès Varda, a triptych of short documentary films exploring the power and vitality of the photograph. Each film separated by 20 years, from her first documentary in the early 60s, through a doc from the early 80s, to her most recent.

 

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Notre musique (Godard)

Director: Jean-Luc Godard
Stars: Sarah Adler, Nade Dieu, Rony Kramer
Genre: Drama
Country: France | Switzerland

An indictment of modern times divided into three “kingdoms”: “Enfer” (“Hell”), “Purgatoire” (“Purgatory”) and “Paradis” (“Paradise”).

 

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Nobody Knows (Koreeda)

Director: Hirokazu Koreeda
Stars: Yûya Yagira, Ayu Kitaura, Hiei Kimura
Genre: Drama
Country: Japan

In a small Tokyo apartment, twelve-year-old Akira must care for his younger siblings after their mother leaves them and shows no sign of returning.

 

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White Diamond, The (Herzog)

Director: Werner Herzog
Stars: Werner Herzog, Graham Dorrington, Dieter Plage
Genre: Documentary
Country: Germany | Japan | UK

About the daring adventure of exploring rain forest canopy with a novel flying device-the Jungle Airship. Airship engineer Dr. Graham Dorrington embarks on a trip to the giant Kaieteur Falls in the heart of Guyana, hoping to fly his helium-filled invention above the tree-tops. But this logistic effort will not be without risk. Twelve years ago, a similar expedition into the unique habitat of the canopy ended in disaster when Dorrington’s friend Dieter Plage fell to his death. With the expedition is Werner Herzog, setting out now with a new prototype of the airship into the Lost World of the pristine rain forest of this little explored area of the world, to record and tell this unique story.

 

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Z Channel: A Magnificent Obsession (Cassavetes)

Director: Xan Cassavetes
Stars: Robert Altman, Vera Carlisle Anderson, C.L. Batten
Genre: Documentary, Biography, History
Country: USA

A documentary on the Z Channel, one of the first pay cable stations in the US, and its programming chief, Jerry Harvey. Debuting in 1974, the LA-based channel’s eclectic slate of movies became a prime example of the untapped power of cable television.

 

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House of Flying Daggers (Zhang)

Director: Yimou Zhang
Stars: Ziyi Zhang, Takeshi Kaneshiro, Andy Lau
Genre: Action, Adventure, Drama
Country: China | Hong Kong

A romantic police captain breaks a beautiful member of a rebel group out of prison to help her rejoin her fellows, but things are not what they seem.

 

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Osama (Barmak)

Director: Siddiq Barmak
Stars: Marina Golbahari, Zubaida Sahar, Khwaja Nader
Genre: Drama
Country: Afghanistan | Ireland | Japan | Iran | Netherlands

After the rise of the Taliban in Afghanistan and the restriction of women in public life, a pre-teen girl is forced to masquerade as a boy in order to find work to support her mother and grandmother.

 

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Time of the Wolf (Haneke)

Director: Michael Haneke
Stars: Isabelle Huppert, Anaïs Demoustier, Béatrice Dalle
Genre: Drama, Horror
Country: France | Austria | Germany

When Anna and her family arrive at their holiday home, they find it occupied by strangers. This confrontation is just the beginning of a painful learning process.

 

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Touching the Void (Macdonald)

Director: Kevin Macdonald
Stars: Simon Yates, Joe Simpson, Brendan Mackey
Genre: Documentary, Adventure, Drama
Country: UK | USA

The true story of two climbers and their perilous journey up the west face of Siula Grande in the Peruvian Andes in 1985.

 

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Five Obstructions, The (Von Trier, Leth)

Director: Jørgen Leth, Lars von Trier
Stars: Claus Nissen, Majken Algren Nielsen, Daniel Hernandez Rodriguez
Genre: Documentary
Country: Denmark | Switzerland | Belgium | France

Filmmaker Lars Von Trier challenges Jørgen Leth, the filmmaker behind The Perfect Human (1967), to remake his classic short under circumstances of increasing constraint.

 

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Belle and Sebastian: Fans Only (Young, Bangs)

Director: Blair Young, Lance Bangs
Stars: Isobel Campbell, Richard Colburn, Mick Cooke
Genre: Documentary
Country: UK

FANS ONLY is an excellent companion to Belle and Sebastian’s albums. It features all of Belle and Sebastian’s videos while on the Jeepster/Matador label (they recently switched to Rough Trade) and also some interesting live performances. These segments are linked together by vintage footage of the band that seems to have been shot for TV a few years ago and by photographs of the band.

 

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Story of Marie and Julien, The (Rivette)

Director: Jacques Rivette
Stars: Emmanuelle Béart, Jerzy Radziwilowicz, Anne Brochet
Genre: Drama, Fantasy, Mystery
Country: France | Italy

Middle-aged Julien lives alone with his cat. He dreams of Marie, and a few minutes later, he sees her on the street and makes a date. He asks her to move in with him, and she does. Her boyfriend is dead, the rest of her past a mystery. Although they quickly seem to fall in love, she sometimes pulls away suddenly from him, is distant, and spends the night in a hotel. She also dreads something imminent and warns him that if he missteps, he will lose her and all memory of her. He responds by digging into her past: what explains her remodeling an upstairs garret room, her nightly dreams, her fears? What can he, now desperately in love, do when he learns why? Can either rescue the other?

 

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Sweet Sixteen (Loach)

Director: Ken Loach
Stars: Martin Compston, Michelle Coulter, Annmarie Fulton
Genre: Crime, Drama
Country: UK | Germany | Spain

Determined to have a normal family life once his mother gets out of prison, a Scottish teenager from a tough background sets out to raise the money for a home.

 

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Cremaster 3 (Barney)

Director: Matthew Barney
Stars: Richard Serra, Matthew Barney, Aimee Mullins
Genre: Drama, Fantasy
Country: USA

The third film of a five-part art-installation epic — it’s part-zombie movie, part-gangster film.

 

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Funny Ha Ha (Bujalski)

Director: Andrew Bujalski
Stars: Kate Dollenmayer, Mark Herlehy, Christian Rudder
Genre: Comedy, Drama, Romance
Country: USA

Marnie just graduated from college, drinks likes she’s still in school, and is looking for a temporary job but a permanent boyfriend. She loves a guy who doesn’t love her (?), ping-pongs between awkward romantic alternatives and even less suitable jobs.

 

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Bus 174 (Padilha, Lacerda)

Director: José Padilha, Felipe Lacerda
Stars: Sandro do Nascimento, Rodrigo Pimentel, Luiz Eduardo Soares
Genre: Documentary, Crime
Country: Brazil

On June 12, 2000, a young man with a gun took the passengers aboard Bus 174 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil hostage. This documentary examines the event itself, the resulting media frenzy, the police response, and the perpetrator’s background.

 

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Bloody Sunday (Greengrass)

Director: Paul Greengrass
Stars: James Nesbitt, Tim Pigott-Smith, Nicholas Farrell
Genre: Drama, History, War
Country: UK | Ireland

A dramatization of the Irish civil rights protest march and subsequent massacre by British troops on January 30, 1972.

 

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To Be and to Have (Philibert)

Director: Nicolas Philibert
Stars: Georges Lopez, Alizé, Axel Thouvenin
Genre: Documentary, Family
Country: France

A documentary portrait of a one-room school in rural France, where the students (ranging in age from 4 to 11) are educated by a single dedicated teacher.

 

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Skin Too Few: The Days of Nick Drake, A (Berkvens)

Director: Jeroen Berkvens
Stars: Nick Drake, Paul Weller, Gabrielle Drake
Genre: Documentary, Biography
Country: Netherlands

A study, mostly chronological, of the life of Nick Drake (1948-1974). Gabrielle, his older sister, tells us of her brother’s birth in Burma, childhood in Warwickshire, life at Cambridge and in London, then back to his parents’ home in Tanworth. His parents describe his habits and personality. Two friends and the producer, arranger, sound engineer, and photographer for his three albums comment. His mother, a musician and poet, is an early influence. His quiet folk style made his one tour a disaster. His lack of success and gradual withdrawal end with his death at 26. Eleven of his recordings play on the soundtrack, usually as we see his room, a city, or the Warwickshire countryside.

 

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Springtime in a Small Town (Tian)

Director: Zhuangzhuang Tian
Stars: Jingfan Hu, Jun Wu, Bai Qing Xin
Genre: Drama, Romance
Country: China | Hong Kong | France | Netherlands

The eight-year marriage of Liyan and Yuwen has left them both unfulfilled and distant. A visitor arrives from Shanghai, a doctor who’s an old school friend of Liyan’s and, unbeknownst to her husband, Yuwen’s childhood sweetheart.

 

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Dirty Pretty Things (Frears)

Director: Stephen Frears
Stars: Chiwetel Ejiofor, Audrey Tautou, Sophie Okonedo
Genre: Crime, Drama, Thriller
Country: UK

Undocumented immigrants Okwe and Senay work at a posh London hotel and live in constant fear of deportation. One night Okwe stumbles across evidence of a bizarre murder setting off a series of events that could lead to disaster or freedom.

 

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Chaos (Serreau)

Director: Coline Serreau
Stars: Vincent Lindon, Catherine Frot, Rachida Brakni
Genre: Comedy, Drama, Crime
Country: France

A bourgeois couple, modern yet conventional. One night by accident, a young prostitute barges into their lives. Hounded down, beaten up, threatened, she will continue to struggle, with the help of a well off lady, first for her survival-her resurrection-then for her dignity and freedom. Stormy encounters for everyone involved.

 

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Read My Lips (Audiard)

Director: Jacques Audiard
Stars: Vincent Cassel, Emmanuelle Devos, Olivier Gourmet
Genre: Crime, Drama, Romance
Country: France

She is almost deaf and he lip-reads. He is an ex-convict. She wants to help him. He thinks no one can help except himself.

 

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What Time Is It There? (Tsai)

Director: Ming-liang Tsai
Stars: Kang-sheng Lee, Shiang-chyi Chen, Yi-Ching Lu
Genre: Drama, Romance
Country: Taiwan | France

A watch salesman meets a young woman soon leaving for Paris and becomes infatuated, so he begins to change all the clocks in Taipei to Paris time.

 

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No Man’s Land (Tanovic)

Director: Danis Tanovic
Stars: Branko Djuric, Rene Bitorajac, Filip Sovagovic
Genre: Comedy, Drama, War
Country: France | Bosnia and Herzegovina | Italy | Belgium | UK | Slovenia

Bosnia and Herzegovina during 1993 at the time of the heaviest fighting between the two warring sides. Two soldiers from opposing sides in the conflict, Nino and Ciki, become trapped in no man’s land, whilst a third soldier becomes a living booby trap.

 

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Time Out (Cantet)

Director: Laurent Cantet
Stars: Aurélien Recoing, Karin Viard, Serge Livrozet
Genre: Drama
Country: France

An unemployed man finds his life sinking more and more into trouble as he hides his situation from his family and friends.

 

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I’m Going Home (de Oliveira)

Director: Manoel de Oliveira
Stars: Michel Piccoli, Catherine Deneuve, John Malkovich
Genre: Comedy, Drama
Country: France | Portugal

The comfortable daily routines of aging Parisian actor Gilbert Valence, 76, are suddenly shaken when he learns that his wife, daughter, and son-in-law have been killed in a car crash.

 

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Domestic Violence (Wiseman)

Director: Frederick Wiseman
Stars: n/a
Genre: Documentary
Country: USA

Renowned documentarian Frederick Wiseman turns his observational camera on The Spring, a Florida shelter for battered women and children. For one-hundred and ninety-six minutes, Wiseman profiles the women and children that have been victim to domestic violence, showing them endure therapeutic, thoughtful lectures and learn from the tireless social workers employed at The Spring that their sanctuary has been found.

 

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Devil’s Backbone, The (del Toro)

Director: Guillermo del Toro
Stars: Marisa Paredes, Eduardo Noriega, Federico Luppi
Genre: Drama, Horror
Country: Mexico | Spain

After Carlos – a 12-year-old whose father has died in the Spanish Civil War – arrives at an ominous boys’ orphanage, he discovers the school is haunted and has many dark secrets which he must uncover.

 

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In the Mirror of Maya Deren (Kudlácek)

Director: Martina Kudlácek
Stars: Miriam Arsham, Stan Brakhage, Chao Li Chi
Genre: Documentary, Biography
Country: Austria | Czech Republic | Switzerland | Germany

Documentary about the life of avant-garde filmmaker Maya Deren, who led the independent film movement of the 1940s.

 

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Circle, The (Panahi)

Director: Jafar Panahi
Stars: Maryiam Palvin Almani, Nargess Mamizadeh, Mojgan Faramarzi
Genre: Drama
Country: Iran | Italy | Switzerland

Various women struggle to function in the oppressively sexist society of contemporary Iran.

 

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Faithless (Ullmann)

Director: Liv Ullmann
Stars: Lena Endre, Erland Josephson, Krister Henriksson
Genre: Drama, Romance
Country: Sweden | Italy | Germany | Finland | Norway

An imaginary woman recollects the painful experience of adultery to a storyteller.

 

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Aberdeen (Moland)

Director: Hans Petter Moland, Tony Spataro
Stars: Stellan Skarsgård, Lena Headey, Jean Anderson
Genre: Drama
Country: UK | Sweden | Norway

A mom dying in Aberdeen, Scotland, asks her coke snorting, nympho, London lawyer daughter to get her estranged, alcoholic dad in Oslo, Norway, to Aberdeen. He’s drunk at the airport, so they travel together by car and ferry.

 

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Under the Sand (Ozon)

Director: François Ozon
Stars: Charlotte Rampling, Bruno Cremer, Jacques Nolot
Genre: Drama, Mystery
Country: France | Japan

When her husband goes missing at the beach, a female professor begins to mentally disintegrate as her denial of his disappearance becomes delusional.

 

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Eureka (Aoyama)

Director: Shinji Aoyama
Stars: Kôji Yakusho, Aoi Miyazaki, Masaru Miyazaki
Genre: Drama
Country: Japan | France

The traumatized survivors of a murderous bus hijacking come together and take a road trip to attempt to overcome their damaged selves. Meanwhile a serial killer is on the loose.

 

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Endurance, The (Butler)

Director: George Butler
Stars: Liam Neeson, Julian Ayer, John Blackborow
Genre: Documentary, History
Country: USA | UK | Germany | Sweden

A retelling of Sir Ernest Shackleton ‘s ill-fated expedition to Antarctica in 1914-1916, featuring new footage of the actual locations and interviews with surviving relatives of key expedition members, plus archived audio interviews with expedition members, and a generous helping of the footage and still photos shot on the expedition.

 

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Wings of Hope (Herzog)

Director: Werner Herzog
Stars: Werner Herzog, Juliane Koepcke, Juan Zaplana Ramirez
Genre: Documentary, Adventure, Biography
Country: Germany | UK

Werner Herzog returns to the South American jungle with Juliane Koepcke, the German woman who was the sole survivor of a plane crash there in 1971. They find the remains of the plane and recreate her journey out of the jungle.

 

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Battle Royale (Fukasaku)

Director: Kinji Fukasaku
Stars: Tatsuya Fujiwara, Aki Maeda, Tarô Yamamoto
Genre: Action, Adventure, Drama
Country: Japan

In the future, the Japanese government captures a class of ninth-grade students and forces them to kill each other under the revolutionary “Battle Royale” act.

 

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Murderous Maids (Denis)

Director: Jean-Pierre Denis
Stars: Sylvie Testud, Julie-Marie Parmentier, Isabelle Renauld
Genre: Biography, Crime, Drama
Country: France

Based on the true story of two chambermaids (the Papin sisters) of 1930s France who murdered their employer and her daughter.

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Sound and Fury (Aronson)

Director: Josh Aronson
Stars: Jaime Leigh Allen, Jemma Braham, Freeda Cat
Genre: Documentary
Country: UK | USA

Academy Award-nominated Sound and Fury follows the intimate, heart-rending tale of the Artinians, an extended family with deaf and hearing members across three generations. Together they confront a technological device that can help the deaf to hear but may also threaten deaf culture – and their bonds with each other.

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Merci pour le Chocolat (Chabrol)

Director: Claude Chabrol
Stars: Isabelle Huppert, Jacques Dutronc, Anna Mouglalis
Genre: Crime, Drama, Mystery
Country: France | Switzerland

In Lausanne, the aspirant pianist Jeanne Pollet has lunch with her mother Louise Pollet, her boyfriend Axel and his mother. Lenna leans that when she was born, a nurse had mistakenly told to the prominent pianist André Polonski that she would be his daughter. André has just remarried his first wife, the heiress of a Swiss chocolate factory Marie-Claire “Mika” Muller and they live in Lausanne with André’s son Guillaume Polonski. Out of the blue, Jeanne visits André and he offers to give piano classes to help her in her examination. Jeanne becomes closer to André and sooner she discovers that Mika might be drugging her stepson with Rohypnol. Further, she might have killed his second wife Lisbeth.

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La Commune (Paris, 1871) (Watkins)

Director: Peter Watkins
Stars: Eliane Annie Adalto, Pierre Barbieux, Bernard Bombeau
Genre: Drama, History, War
Country: France

In this war drama blurring the lines between documentary and fiction, the working class and the bourgeoisie of 19th century Paris are interviewed and covered on television, before and during a tragic workers’ class revolt.

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Paragraph 175 (Epstein, Friedman)

Director: Rob Epstein, Jeffrey Friedman
Stars: Rupert Everett, Klaus Müller, Karl Gorath
Genre: Documentary, History, Romance
Country: UK | Germany | USA

Historian Klaus Müller interviews survivors of the Nazi persecution of homosexuals because of the German Penal Code of 1871, Paragraph 175.

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Set Me Free (Pool)

Director: Léa Pool
Stars: Karine Vanasse, Pascale Bussières, Predrag ‘Miki’ Manojlovic
Genre: Drama, Romance
Country: Canada | Switzerland | France

In the year 1963, an awkward thirteen-year-old girl comes of age during her escapism into the world of cinema, with potentially dangerous results.

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Specialist, The (Sivan)

Director: Eyal Sivan
Stars: Adolf Eichmann, Gideon Hausner, Gabriel Bach
Genre: Documentary
Country: Israel | France

The incredible trial of an appallingly ordinary man. Drawn entirely on the 350 hours of rare footage recorded during the trial of Adolf Eichmann, in 1961, in Jerusalem, this film about obedience and responsibility is the portrait of an expert in problems resolving, a modern criminal. The film is inspired from the controversial book by Hannah Arendt : “Eichmann in Jerusalem, report on the banality of evil”.

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It All Starts Today (Tavernier)

Director: Bertrand Tavernier
Stars: Philippe Torreton, Maria Pitarresi, Nadia Kaci
Genre: Drama
Country: France

Daniel is schoolmaster of a kindergarten in a small French town. The local economy, which depended entirely on coal production, has been mired in a depression ever since the mines were closed. When their parents fall into utter discouragement or even poverty because of prolonged unemployment, the children suffer the consequences.

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Color of Paradise, The (Majidi)

Director: Majid Majidi
Stars: Hossein Mahjoub, Mohsen Ramezani, Salameh Feyzi
Genre: Drama, Family
Country: Iran

The story of Mohammed, a blind Iranian boy and his father, Hashem, who is always oscillating between accepting his son as he is and abandoning him, as he represents a burden for him, after the loss of his wife.

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Buena Vista Social Club (Wenders)

Director: Wim Wenders
Stars: Compay Segundo, Ibrahim Ferrer, Rubén González
Genre: Documentary, Music
Country: Germany | USA | UK | France | Cuba

Aging Cuban musicians whose talents had been virtually forgotten following Castro’s takeover of Cuba, are brought out of retirement by Ry Cooder, who travelled to Havana in order to bring the musicians together, resulting in triumphant performances of extraordinary music, and resurrecting the musicians’ careers.

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42 Up (Apted)

Director: Michael Apted
Stars: Bruce Balden, Jacqueline Bassett, Symon Basterfield
Genre: Documentary, Biography
Country: UK

Director Michael Apted revisits the same group of British-born adults after a 7 year wait. The subjects are interviewed as to the changes that have occurred in their lives during the last seven years.

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Cruise, The (Miller)

Director: Bennett Miller
Stars: Timothy ‘Speed’ Levitch
Genre: Documentary
Country: USA

Affectionate portrait of Tim “Speed” Levitch, a tour guide for Manhattan’s Gray Line double-decker buses. He talks fast, is in love with the city, and dispenses historical facts, architectural analysis, and philosophical musings in equal measures.

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Brakhage (Shedden)

Director: Jim Shedden
Stars: Jerry Aronson, Jane Brakhage, Marilyn Brakhage
Genre: Documentary, Biography
Country: Canada

The film BRAKHAGE explores the depth and breadth of the filmmaker’s genius, the exquisite splendor of his films, his magic personal charm, his aesthetic fellow travelers and the influence his work has had on generations of other creators.

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General, The (Boorman)

Director: John Boorman
Stars: Brendan Gleeson, Adrian Dunbar, Sean McGinley
Genre: Biography, Crime, Drama
Country: UK | Ireland

The real-life story of Dublin folk hero and criminal Martin Cahill, who pulled off two daring robberies in Ireland with his team, but attracted unwanted attention from the police, the I.R.A., the U.V.F., and members of his own team.

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Eternity and a Day (Angelopoulos)

Director: Theodoros Angelopoulos
Stars: Bruno Ganz, Isabelle Renauld, Fabrizio Bentivoglio
Genre: Drama
Country: France | Italy | Greece | Germany

Famous writer Alexander is very ill and has little time left to live. He meets a little boy on the street, who is an illegal immigrant from Albania, and goes on a journey with him to take the boy home.

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4 Little Girls (Lee)

Director: Spike Lee
Stars: Maxine McNair, Walter Cronkite, Chris McNair
Genre: Documentary, History
Country: USA

A documentary of the notorious racial terrorist bombing of an African American church during the Civil Rights Movement.

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Level Five (Marker)

Director: Chris Marker
Stars: Catherine Belkhodja, Kenji Tokitsu, Nagisa Ôshima
Genre: Documentary, Romance, War
Country: France

The French computer programmer Laura inherits the task of making a computer game of the Battle of Okinawa during World War II. She searches the internet for information on the battle, and interviews Japanese experts and witnesses. The extraordinary circumstances of the Battle of Okinawa lead Laura to reflect deeply on her own life and humanity in general, particularly the influence of history and memories.

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Lawn Dogs (Duigan)

Director: John Duigan
Stars: Sam Rockwell, Kathleen Quinlan, Mischa Barton
Genre: Drama
Country: UK

When Devon, a 10-year-old girl, forges a friendship with Trent, a 21-year-old outsider who mows the neighborhood lawns, things suddenly get very complicated and private.

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Same Old Song (Resnais)

Director: Alain Resnais
Stars: Pierre Arditi, Sabine Azéma, Jean-Pierre Bacri
Genre: Comedy, Drama, Musical
Country: France | Switzerland | UK | Italy

A musical story about how people find their love on the streets of beautiful Paris.

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Children of Heaven (Majidi)

Director: Majid Majidi
Stars: Mohammad Amir Naji, Amir Farrokh Hashemian, Bahare Seddiqi
Genre: Drama, Family, Sport
Country: Iran

After a boy loses his sister’s pair of shoes, he goes on a series of adventures in order to find them. When he can’t, he tries a new way to “win” a new pair.

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Irma Vep (Assayas)

Director: Olivier Assayas
Stars: Maggie Cheung, Jean-Pierre Léaud, Nathalie Richard
Genre: Comedy, Drama
Country: France

A Chinese movie actress, in France to star in a remake of “Les Vampires”, finds petty intrigues and clashing egos on the set.

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Cremaster 1 (Barney)

Director: Matthew Barney
Stars: Marti Domination, Gemma Bourdon Smith, Kathleen Crepeau
Genre: Short, Fantasy, Musical
Country: USA

An experimental short film from the Cremaster series which alludes to the position of the reproductive organs during the embryonic development process.

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That Thing You Do! (Hanks)

Director: Tom Hanks
Stars: Tom Hanks, Liv Tyler, Charlize Theron
Genre: Comedy, Drama, Music
Country: USA

A local Pennsylvania band scores a one hit wonder in 1964 and rides the star-making machinery as long as they can, with lots of help from its manager.

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Without Memory (Koreeda)

Director: Hirokazu Koreeda
Stars: Hiroshi Sekine, Miwa Sekine, Taku Sekine
Genre: Documentary
Country: Japan

This documentary follows the life of a man who has a disability which prevents him from forming new memories. The vital importance of human memory is revealed through his daily interactions with his family and the filmmakers.

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Promise, The (Dardenne, Dardenne)

Director: Jean-Pierre Dardenne, Luc Dardenne
Stars: Jérémie Renier, Olivier Gourmet, Assita Ouedraogo
Genre: Comedy, Drama
Country: Belgium | France | Luxembourg | Tunisia

Roger uses his son Igor to ruthlessly traffic and exploit undocumented immigrants. When one of the immigrants is killed, Igor is guilt-ridden and wants to care for the dead man’s family against his father’s orders.

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Shanghai Triad (Zhang)

Director: Yimou Zhang
Stars: Li Gong, Baotian Li, Xiaoxiao Wang
Genre: Crime, Drama, History
Country: France | China

A provincial boy related to a Shanghai crime family is recruited by his uncle into cosmopolitan Shanghai in the 1930s to be a servant to a ganglord’s mistress.

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La Cérémonie (Chabrol)

Director: Claude Chabrol
Stars: Isabelle Huppert, Sandrine Bonnaire, Jacqueline Bisset
Genre: Crime, Drama, Mystery
Country: France | Germany

A newly hired maid for a rich countryside family befriends a post-office clerk who encourages her to rebel against her employers.

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Who Killed Pasolini? (Giordana)

Director: Marco Tullio Giordana
Stars: Carlo De Filippi, Nicoletta Braschi, Toni Bertorelli
Genre: Crime, Drama
Country: Italy | France

It’s the story of the murder of a poet, a man, a great film director: Pier Paolo Pasolini. The story begin with the arrest of “Pelosi”, a young man then accused of the murder of the poet. All the investigation about the crime is about the question: “Was ONLY the “Pelosi” to kill Pasolini?” The help of a Policeman, Trepalle put in evidence a trouble: Was Pasolini killed because of his accuses to some politicians?

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Jupiter’s Wife (Negoponte)

Director: Michel Negroponte
Stars: Maggie Cogan, Katina Pendleton
Genre: Documentary, Biography, Mystery
Country: USA

Michel Negroponte, a documentary filmmaker, meets Maggie one day in Central Park. Maggie claims to be married to the god Jupiter and the daughter of actor Robert Ryan. Michel gets to know Maggie over the next couple of years, and attempts to use her often outlandish stories as clues to reconstruct her past.

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Ulysses’ Gaze (Angelopoulos)

Director: Theodoros Angelopoulos
Stars: Harvey Keitel, Maia Morgenstern, Erland Josephson
Genre: Drama, War
Country: Greece | France | Italy | Germany | UK | Federal Republic of Yugoslavia | Romania | Albania | Bosnia and Herzegovina

An exiled filmmaker finally returns to his home country where former mysteries and afflictions of his early life come back to haunt him once more.

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Sense and Sensibility (Lee)

Director: Ang Lee
Stars: Emma Thompson, Kate Winslet, James Fleet
Genre: Drama, Romance
Country: USA | UK

Rich Mr. Dashwood dies, leaving his second wife and her three daughters poor by the rules of inheritance. The two eldest daughters are the title opposites.

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Anne Frank Remembered (Blair)

Director: Jon Blair
Stars: Kenneth Branagh, Glenn Close, Janny Brandes-Brilslijper
Genre: Documentary, Biography, War
Country: UK | USA | Netherlands

Using previously unreleased archival material in addition to contemporary interviews, this academy award-winning documentary tells the story of the Frank family and presents the first fully-rounded portrait of their brash and free-spirited daughter Anne, perhaps the world’s most famous victim of the Holocaust.

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World of Jacques Demy, The (Varda)

Director: Agnès Varda
Stars: Anouk Aimée, Richard Berry, Nino Castelnuovo
Genre: Documentary
Country: France | Belgium | Spain

In tribute to her late husband, the wife of the respected French director honors his life and artistic works by highlighting his vision in clips and interviews.

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Fresh (Yakin)

Director: Boaz Yakin
Stars: Sean Nelson, Giancarlo Esposito, Samuel L. Jackson
Genre: Crime, Drama, Thriller
Country: USA | France

Death and violence anger a twelve-year-old drug courier, who sets his employers against each other.

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I Can’t Sleep (Denis)

Director: Claire Denis
Stars: Yekaterina Golubeva, Richard Courcet, Vincent Dupont
Genre: Drama, Mystery, Romance
Country: France | Germany | Switzerland

A serial killer terrorizes Paris at night, but that doesn’t stop Daïga and Théo from meeting up, and falling in love.

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Faust (Svankmajer)

Director: Jan Svankmajer
Stars: Petr Cepek, Jan Kraus, Vladimír Kudla
Genre: Animation, Comedy, Drama
Country: Czech Republic | France | UK | Germany

An ordinary man is lured into a strange puppet theatre by a map and finds himself embroiled in a production of the Faustian legend.

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Cold Water (Assayas)

Director: Olivier Assayas
Stars: Virginie Ledoyen, Cyprien Fouquet, László Szabó
Genre: Drama
Country: France

When the girl of a rebelious teenage couple finds out she is being sent away, they both believe escaping the rigid order suffocating them is the only way to be free. But is it?

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Smell of Burning Ants, The (Rosenblatt)

Director: Jay Rosenblatt
Stars: Richard Silberg
Genre: Short, Documentary
Country: USA

A haunting documentary on the pains of growing up male. It explores the inner and outer cruelties that boys perpetrate and endure. The film provokes the viewer to reflect on how our society can deprive boys of wholeness.

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Cronos (del Toro)

Director: Guillermo del Toro
Stars: Federico Luppi, Ron Perlman, Claudio Brook
Genre: Horror
Country: Mexico

A mysterious device designed to provide its owner with eternal life resurfaces after four hundred years, leaving a trail of destruction in its path.

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Maadadayo (Kurosawa)

Director: Akira Kurosawa, Ishirô Honda
Stars: Tatsuo Matsumura, Hisashi Igawa, George Tokoro
Genre: Drama
Country: Japan

Following World War II, a retired professor approaching his autumn years finds his quality of life drastically reduced in war-torn Tokyo. Denying despair, he pursues writing and celebrates his birthday with his adoring students.

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Last Bolshevik, The (Marker)

Director: Chris Marker
Stars: Léonor Graser, Nikolai Izvolov, Kira Paramonova
Genre: Documentary, Biography, History
Country: France | Finland

This documentary tells the story of film director Aleksandr Medvedkin, throughout his life a sincere believer in communism, whose films were repeatedly banned in the Soviet Union. Modern Russian film students express their excitement at seeing his film HAPPINESS for the first time, and his contemporaries shed light on his life and work.

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Bells from the Deep (Herzog)

Director: Werner Herzog
Stars: Werner Herzog, Anna Hitch, Vissarion
Genre: Documentary
Country: Germany | USA

What is faith and religion to Russians after the fall of communism? We get the insight into the Russian Orthodox church as well as different folk and shamanic beliefs.

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Bitter Moon (Polanski)

Director: Roman Polanski
Stars: Hugh Grant, Kristin Scott Thomas, Emmanuelle Seigner
Genre: Drama, Romance, Thriller
Country: France | UK

After hearing stories of her, a passenger on a cruise ship develops an irresistible infatuation with an eccentric paraplegic’s wife.

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Olivier, Olivier (Holland)

Director: Agnieszka Holland
Stars: Brigitte Roüan, François Cluzet, Jean-François Stévenin
Genre: Drama
Country: France

Olivier, the nine-year-old son of Elisabeth and Serge, a country veterinarian, vanishes one afternoon on the way to his grandmother’s house. The emotional aftermath of his disappearance sends his father packing from France to Africa and nearly destroys his mother, who clings to her remaining child, Nadine, and her devoted neighbor, Marcel. Several years later, having relocated to the city, the police investigator who handled the case meets a Paris rent boy whom he believes to be the missing Olivier.

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Strange Tale of Oyuki, The (Shindô)

Director: Kaneto Shindô
Stars: Masahiko Tsugawa, Yuki Sumida, Kazuyo Asari
Genre: Drama
Country: Japan

The film tells the story of Japanese writer Kafu Nagai (1879-1959), a man about sixty with a huge reputation of seducer who falls madly in love for a young geisha named Oyuki. Meticulous and smartly dressed, Nagai patiently wrote in his diary his thoughts during many years. A melancholy reflection on the passage of time and a brilliant interpretive exercise.

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Sunday’s Children (D. Bergman)

Director: Daniel Bergman
Stars: Henrik Linnros, Thommy Berggren, Lena Endre
Genre: Adventure, Biography, Drama
Country: Sweden | Denmark | Finland | Iceland | Norway | France

The film switches back and forth between the adventures of Pu on a summer holiday in Norrland in Sweden and and the adult Pu visiting his father who lives in an old people’s home. Little Pu spends a summer in Norrland in the 1920s with all his relatives. He and his brother get to hear the story about the watchmaker who hung himself, learns to shoot with a bow and follow his father on a bicycle trip.

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In the Land of the Deaf (Philibert)

Director: Nicolas Philibert
Stars: Jean-Claude Poulain, Abou Bakar, Anh Tuan
Genre: Documentary
Country: France | Italy | UK | Switzerland

With unerring curiousity and sensitivity, director Philbert portrays the difficulties and joys of being deaf, offering vivid portraits of people of all ages coping with and surmounting their challenges.

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Lessons of Darkness (Herzog)

Director: Werner Herzog
Stars: Werner Herzog
Genre: Documentary, War
Country: France | UK | Germany

This film shows the disaster of the Kuwaitian oil fields in flames, with few interviews and no explanatory narration. Hell itself is presented in such beautiful sights and music that one has to be fascinated by it.

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Forbidden Love: The Unashamed Stories of Lesbian Lives (Fernie, Weissman)

Director: Lynne Fernie, Aerlyn Weissman
Stars: Keely Moll, Stephanie Ozard, Ann Bannon
Genre: Documentary
Country: Canada

Ten women, most of them in Vancouver or Toronto, talk about being lesbian in the 1940s, 1950s, and 1960s: discovering the pulp fiction of the day about women in love, their own first affairs, the pain of breaking up, frequenting gay bars, facing police raids, men’s responses, and the etiquette of butch and femme roles. Interspersed among the interviews and archival footage are four dramatized chapters from a pulp novel, “Forbidden Love”: Laura leaves her hick town and heads for the city, where she meets Mitch in a bar. Sparks fly, and so do laughter and joy. Ann Bannon, one of the writers of those paperback novels about forbidden love, talks about the genre.

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