ABOUT US |OUR FILMS |FESTIVAL |FESTIVAL BOARD |CONTACTS |PARTNERS   COMPETITION American Radical: The trials of Norman Finkelstein/ 2009 Canada/USA, directors David Ridgen, Nicolas Rossier, color, video, 84 min, documentary, russian premiere, english/russian subtitles 1/04 thursday 20:00 PIONER movietheater For many years, Jewish-American professor Norman Finkelstein has been leveling tough criticism at Israeli policy in his books focusing on what he describes as the Holocaust industry: the misuse of anti-Semitism and the war crimes perpetrated by the state of Israel. In American Radical: The Trials of Norman Finkelstein, he explains that it all began for him when Israel invaded Lebanon in 1982. From that moment on, he felt himself politically, scientifically and personally involved in everything Israel did. The film shows something of the opposition Finkelstein has met with along the way -- he has been fired by two universities and still has no new position. But Finkelstein insists, quoting the renowned linguist and activist Noam Chomsky, that it must surely still be possible to put forward "exact scientific articulation combined with rigid moral discontent." Be loved/ 2010 Germany, director Jan Soldat, color, digibeta, 16 min, documentart, international premiere, german/russian subtitles 26/03 friday 22:00 PIONER movietheater Life’s all about two things: firstly, being loved, and secondly not being alone. But what happens when people aren’t enough, or when they’re too much? GELIEBT is not a film about the pros and cons of emotional and sexual relationships with animals but a film about the relationship between humans and animals, poised somewhere between love and dependence. In the air/ 2009 USA, director Liza Johnson, color, HDcam, 22 min, russian premiere, English/russian subtitles 26/03 friday 22:00 PIONER movietheater April works in a scrap yard in southeast Ohio. Daphany waits for customers at the window of a fast food outlet. Lee spends all day waiting for school to end. At circus school, they dance, swing, flip, leap. Where to go, when the future is a long way off? Out in that deep blue sea/ 2009 Canada, director Kazik Radwanski, color, 35мм, 16 min, russian premiere, English/russian subtitles 2/04 friday 20:00 PIONER movietheater A real estate agent encounters a slump late in his career. Exhibiting questionable behaviour, he struggles to find balance between his professional obligations and personal relationships. The Invention of Dr. Nakamats/ 2009 Denmark, director Kaspar Astrup Schroder, color, HD, 57 min, documentary, russian premiere, English/ Russian subtitles 2/04 friday 20:00 PIONER movietheater Dr. Nakamats is a cult figure in Japan and a famous inventor with over 3400 patents. He is about to celebrate his 80th birthday, still feeling young and full of energy. He is convinced that he will live to be 144 years old. But how will Dr. Nakamats reach this goal? The film follows this extraordinary Japanese celebrity on his life-prolonging mission whilst delving into new inventions. Redemption/ 2009 Germany, director Sabrina Wulff, color, video, 92 min, documentary, russian premiere, English/ russian subtitles 4/04 sunday 18:00 PIONER movietheater A portrait of three deserters from the American army, who now live in Canada. In Redemption, they speak about their memories of the war in Iraq, a war that they all now view as senseless. "Even sitting here now, I'm smelling burning flesh," one of them says. Such memories simply refuse to go away, however much the young men would like them to. If they could, they would all like to take back their decision to join the army. They also talk about the methods used to entice soldiers to join up. And we see how they now live: disillusioned, slumped on the sofa, drinking beer and smoking joints. In their early twenties, they already seem to have lost most of their youthful energy. These deserters also feel guilty -- not about deserting, but about having taken part in the war in Iraq at all in the first place. The interviews are interspersed with footage of the war and of the homes the deserters have left behind. So why did they ever join up? Boredom, unemployment, lack of self-worth. And -- above all -- the rosy picture painted of the army's role in Iraq: "I thought I would be feeding hungry children." Like water through stone / 2009 Brazil, director Marilia Rocha, color, 35мм, 85 min, documentarty, russian premiere, Portuguese/ russian subtitles 30/03 tuesday 20:00 PIONER movietheater In the Espinhaço Mountains one winter, a group of small-town Brazilian girls are coming to the end of their adolescence. Impossible romances link them with men from the outside, leaving marks on their bodies and the surrounding landscape. Among the parties, friendships, anxieties and contradictions of their passage into adulthood, each of the friends finds her own particular way to resist the changes and to live with the tangle of uncertainty. Book of Miri/ 2009 Denmark, director Katrine Philp, color, video, 29 min, documentary, russian premiere, Swedish/ russian subtitles 26/03 friday 22:00 PIONER movietheater Miri lives on her own in the suburb of Linköping, Sweden. She works as a librarian. Everyday she writes a personal blog. Takes photographs of herself and uploads them on the internet. She writes about the life she leads and shares her thoughts with the world around her. Book of Miri is a film about having a double life, finding an identity, and above all about dreams. Open/ 2010 USA, director Jake Yuzna, color, HDcam, 88 min, russian premiere, English/ russian subtitles 3/04 saturday 22:00 PIONER movietheater A queer road-movie-cum-transsexual romance. In his feature film debut, director Jake Yuzna spectacularly combines all kinds of gender crossing permutations. One of the film’s protagonists is the young hermaphrodite Cynthia. It’s not until Cynthia meets Gen and Jay, a couple that has recently undergone plastic surgery enhancements, that she first hears the term pandrogony. The word is like a promise and speaks of the possibility of two people being able to merge their facial expressions in order to conquer their isolated identities and become a single entity. Cynthia is enchanted by the idea! She promptly leaves her husband and sets off with Jay and Gen on a road trip that takes her through what’s left of the American dream of the twentieth century. At the same time, Syd, a transsexual, meets a young punk named Nick. Not only do they fall in love with each other, but Syd also falls pregnant! OPEN is a film about hormone treatments and surgery; a film that also unveils a new kind of human being. Pioneers in the world of transcending human experience, authentic hermaphrodites and transsexuals all join forces to present on screen the possibilities that are emerging for humankind at the outset of a century that has barely begun. Greetings from the woods/ 2009 Sweden, director Mikel Cee Karlsson, color, video, 75 min, documentary, russian premiere, Swedish/ russian subtitles 27/03 saturday 18:00 PIONER movietheater Over a period of three years, the music video director and former professional skateboarder Mikel Cee Karlsson has documented life in his home village deep in the Swedish forest. With a mixture of playful precision, humour and melancholy he portrays people's dreams, their relationships and everyday destinies. Greetings from the Woods is a visual and personal portrait of Swedish rural life stripped bare. Today the hawk takes one chick/ 2008 USA/Swaziland, director Jane Gillooly, color, 72 min, documentary, russian premiere, English/ russian subtitles 27/03 saturday 20:00 PIONER movietheater The Lubombo region of Swaziland suffers from the world's highest prevalence of HIV and a life expectancy that has dropped to 32 years. In this small, landlocked country in southern Africa, a generation of parents has died, leaving the grandparents in charge of the children as well as responsible for retaining the threads of the fraying traditional life. Presented without an overt narrative structure or narration, the film's drama emerges from the steady accumulation of details that tell a greater story of family in a world dictated by AIDS. Ida’s dance club/ 2009 Israel, director Dalit Kimor, color, 59 min, documentary, russian premiere, Hebrew/ russian subtitles 28/03 sunday 20:00 PIONER movietheater Once a year in Ida's club, a ballroom dancing competition takes place. All the competitors are way past retirement age, but that doesn’t stop them from dancing and singing, to falling in love and being disappointed. The competition participants hardly know one another outside the club walls, but their lives, full of problems, are gradually revealed to us. The magical atmosphere of the club and the ballroom dancing, gives them the strength to overcome the ravages of time, the health problems and the difficult memories. They become princes and princesses, for whom anything is still a possibility. The care factory/ 2009 The Netherlands, director Kim Brand, color, HD, 16 min, documentary, international premiere, Dutch/ russian subtitles 28/03 sunday 20:00 PIONER movietheater This is a short documentary about a typical day in an elderly care facility, where bureaucracy and efficiency are increasingly what matter. The title, The Care Factory, is no exaggeration: the nurses carry cash cards and are constantly watching the clock. They are also not allowed to provide any care other than that covered by the "package" of the "client" in question. A manager ensures that all of the requirements are complied with and talks in indecipherable abbreviations derived from privatized health care jargon. This commercial approach seems difficult to reconcile with the social nature of the work and runs contrary to the motivation of the nurses, who want to help people in the most human way possible. The documentary does not pronounce judgment on the situation, but simply records the increasingly quiet lives of the elderly residents and the hectic meetings behind the scenes of this "care factory." We hear the beeping of the cash cards and watch as carrots are spooned out onto plates in the institutional kitchen. The film also reveals the chasm between new technology and old people, as the nurses play around with the computer system while the old people listen to the songs of yesteryear. Fondamenta delle convertite/ 2008 Italy/France, director Penelope Bortoluzzi, color, Mini DV, 117 min, documentary, russian premiere, Italian/ russian subtitles 29/03 monday 20:00 PIONER movietheater One year in Venice women’s prison. Everyday life in the corridors and common spaces of this former monastery overlooking the lagoon. Cells are closed at night but open all day long and a "nursery floor" is devoted to prisoners with children. Inmates from the entire world, together with their children and the wardens must endure permanent promiscuity, each trying to manage their way through wants, friendships, hierarchy, power games and imposed roles. Hiroshima/ 2009 Uruguay/ Colombia/ Argentina/ Spain, director Pablo Stoll, color, video, 79 min, Russian premiere, English subtitles/ Russian subtitles 3/04 saturday 20:00 PIONER movietheater Hiroshima is the first solo direction by the Uruguayan Pablo Stoll after the death of his companion Juan Pablo Rebella, with whom he had made the widely praised 25 Watts and Whisky. In this both hyper-realistic and surrealist slacker film, Stoll follows for 24 hours the everyday routine of his brother Juan, who seals cheese sticks in a bakery, does some household chores, goes to a barbecue and rehearses with his band . Hiroshima is an almost silent film; the only means of communication is the post-punk and techno music that we hear from Juan's Discman. The dialogues are inaudible and appear in the form of inter-titles, resulting in an uncanny mood. Stoll shows with Hiroshima that he is still in the middle of the Uruguayan scene, with cameos by Adrián Biniez (Gigante), Federico Veiroj (Acné) and Manuel Nieto Zas (La perrera). Stoll's father and his other brother are also seen. Hiroshima is dedicated to Juan Pablo Rebella. DANISH PROGRAM Northern Lights / 2009 Denmark, director Kristoffer Kiorboe, color, video, 27 min, russian premiere, Danish/ Russian subtitles Two brothers embark on a journey north to find the northern lights, but what they're really searching for is each other and the intimacy they once shared. Somehow, though, smiles turn into silence. Samuel, the older brother, is brain-damaged and the younger brother, Simon, has an important decision to make concerning himself and Samuel, but Simon's efforts to get through to his brother seem to be in vain. Simon and Samuel set off to find the northern lights. But how do you find the northern lights, and how do you find the light within yourself? Love on Delivery / 2009 Denmark, director Janus Metz, color, video, 59 min, Russian premiere, Danish, Thai/ Russian subtitles In a remote fishing community in the north of Denmark live 575 Thai women married to Danish men. Fifteen years ago, there were almost none. But Sommai was there – a former sex worker from Pattaya. Now, she and a group of other industrious and strong Thai women are trying to find a man for Sommai's young niece Kaeh who is in Denmark on a three-month tourist visa. A different kind of love story, the film gives an intimate insight into the special relationships between Danish men and their Thai wives who all try to outlive the idea of Western happiness and thereby achieve respect and social status back home in Thailand. SPECIAL SCREENING/ TEL AVIV UNIVERSITY STUDENT FILMS Surrogate / 2008 Israel, director Tali Shalom Ezer, color, video, 56 min, russian premiere, Hebrew/Russian subtitles Eli is a 32 year old man who has problems with relationships with women. Hagar is a surrogate, an alternative partner for practical, sexual therapy. They meet once a week and practice a relationship and intimacy in laboratory conditions. The fictitious relationship between them exposes them both physically and emotionally and brings to surface repressed fears from the real world. The changes Eli goes through during the therapy, along with the secrets revealed, not only shake his own life, but also the life of his family. Between clinic walls, due to an "artificial" process, Eli learns how to love for the first time. "In Tel Aviv" project: Russian premiere Made up of 20 short documentary films between 10 and 15 minutes long, the series creates a fascinating mosaic of the city of Tel Aviv-Jaffa as it is perceived by the camera lenses of the young participating directors. This time, in light of nearing the 100 year mark for the city of Tel Aviv-Jaffa, the project will focus on the public arena and various other places that make the city so vivacious and create its unique rhythm of life. 3 films from the series are selected for the program. Local sheriff director Limor Ofri Glick, 21 min Neve Sha'anan director Helen Yankovsky, 12 min Independence Park director Raphael Raphaeli, 14 min SPECIAL SCREENINGS 7915 km/ 2008 Austria, director Nikolaus Geyrhalter, color, 35мм, 100 min, russian premiere, French, Arabic, English, Wolof, Assania, Bambara, Soninke/ Russian subtitles 3/04 saturday 18:00 PIONER movietheater Preferring the aftermath of the Dakar Rally, the Austrian director and cinematographer, Nikolaus Geyrhalter, chose to follow the path that hundreds of cars, motorbikes and trucks had taken through Morocco, Mauritania, Mali and Senegal, in order to examine what they had left behind, apart from clouds of dust. In a style resembling postcards, he fixes the camera gaze on wild landscapes, with tire tracks, leaving behind their deep, harsh impressions. Amongst the postcards, he examines, with the inhabitants in the villages and towns along the route, what kind of impression the passing vehicles left behind, what taste was left in their mouths after encounters with the wealthy westerners, and why so many want to leave everything and to reach Europe. It's a dream that never fades, even when talking about a wooden boat that is tossed about in the waves en route to the Spanish coast, overcrowded with hundreds of illegal immigrants – full of hope and despair. TRASH HUMPERS/ 2009 UK/USA, director Harmony Korine, color, VHS, 78 min, russian premiere, English/Russian subtitles 4/04 sunday 20:00 PIONER movietheater Trash Humpers is at least as disruptive and exceptional as Harmony Korine's earlier films Gummo (1997) and Julien Donkey-Boy (1999). The title should be taken literally: the protagonist, unrecognisable thanks to sinister masks, gets his kicks by humping trash cans. With much satanic pleasure and liberated of any sense of morality, the pariahs 'torture' dolls and destroy what they come across or set fire to it. Korine, who plays one of the leading roles, wants to show the creative beauty of destruction. He filmed his ode to vandalism on video, doing part of the camera work himself, and edited it on two video recorders. At the top of the screen, the commands (forward, rewind) are occasionally plainly visible. In a time when everyone wants to shoot at the highest possible technical quality, he chooses the graininess and imperfection of video, which makes the images even more alarming. The largely improvised scenes seem to follow each other in a random order. The viewer does not even have a narrative structure to cling onto. BECAUSE WE WERE BORN/ 2008 France, directors Jean-Pierre Duret, Andrea Santana, color, 35мм, 89 min, russian premiere, Portuguese / Russian voice over 2/04 friday 22:00 PIONER movietheater A gas station, in the middle of nothingness in northeastern Brazil, is the centre of attraction for two impoverished boys. They watch the heavy trucks and their worldly drivers, the tourist buses that stop for a moment, and they fantasize about another life. Cocada, 14, an orphan whose father died in his arms and since has been searching for food and shelter; despondent sometimes to the point of thoughts about suicide, but he has a dream – to be a truck driver. Nego, 13, has 9 brothers from different fathers who stayed one or two years, abused his mother and then disappeared; he has to help with the family income. Two clever kids, watching reality from a dark corner at the edge of a well lit gas station. Today, the same day is different/ Hoy el dia se repite diferente/2008 Spain, color, directors Xavier Baig, Oscar Moreno, Dv/HD/Super 8mm, 98 min, russian premiere, Spanish/ Russian subtitles 27/03 saturday 16:00 PIONER movietheater “You don’t decide to be an addict. One morning you wake up sick and you’re an addict,” writes William S. Burroughs in his cult book Junkie, from which Spanish directors Xavier Baig and Òscar Moreno borrowed the motto for their film. Their main character is Toni, a 49-year-old addict. After thirty years on heroin, he has to get up during the night every two hours to inhale oxygen, otherwise he’d suffocate. Then immediately after inhaling, he lights up a joint, otherwise he wouldn’t get back to sleep again. He knows that the drugs are slowly killing him, but he just can’t resist them. In this formally diverse, at times visually stunning portrait, immersed in an excellent soundtrack by Micka Luna, we glimpse into the inner world of Toni, a highly intelligent, well-travelled man with a unique life philosophy. A gravely ill man whose only love in life, apart from drugs, is his dog. A man who only has six months left to live. MAYSLES BROS. RETROSPECTIVE Psychiatry in Russia/ 1955 USA, director Albert Maysles, b/w, 16мм, 14 min, English/ Russian subtitles In 1955, Albert Maysles traveled by motorcycle throughout Russia. During this trip, he shot what was to become his first film, Psychiatry in Russia, an unprecedented view into Soviet mental healthcare. Originally televised by the David Garroway Show on NBC-TV in 1956. With love from Truman/ 1966 USA, directors Albert Maysles, David Maysles, Charlotte Zwerin, b/w, 16мм, 29 min, English, Russian subtitles With Love From Truman portrays an intimate meeting with renowned author Truman Capote. As a reporter interviews him in his beachfront home, Capote shares his "self-regarding" personality through hip philosophy and calculated jokes. He offers insights in an endearingly raspy voice about his latest book, In Cold Blood, which Capote declares to be part of a new genre, the "non-fiction novel." Just as the Maysles brothers' direct cinema classics turn real stories into narratives, Capote's non-fiction novel makes an effort to turn reality into art. Salesman/ 1968 USA, directors Albert Maysles, David Maysles, Charlotte Zwerin, b/w, 16мм, 91 min, English/ Russian subtitles Salesman follows four door-to-door Bible salesmen as they walk the line between hype and despair. Paul "The Badger" Brennan, Charles "The Gipper" McDevitt, James "The Rabbit" Baker, and Raymond "The Bull" Martos, are so nicknamed for their particular selling styles -- on their rounds. First making calls in and around Boston, where the company is based, then in Chicago at a sales conference, and finally in the promising new "territory" of Miami and vicinity. Their mission is simple: to convince people to buy what one of them calls "still the best seller in the world." Gimme shelter/ 1970 USA, directors Albert Maysles, David Maysles, Charlotte Zwerin, color, 16 мм, 90 min, English/Russian subtitles Called “the greatest rock film of the greatest rock and roll band,” this landmark documentary follows the Rolling Stones on their notorious 1969 U.S. tour that lead up to the free concert at the Altamont Speedway in San Francisco. Only four months earlier, Woodstock defined the Love Generation; now it lay in ruins on a desolate racetrack six miles outside of San Francisco. Grey gardens/ 1976 USA, directors Albert and David Maysles,Elen Hovde, Muffie Meyer, Susan Froemke, color, 16мм, 94 min, English/Russian subtitles Grey Gardens is the unbelievable but true story of Mrs. Edith Bouvier Beale and her daughter Edie, the aunt and first cousin of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis. Mother and daughter live in a world of their own behind the towering privets that surround their decaying 28-room East Hampton mansion known as "Grey Gardens," a place so far gone that the local authorities once threatened to evict them for violating building and sanitation codes. The incident made national headlines -- American royalty, living in squalor! For the Beales were nothing short of the upper crust. Mrs. Beale, a.k.a. "Big Edie," was a born aristocrat, sister of "Black Jack" Bouvier, Jackie O's father. "Little Edie" was an aspiring actress of striking beauty who put her New York life on hold to care for her mother - and never left her side again. Together they descended into a strange life of dependence and eccentricity that no one had ever shared until the Maysles arrived with their camera and tape recorder. Running Fence/ 1978 USA, directors Albert Maysles, David Maysles, Charlotte Zwerin, color, 16мм, 58 min, English/ Russian subtitles A celebration of Christo and Jeanne-Claude's vision; first a four-year struggle, then 24 1/2 miles of white nylon fabric, rising from the Pacific and stretching like a white sail across California. SPECIAL PROGRAM / ARCHAIVES 1/04 thursday 22:00 PIONER movietheater I am always on top/Wo ich bin ist oben Germany, 2010, director Bettina Schoeller, color, Digibeta, 18 min, international premiere, German/ Russian subtitles The bags are packed, hats have been found and now they’re off on their journey. A grandma, her daughter and her grandchild are flying to Gran Canaria for the weekend. The granddaughter films her grandmother, whilst her mother takes her mother by the arm, and Gran makes comments about life in a foreign country. In between all the usual package holiday moments there are flashes of the deep-seated principles of German upbringing that were prevalent in the first decade of the last century. An insight into another time – and a distant reflection of another era. Bernadette UK, 2008, director Duncan Campbell, b/w / color, Digibeta, 40 min, russian premiere, English/ Russian voice over A masterful 'experimental' documentary and disarmingly alluring representation of Bernadette Devlin, one of the key figures in Northern Ireland’s republican and civil rights movements during the late 1960s and early 1970s. Bernadette presents an unravelling, yet accumulatively open-ended portrayal of the female Irish dissident and political activist, Bernadette Devlin. Cutting between archival material, animation, and scripted voice-over, Jarman Award nominee Duncan Campbell's film is interested in fusing documentary and fiction in order to assess both the subject matter and the mode of communicating it, striving for what Samuel Beckett terms, 'a form that accommodates the mess'. Cyclist/Radfahrer Germany, 2008, director Marc Thummler, b/w, Digibeta, 30 min, russian premiere, German/ Russian subtitles Remarkable document about East German photographer Harald Hauswald and the work he made in the 1980s in East Berlin that was stamped subversive. Because the East German photographer Harald Hauswald was considered a subversive element, the Stasi observed him for years under the code name 'Radfahrer' (cyclist). In this experimental short, Marc Tümmler intriguingly sets Hauswald’s pictures alongside the Stasi reports. SPECIAL PROGRAM/ INDUSTRIAL 31/03 wednesday 22:00 PIONER movietheater Terminal Germany, 2009, director Jorg Wagner, color, 35мм, 8 min, russian premiere, no dialogue An expedition into the wondersome world of a container terminal. Everyday work processes are densified into an allround aesthetic composition to the rhythm of music and editing. Opera/Oper Norway, 2008, director Bodil Furu, color, 35мм, 13 min, russian premiere, No dialogue / Norwegian subtitles/ Russian subtitles In Opera, director Bodil Furu captures the atmosphere from behind the scenes in Norway’s first national opera house as the country holds its breath for the much anticipated opening of its replacement. Her inquisitive and direct focus point is the invisible work of the backstage crew who play out their roles behind the scenes. The film turns the usual hierarchy of opera production upside down and places the backstage staff – the foundation blocks in the pyramid - in front of the camera whilst the director and singers are out of the picture. Furu's emphasis on social hierarchies draws a parallel towards the building’s history as a part of the Norwegian history of early social democracy. Hanasaari A Finland, 2009, directors Hannes Vartiainen, Pekka Veikkolainen, color/ b/w, video/photo, 15 min, Russian premiere, No dialogue Hanasaari A is an experimental documentary about the changing cityscape of Helsinki, and the final moments of a coal-fired power plant. The old industrial milieu is being destroyed to make space for modern housing units. The film is a combination of animation, live-action cinematography, and graphic elements. It is based on 500 thousand photographs taken during the final two years of the existence of the power plant. City of cranes UK, 2007, director Eva Weber, color, Digibeta, 14 min, russian premiere, English/ Russian subtitles What's it like to spend long hours every day between the skies and earth, in a small cabin at the end of a crane? Looking from above at London, especially when the skies are blue, and at the goings on of those who sit alone for long hours, in the silence, above the noisy city. Dining cars/Restauratiewagens Netherlands, 2010, director Arianne Olthaar, color, Super-8, 15 min, international premiere, No dialogue Empty interiors of dining cars, shot on Super-8, rock through the landscape, like a rolling time capsule. Olthaar’s recent films and models show specifically designed spaces. Dining Cars was shot on Super-8 in trains from the 1960s and 70s. Having dinner here must have been very cosy once, but today the rolling interiors have become rocking time capsules. SPECIAL PROGRAM/ LUSSAS Bassidji/ 2009 Switzerland/France, Director Mehran Tamadon, HDV, 114 min, russian première For almost three years, I’ve decided to immerse myself into the very heart of the most extremist supporters of the Islamic republic of Iran (the Bassidjis), to understand better their paradigms. We come from the same country, however everything divides us. I can only harm their convictions being an atheist Iranian, living in France, and son of communist activists under the Shah’s regime. Nevertheless, we start discussions, build a dialogue. But, between seductive and rhetorical games, moments of truth and the reality of the political and religious system they support, how much are we ready to give up some of our respective convictions to perceive and understand one another? A man without name/L’homme sans nom/2009 China/France, Director Wang Bing, Digibeta, 92 min, russian première The story sets into the ruins of a deserted village, surrounded with an old wall, where lives only a man of 40 years old. He has no name. During the day, he works like an animal into the ruins, the night, he sleeps like a primitive in a cave. The winter, he goes out of the cave early and walks far away, in deserted fields, in order to find sheep and cow dirt for feeding his garden. In Springtime, the ruins of the village are grass- covered, he cultivates his garden and sows the seed. In summertime, he picks up little stones in the grass for building his house. In fall, he harvests a crop. His food comes from his own picking or from what he finds in another villages. He never speaks a word. Sometime, he speaks to himself. Sometime, he bursts into lau- ghter. The bowl, the water keg and the other objects of everyday life are industrial waste. Day and night, month and year, he lives this way until his death in the cave or in the ruins or in the fields. Face aux fantômes/2009 France, Directors Sylvie Lindeperg, Jean-Louis Comolli, Color, Beta Num, 109 min, russian premiere In 2008 Sylvie Lindeperg published a book: Nuit et Brouillard, un film dans l’histoire (Ed. Odile Jacob), that was the result of a long reflection on the work of Alain Resnais. Gérald Collas suggested I make a film of the book. I had known and appreciated Sylvie Lindeperg and her work for years. The idea of filming her in action (as I had already filmed the architect Pierre Riboulet, the chef Alain Ducasse, the musician Michel Portal or the historian Carlo Ginzburg) attracted me immediately. In this film as in the book but this time via images and sounds, Sylvie Lindeperg questions the complex play of influences that led to the production of Night and Fog and which weighed on the film’s destiny. With her, artistic practice and this film in particular is viewed as an analyser of the contradictions of a period. But the goal was not to "reconstitute". We wanted to replace the historian’s gestures and ways of seeing. The archive images from the concentration camps and the death camps reused in Night and Fog still raise questions of their legitimacy, the suffering they bear, the challenge they present to the viewer’s or user’s desires or possibilities of seeing. When the subject is the destruction of Europe’s Jews, these questions become burning. Jean-Louis Comolli L’Arrière-pays/ 2009 France, Director Safia Benhaim, Color, Mini DV, 48 min, russian premiere End of the day in the French countryside. A woman, my mother, an exiled Communist political refugee, goes walking in the countryside of Morvan where she has chosen to live because it recalls her childhood landscapes in Morocco. In these Morvan landscapes emerge little by little her reminiscences of another place. A mental territory, the only country of the refugee, spreads out, similar to the spirits which, perhaps, inhabit the house. Off Season/ Hors Saison/ 2008 France, Director Jean-Claude Cottet, Beta Num, Color, 42 min, russian premiere Friday 24th of May 1996, the hamlet Gremey in the region of Haute-Savoie. The house in which I grew up in has been sold at auction. I was twenty at the time we were forced to leave this house. I ran away, far, far away, somewhere else, whereas my parents decided to stay and struggle along, living in the neighbourhood of this small hamlet of this low mountain range. Throughout twelve years we shared very little contact with one another, we hardly ever saw each other… how am I supposed to go back? FESTIVAL The sixth film festival of direct cinema Kinoteatr.doc will take place in Moscow from March 26 to April 5 This year, for the first time, the competition will be international, with 17 movies from US, Canada, Israel, Uruguay, Denmark, Netherlands, Germany, Brazil, Sweden, Swaziland and Russia taking part. The festivals program includes four international premieres. All foreign movies will be shown in Russia for the first time. One of the movies competing for the festival prize is «Hiroshima» by Pablo Stoll, his first work after the death of his friend and partner Juan Pablo Rebella. Together they made award-winning movies «Wiscky» and «25 Watts», as well as picking up two prizes at the International Cannes Film Festival. Another film competing is Sabrina Wulff's documentary «Redemption» a prize winner at documentary festivals in Leipzig and Amsterdam. «Redemption» tells the story of three American soldiers who deserted from Iraq and live in a rental apartment in Canada with no chance of returning to the US. All they can do is reflect on their lives and on what happened in Iraq. «The Invention of Dr. Nakamats» is another contestant. It is one of the headliners of the upcoming Dutch IDFA documentary festival, concerning an aged Japanese inventor and his very original attitude to life, the Universe and everything.upcoming Kinoteatr.doc will also present the first Russian retrospective of prominent American documentary makers, brothers Albert and David Maysles. Pioneers of direct cinema, the Maysles were responsible for the highly-acclaimed documentary «Gimme Shelter», concerning a notorious Rolling Stones gig in the summer of 1970. The retrospective will open with the famous Maysles film «Grey Gardens», which is about two female relatives of Jackie Kennedy Onassis living in an abandoned country house in East Hampton. In 2009, HBO made a remake of "Grey Gardens" starring Drew Barrymore and Jessica Lange, which won two Golden Globes. It is the first time a Broadway musical has been based on a documentary film. Kinoteatr.doc will also include gala screenings of new movies by world renowned directors: - Harmony Corine's "Trash Humpers“ a radical experiment filmed on VHS. The world premiere of the picture was in September 2009 in Toronto; while the European premiere took place in February 2010 in Rotterdam. - Nikolaus Geyrhalter's ("Our Daily Bread") new movie "7915 km" about complicated relations between Europe and Africa with the Paris-Dakar rally as an example. - A winner of many festivals, French movie "Because We Were Born" (Puisque nous sommes) by Jean-Pierre Duret and Andrea Santana. Cristoph Postik, director of French film festival "Etats generaux du documentaire de Lussas" will present a special program as a part of the official Year of France in Russia. The festival will also consist of some experimental programs, such as archive and industrial. Danish and Israeli films will also be shown off. An informative Russian program will complete the direct cinema festival. Various master classes, discussions, and round table conferences will also be an important part of the event. At the end of the festival an honorary jury will name three winners and award them equally. Contest and special screenings will be shown at Pioneer cinema, while the Russian program will play at Teatr.doc and Aktovy Zal. Trailers of some festival participants are available at: http://www.youtube.com/user/kinoteatrdoc