12 foreign films and 3 Iranian films have been selected to vie for top prizes at the main competition section of the 36th edition of Fajr International Film Festival.
Here are all the feature-length titles screening:
A Call to Father (2017)
Director: Seric Aprymov
Country: Kazakhstan
Synopsis
Yerken is unlike his peers. He confuses reality with fantasy. His mother is desperate as public school typically doesn’t admit kids like hers. Nonetheless, he has the dream – to attend a public school. When mother leaves the family, Yerken is left alone with his father.
Aga (2017)
Director: Milko Lazarov
Country: Bulgaria, Germany, France
Synopsis
Reindeer hunter Nanook and his wife Sedna live somewhere in the icy wastes of the north. Their daily life is arduous, but they never complain. Instead, they tell each other the old legends, and their dreams. No matter whether they are describing imaginary encounters with animals, humans, the living or the dead, everything has its meaning. A rather special love story, set against the striking backdrop of the permafrost that is also a study of speechlessness and an emotional hardening that can only be softened in the face of death.
Beyond the Clouds (2017)
Director: Majid Majidi
Country: India, Iran
Synopsis
Teenager Amir is constantly dodging trouble while dealing drugs in the underbelly of Mumbai. Following a drug bust, he evades the cops and ends up on the doorstep of his estranged sister Tara. Complications from concealing Amir land Tara in jail, but she still sees her brother as her only hope of living in the outside world again. While their lives have been darkened by despair, hope may shine from beyond the clouds.
Dovlatov (2018) – International Premiere
Director: Alexey German Jr.
Country: Russia, Poland, Serbia
Synopsis
Dovlatov charts six days in the life of brilliant, ironic writer who saw far beyond the rigid limits of 70s Soviet Russia. Sergei Dovlatov fought to preserve his own talent and decency with poet and writer Joseph Brodsky while watching his Soviet artist friends getting crushed by the iron-fisted state machinery.
Grain (2017)
Director: Semih Kaplanoglu
Country: Turkey, Germany, France, Sweden, Qatar
Synopsis
Global corporations have established cities and agricultural zones in areas where the climate is relatively good. These cities are populated by the elites, corporation’s executives, scientists, and those multi-ethnic immigrants who have been admitted after passing genetic compatibility tests. For unknown reasons, the city’s agricultural plantations have been hit by a genetic crisis. In a meeting at the headquarters of the corporation which employs him, Prof. Erol learns of Cemil, a fellow scientist who wrote a thesis about the recurrent crisis affecting genetically modified seeds – but the work was banned by the corporation. Erol sets out to find Cemil and finds him, who is searching for the remains of life.
Little Tito and the Aliens (2018)
Country: Italy
Synopsis
Tito, a scientist who works on a secret project for the US government, has always been known as the legendary American Uncle by his nephews, Anita (14) and Little Tito (7). When they become orphans, they get to Nevada to join Tito, but find a rather depressed professor, a desert, and the secrets of Area 51.
Little White Lie (2017)
Director: Tomas Alzamora
Country: Chile
Synopsis
A failed journalist is forced to fabricate news to avoid losing his job. When he becomes the most popular journalist around, he has to decide between continuing the lie, or telling the truth and losing his fame.
Night Accident (2017)
Director: Temirbek Birnazarov
Country: Kyrgyzstan
Synopsis
A 70-years-old man is driving a car being mad, and suddenly he runs down a girl. After the accident they come to know each other more.
Red Flowers and Green Leaves (2018)
Director: Miaomiao LIU, Weijie HU
Country: China
Synopsis
In a Hui Muslim village in Northwest China, a young couple begin their arranged marriage without knowing each other’s secrets. Confronted with tasks of mundane life, will they learn forgiveness and nourish true love?
Song of Granite (2017)
Director: Pat Collins
Country: Ireland, Canada
Synopsis
This film revolves around the life of the great traditional Irish singer, Joe Heaney. The stylized black-and-white picture, obscuring the border between documentary and fiction, is a cinematic ballad that invites viewers to join the enigmatic, talented and idiosyncratic artist on his dramatic life journey; along the way we also get a sense of the difficult yet humble life of the people of Ireland over the course of last century. The film takes us to the district of Connemara, and to the village of Carna, Joe Heaney’s birthplace, considered the cradle of local folklore, and then the camera accompanies him on his travels round the world. The power and magic of the songs provide the central motif threading its way through the film.
The Miner (2017)
Director: Hanna Slak
Country: Croatia, Slovenia
Synopsis
The Miner is based on a true story of an immigrant miner in Slovenia. He finds thousands of bodies of people thrown into a pit after WW2. He affronts the society by insisting to arrange a funeral for those unidentified victims, thus risking his job, the wellbeing of his family, and even his own life.
The Silent Revolution (2017)
Director: Lars Kraume
Country: Germany
Synopsis
East Berlin, 1956. During a visit to the cinema in West Berlin, high school pupils Theo and Kurt see dramatic pictures of the Hungarian uprising in Budapest on the newsreel. Back at school in East Germany, they share the tragic untold news with their class and spontaneously hold 2 minutes of silence in solidarity with the young Hungarian victims during a lesson. But the gesture causes much bigger ripples than expected: the schoolchildren become objects of the political machinations of the fledgling East Germany.
Forty Seven (2017) – National Premiere
Director: Ahmad Otraghchi, Alireza Ata’ollah Tabrizi
Country: Iran
Synopsis
Story of three 47-year-old women who cross paths.
Hattrick (2018)
Director: Ramtin Lavafi
Country: Iran
Synopsis
There is a say that people do not change suddenly. But it is us who do not pay attention to them for quite long time.
The Lost Strait (2018)
Director: Bahram Tavakoli
Country: Iran
Synopsis
On the very last days of the Iraq-Iran War, a group of Iranian soldiers from three generations return home. A serious attack on a strategic border area forces them to make a tough choice.
For all Festival goers who are already planning their visit, check screening time and other information at www.fajriff.com. Presided over by Iranian film writer and director Reza Mirkarimi, the 36th edition of Fajr International Film Festival will be held in Tehran on April 19-27.
MS/PR
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