FREE MEN by Anne-Frédérique Widman

Presented at AIFF 2019

90 min | Switzerland/USA | 2018 | BOSTON PREMIERE

Synopsis: Anne-Frédérique Widmann is a Swiss investigative reporter and documentary filmmaker. Formerly, she was U.S. correspondent for European media, co-editor-in-chief, anchor of the current affairs documentary program Temps Présent and head of the investigative team of the French Swiss National Television and Radio RTS. With New-York Times editorial cartoonist Chappatte, she co-founded the art & documentation project, Windows on Death Row. FREE MEN is a portrait of two innocent African Americans who spent most of their lives behind bars in complete isolation, on death row. One of them, Ndume was freed in 2012. He is now supporting his fellow friend, Kenneth, who is still incarcerated and fighting for justice. Despite the inhuman conditions they have endured, what has kept them both alive is art, love, and an impressive resilience. In these moments of racial tensions outside and in the U.S., FREE MEN show how people can resist social and racial prejudices by finding inner resources and personal strength to move forward... a universal lesson of hope and humility.

Awards: Geneva Int’l Film Festival and Forum on Human Rights Champ-Dollon Jury Prison Award; Int’l Film Festival of Algiers Jury Award.

THE LAST AMERICAN COLONY by Bestor Cram and Mike Majoros

Presented at AIFF 2019

92 min | USA | 2019 | BOSTON PREMIERE

Co-presented by India International Film Festival of Boston

Synopsis: In September 2017, Hurricane Maria pummeled the island of Puerto Rico, but it isn't the forces of nature that have done the most damage to the 3.5 million American citizens who live there. A history of economic exploitation, forced dependency, and systemic racism coming from the US have all wreaked havoc on an island that many see as the last colony in the western hemisphere. THE LAST AMERICAN COLONY traces the life of Juan Segarra, who graduates from Harvard and sets off on a treacherous path to fight for Puerto Rico's independence—a struggle that he rightly assumes will lead to either jail or death. Filmmaker Bestor Cram is an award-winning film director and has won numerous awards including CINE Golden Eagle, American Film Festival Blue Ribbons and Houston Int’l Film Festival Gold Awards. His films have been selected to screen at Sundance and Human Rights Watch Film Festival.

GREEN TALES OF THE CITY by Gwen Jansen

Presented at AIFF 2019

78 min | Netherlands |  US PREMIERE

Synopsis: GREEN TALES chronicles how the sustainability movement in several cities in the Netherlands, Amsterdam, Leeuwarden, Nijmegen, Rotterdam, and Utrecht are getting louder, more powerful, and more extensive at a breakneck pace. An increasing number of citizens, artists, businesses, research institutions, and local governments are joining forces. They want to make their own living environments more sustainable and are no longer waiting on the slow decisions being made at the national level. Filmmaker Jansen brought her camera along to these locations to document various “green tales” and to inspire other cities and people all over the world. Truly an optimistic attitude toward climate change!

THE BAR MITZVAH BOYS by Kata Oláh and Sándor Csukás

Presented at AIFF 2019

74 min | NEW ENGLAND PREMIERE

Synopsis: A film about the special relationship between a religious teenager and a lonely, old, atheist widower. Through their preparation for a spiritual celebration, the boy becomes the teacher and tries to restore the old man's faith and trust. The old man slowly opens up and allows himself to remember. He finally breaks his 70-year silence about that terrible time in history when he lost his family, his childhood and his faith.

Awards: Santa Monica Film Festival Jewish Plays Project Award.

ARTES LIBERALES by Ceng Chen

Presented at AIFF 2019

50 min | USA | 2018 | TALAMAS BOSTON AWARD

Synopsis: Dr. Chen is active in science, academies, and societies back in China; she organizes many academic writing workshops for graduate students majoring in science. Through running these workshops, she discovered common challenges faced by Chinese students who choose a liberal arts education as an approach to tackling important topics in one’s life. This film is for all the Chinese international students fighting to be successful in the US education system.

IN THE PATH OF THE STONES by Marco Antonio Pereira

Presented at AIFF 2019

72 min | Brazil/Portugal | 2019 | USA PREMIERE

Synopsis: This mosaic of stories was created to honor the 450th year of Rio de Janeiro and to celebrate its process of urbanization. The film chronicles the rich history of the famous sidewalks made of Portuguese stones, since their appearance in Lisbon in the mid-19th century to their arrival in Rio de Janeiro, revealing the art, referencing the cultures and the omnipresence of the stones under the Carioca’s and Portuguese’s feet. The film includes the participation of musicians, poets and visual artists from Brazil and Portugal who were inspired by the works of art.

TACKLING LIFE by Johannes List

Presented at AIFF 2019

94 min | Germany | 2018 | USA PREMIERE

Co-presented by India International Film Festival of Boston

Synopsis: Human Rights, Society, Sports and LGTB !!!!

TACKLING LIFE is a documentary about the Berlin Bruisers, Germany’s first gay and inclusive rugby club. Founded by a handful of friends several years ago in a Berlin park, this gentle and affecting film paints their lives as they build up to their first major tournament.

Perennial losers when they first meet, the Bruisers greatest achievements would seem to mostly lie off the pitch. From sterling anti-bullying workshops in schools to caring for elderly, distant relatives and much more, each Bruiser’s journey is very different. We see a band of individuals come together as a family, who are there for one another as much in life as they are on the pitch. A rousing portrait of a team sweating, celebrating, laughing and crying together, winning and losing, and the joy, after years of searching, of finally finding a community where they could be themselves. This film is indeed fragile and profound yet spectacular and loud!

Awards: Audience Award DOK.fest Munich 2018 - World Premiere

AMERICAN MIRROR: Intimations of Immortality by Arthur Balder

Presented at AIFF 2019

63 min | USA | 2019 | NEW ENGLAND PREMIERE // BEST OF FESTIVAl & Academy Award Nominee

Co-presented by India International Film Festival of Boston

Synopsis: AMERICAN MIRROR subtlety focuses on a social issue that has global reach: how we perceive and judge ourselves and others in a world dominated by social media, which demands perfect beauty and instant gratification. As Armenian artist Tigran Tsitoghdzyan paints the portrait of actress Susan Sarandon in his New York City studio, the two discuss the concepts of beauty and aging in our modern society dominated by social media.  While they talk, director Arthur Balder takes us on a visually spectacular journey that expands our ordinary perception of time. His artistic vision, opening with a dream within a dream, challenges the canons of nowadays 'conscious' and 'mainstream' documentary filmmaking.

‘Intimations of Immortality’ is a reference taken from British Romantic poet William Wordsworth’s ‘Ode: Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of Early Childhood’. For Wordsworth poetry was all about the memories we keep from our most deeply felt living hours. This has become a revelation to Balder’s craft as an essential part of his filmmaking: the reconstruction of deep thought-processes, which we can call memories but also omens and other sort of visions, imagery occurring in the internal eye of the subject, entirely subjective.

Director's Arthur Balder statement:

"My dream is to fuse the power of word and image into compelling cinematic art with a potentiality to make us reflect on who we are and ultimately, ideally, to change our lives and to build a better society and world."

Awards: Parajanov-Vartanov Awards (US) for Best Innovative Film, Best Cinematography and Best Composer; Fabrique du Cinema Award (Italy) for Best International - Lady Of the Victory of the Critics Circle of Mexico (2015) - Michel Foucre Award for Best Director (6th Ierapetra International Film Festival, 2019) - Documentary; Melbourne Documentary Film Festival nominated for Best Art, Best Director and Supreme Jury Award; Ierapetra Documentary Film Festival (Greece) Audience Award and Best Director; European Cinematography Awards (Netherlands) nominated for Golden Eagle Award for Best Film of 2019, Best Cinematography, Best Lead Actor and Best Original Score. The Hispanic Organization of Latin Actors of New York (HOLA Awards 2016) as honored him with the Excellence in Documentary Filmmaking Award (2016). In his documentary films he has sought from the set-out to defy the boundaries between documentary and fiction. Arthur Balder has been honored with two consecutive Best Documentary of the Year awards by the Association of Latin Entertainment Critics of New York (2015 and 2016)

DANSEUR by Scott Gormley

Presented at AIFF 2019

71 min | USA | 2018 | BOSTON PREMIERE

Sypnosis: DANSUER, a documentary that confronts the social stigma of boys choosing to study ballet, lifts the curtain and allows an in-depth look into their world through interviews with ballet students, teachers, directors, and professional dancers. It reveals the prevalence of harassment and lack of support that boy dancers often endure from peers as well as family. The film follows several male dancers, some gay, some straight, and sensitively unfolds their relationships to dance and we come to see that boys who choose ballet really know what they love and their passion and determination is inspiring to witness.

Awards: Choreoscope/The Int’l Dance Film Festival of Barcelona Winning Portrait of an Artist; Social Relevant Film Festival New York Grand Prize Doc Feature.

WAMIN (The Apple) by Katherine Nequado

Presented at AIFF 2019

3 min | Canada | 2018 | USA PREMIERE | BEST EXPERIEMENTAL SHORT

Synopsis: Red on the outside, white on the inside! Wamin meaning apple in Atikamekw is used as an insult referring to people who leave their community to live in the city. Katherine Nequado is an Atikamekw woman from Manawan, a First Nations reserve on the south-western shores of Lake Métabeskéga in the Lanaudière region of Quebec, Canada. Katherine’s experimental short intends to show that living outside her reserve does not make her any other person than who she really is. Festival du Court Metrage de Clermont-Ferrand – Talent Tout Court Award (Quebec, Canada).

PATH OF THE DAFF by Michael Piscitelli

Presented at AIFF 2019

Doc | 87 min | USA/Netherlands | 2019 | BOSTON PREMIERE | HIGH OUTPUT AWARD

Co-presented by India International Film Festival of Boston

Synopsis: For the past five years, 25,000+ Dutch Master daffodil bulbs are imported from Holland and cared for by Olsen’s Greenhouse in Raynham, MA and the potted daffodils are delivered throughout Boston and along the Boston Marathon route for Patriots Day…a new tradition that bloomed in the wake of the 2013 Boston Marathon bombings. This is a story of Hope and Inspiration. Follow one daffodil bulb’s adventurous journey from the soil in the Netherlands, across the Atlantic, into a MA greenhouse, and onto the finish line of the Boston Marathon. A zen story of purpose, community healing, and the resilience to continue the tradition of welcoming thousands of runners to our special city…BOSTON!