STOLEN LIFE
DIRECTOR: LI
SHAOHONG
CHINA 2005
APRIL 21 FRI 7PM Whitsell
Auditorium
APRIL 24 MON 4PM Guild Theatre
 A
shattering film from China’s leading woman director based
on a true story,Yan-ni was abandoned by her birth parents
for unknown reasons and raised by relatives in Beijing. Sullen
and withdrawn as a result, she is unexpectedly granted a place
at the university to study chemistry, but on her way to her
new life she meets her fate, an unscrupulous young man whose
promise of love comes at a terrible price. Li dispassionately
takes us through Beijing’s underworld, discovering not
only life under the city but also a modern perspective on
human experience. Best Film Prize, Tribeca Festival.(90
mins.)
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ALMOST BROTHERS
DIRECTOR: LÚCIA
MURAT
BRAZIL
2004
APRIL 22 SAT 5PM Guild
Theatre
APRIL 28 FRI 7PM Whitsell
Auditorium
 A
hard-hitting drama, ALMOST BROTHGERS covers 50 years of Brazilian
history, and the twin themes of race and class. In 1950s Rio
de Janeiro, a white middle-class boy becomes a friend with
a poor black boy through their fathers’ shared passion
for music. Their friendship deepens through time spent in
prison during their youth. Years later, they meet again, one
a government official and the other a drug lord, running his
street gang from a jail cell. Murat’s politically astute
and emotionally engaging film provides a fascinating portrait—marked
by popular music and recent political history—of the
relationship between Rio de Janeiro’s middle class and
its favelas.(103 mins.)
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BORDER CAFÉ
DIRECTOR: KAMBOZIA
PARTOVI
IRAN/FRANCE
2005
APRIL 22 SAT 7:30PM Whitsell
Auditorium
APRIL 25 TUE 4PM Guild Theatre
 Following
the death of her husband, Reyhan is expected to follow custom
and marry her brother-in-law Nassar, a proud, controlling,
and self-serving man. Instead, with the help of her two young
daughters, Reyhan decides to reopen her husband’s abandoned
truck stop cafe. Soon it is the most popular eatery in the
area, attracting an array of diverse truckers, as well as
unwanted attention from Nassar, who threatens Reyhan’s
newly found independence. BORDER CAFÉ’s brave feminist
themes and tender performances earned the Best Screenplay
and Best Actress Awards at the Fajr (Iran) Film Festival.
In Persian, Greek and Turkish with subtitles.(105
mins.)
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IN THE BATTLEFIELDS
DIRECTOR: DANIELLE
ARBID
BELGIUM/FRANCE/GERMANY/LEBANON
2004
APRIL
23 SUN 5PM
APRIL 27 THU 8PM
Whitsell
Auditorium
 Set
in 1983 in Beirut, in the midst of the civil war, 12-year-old
Lina spends most of her time on her own or with her old auntie’s
maid, who lives upstairs. Siham is 18, and from neighboring
Syria. Their friendship and complicity is based on shared
moments of secrecy, fear, tenderness and cruelty. An accomplice
to Siham’s clandestine love affairs, Lina witnesses the
physical and psychological decline of the world of the adults,
in the chaos of war, and mostly her own family’s fall.
A bittersweet film about cruelty, innocence, the awakening
of the senses, and coming of age.(90 mins.)
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CINEMA, ASPRIN AND VULTURES
DIRECTOR: MARCELO
GOMES
BRAZIL 2004
APRIL
23 SUN 7PM Whitsell Auditorium
APRIL 30 SUN 5PM Guild Theatre
 Johann,
a young German, has fled to Brazil to avoid World War II.
Living in his truck in the country’s remote, arid, northeastern
region, he drives from village to village peddling aspirin,
which he promotes by showing films of the miracle cure-all.
Along the way, he meets Ranulpho, an impoverished local who
he hires as his assistant. Daily radio broadcasts remind them
that perhaps the war is not that far away after all, and the
two experience life-changing events that will keep them far
away from their own cultures. Evoking a lost time and innocence,
this warmly told road trip finds two intrepid travelers intent
on making the most of whatever life throws into their path.(99
mins.)
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MAX AND MONA
DIRECTOR: TEDDY
MATTERA
SOUTH
AFRICA/SWEDEN 2004
APRIL 25 TUE
7PM
MAY 1 MON 4PM
Guild Theatre
 Through
a quirky combination of love, tears, death and comedy, Mattera
plumbs the divide between traditional country life and the
fast-paced city in modern-day South Africa. Max is a Candide-like
innocent, sent off with financial contributions from his entire
village to study to be a doctor. Through a series of hilarious
mishaps, he lands at the doorstep of his notorious uncle,
with a sacred (and troublesome) goat and nowhere to sleep.
Things get worse when a local hood turns up to collect a debt
and his uncle has to give him Max’s tuition money. But
Max still has a rare and unlikely asset that inspires his
uncle to devise a plan that will solve everything.(98
mins.)
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THE NIGHT OF TRUTH
DIRECTOR: FANTA
RÉGINA NACRO
FRANCE/BURKINA
FASO 2004
APRIL 28
FRI 9:15PM
APRIL 29 SAT 7PM
Whitsell Auditorium
 Nacro,
Burkina Faso’s first female director, makes an impressive
debut with this darkly satirical parable, an exploration of
the hatred and bitterness between the Nayak and Bonande tribes
in an unnamed African country. After a decade of bloody conflict,
both sides want the war to end. A feast of reconciliation
is arranged in the rebel village, where a peace treaty is
to be signed and soldiers on both sides will lay down their
arms. After all the barbarism, however, the likelihood of
vengeance seeking looms large. Will the truths revealed this
night bring understanding or renewed warfare? Taking her cue
from Shakespearean drama, Nacro weaves her story with brutal
honesty and clarity, creating an emotional kaleidoscope of
horror and hope.(100 mins.)
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THIRST
DIRECTOR: TAWFIK
ABU WAEL
ISRAEL
2004
APRIL 29
SAT 9PM
APRIL 30 SUN 7PM
Whitsell Auditorium
 Winner
of the Critic’s prize at the Cannes Film Festival, THIRST
is a masterfully shot tale of repression and control that
examines the dynamics of power in a family stretched to breaking
point. After one of his daughters “shames” him,
Abu Shukri brings his family to an abandoned military outpost,
where he rules with an iron fist. Physically and mentally
isolated in the struggle to survive, their self-sufficient
existence is governed by unwritten laws and haunted by impending
tragedy. Palestinian director Wael has crafted an archetypal
story that suggests the deeply rooted Israeli-Palestinian
conflict without actually depicting it. In Arabic with subtitles.(100
mins.)
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GLOBAL SHORTS
DIRECTOR: VARIOUS
MAY
1 MON 7 PM
Whitsell
Auditorium
(Adama
Roamba, Burkina Faso/France) A young boy enlists in the army
after seeing his parents slaughtered. In French. (22 mins.);
LITTLE TERRORIST (Ashvin Kumar, India,Great Britain) A boy
playing with his ball accidentally crosses into a minefield
on the border of India and Pakistan. (15 mins.)ELEPHANTS NEVER
FORGET (Lorenzo Vigas Castes, Mexico) A man on a bus fails
to recognize two teenagers whom he once abused. In Spanish,
English subtitles. (13 mins.) HARVEST TIMES (Zheng Zheng,
China)After graduating from college, Xiaosong returns to his
rural village to visit with former classmates. (38 mins.)
MORE THAN THE WORLD (Lautaro Nenez, Argentina) On the Argentine
plains, a hunter falls in love with a girl at a party. (12
mins.) mins.Total run time: 105
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