Social & External
Semyon
Mother
It's 1992. Martin is 17 and he films his daily life with his Hi8 camera. He films anything and everything—his room, the world around him... But never his father, the thought doesn't occur to him. One day he meets Dominique. He's 23 and works as a student monitor at Martin's high school.
Paul is 16 years old and earns his pocket money working the streets. But there is something special about Paul. He has made a pact with some ants, which questions the strict patterns of our reality.
Extremely shy Lars finds it impossible to make friends or socialize. His brother and sister-in-law worry about him, so when he announces that he has a girlfriend he met on the Internet, they are overjoyed. But Lars' new lady is a life-size plastic woman. On the advice of a doctor, his family and the rest of the community go along with his delusion.
This delightful short is a world away from Tomomatsu's later works. It's a lovely story, told well. The reason that I tracked it down is because I'm quite a fan of Alice Sailor's music. She fronts new wave band Amaryllis and I was curious to see her acting. She has frequently supplied theme songs and other music to several of Tomomatsu's films. Indeed, the most disturbing sequence in this movie is accompanied by a psychotic Amaryllis track, 'Haha', and the closing piece is another Amaryllis song, 'Usagi'. This rip comes from the 'Eat The Schoolgirl' DVD, where it was one of the extras. Having just watched the main feature from that disc, I can say with some certainty that I found this tale far more enjoyable.
The elderly at the nursing home have their heads shaved. The protagonist who works there sees them but can't read their expressions. However, from one instance, he finds himself looking closely at their faces.
Five young New Yorkers throw their friend a going-away party the night that a monster the size of a skyscraper descends upon the city. Told from the point of view of their video camera, the film is a document of their attempt to survive the most surreal, horrifying event of their lives.
Iris is a shy and dowdy young woman stuck in a dead-end job at a match factory, who dreams of finding love at the local dancehall. Finding herself pregnant after a one-night stand and abandoned by the father, Iris finally decides the time has come to get even and she begins to plot her revenge.
Upon discovering her husband’s affair, Pooja seeks guidance from her friend. Eventually, more secrets unveil, pushing Pooja to her emotional extreme.
Salma Zidane, a widow, lives simply from her grove of lemon trees in the West Bank's occupied territory. The Israeli defence minister and his wife move next door, forcing the Secret Service to order the trees' removal for security. The stoic Salma seeks assistance from the Palestinian Authority, Israeli army, and a young attorney, Ziad Daud, who takes the case. In this allegory, does David stand a chance against Goliath?
Edo, 1863. Aisuke Kajiki, a young blind swordsman, is entrusted the son of his best friend Toramaru Sakakibara, who is about to join the Shogun's Samurai Unit and promises to train him well. However, after Toramaru's death in battle, Eisuke drowns in a river and is transported in time to present-day Tokyo. Eisuke and his descendant, Ryusei, a college student, go to meet Toramaru's descendant, Taiga, a swimmer. The blind samurai's promise to his best friend in Edo is fulfilled 160 years later in present-day Tokyo through para-swimming.
Chloe, a straight talking film director, tries to convince her friend Sam to be an actor in her next short film. Just after finding out that he once again didn’t get into medical school, Sam meets Alex, a hypochondriac 18 year old. A love triangle forms in these self-reflexive, humoristic fragments filled with sex talk , set in New Orleans.
A student's increasingly intimate line of questioning causes his interview with a local horror host to take a vulnerable turn.
Every gay person goes through a process of discovering their own identity. Caught between their truest self and the family and societal pressure around them, which should a college student still in the middle of this process choose? Details
My Pretty Pony is a story telling about time and what the old man believes time is telling him. He believes this pony represents time and he must fufill it.
An evocative and imaginative exploration of the racial tensions in Othello and how the themes in Shakespeare's play still resonate today.
In a dystopian future where people live nocturnally to avoid the harmful rays of the sun, a young black girl unravels the lie that has kept her and her sister in the dark.
Aging painter Louis and his wife Michelle struggle to cope with Louis' advancing dementia.
Joe Buck is a wide-eyed hustler from Texas hoping to score big with wealthy New York City women; he finds a companion in Enrico "Ratso" Rizzo, an ailing swindler with a bum leg and a quixotic fantasy of escaping to Florida.
With her life crashing down around her, Linda attempts to navigate her child's mysterious illness, her absent husband, a missing person, and an increasingly hostile relationship with her therapist.
Clinging to control after a broken marriage, an overbearing mother begins to lose her grasp on reality.
The drug-induced utopias of four Coney Island residents are shattered when their addictions run deep.
A group of friends' fishing boat capsizes off the coast of Mexico and they're left alone stranded at sea and struggling for survival.
A man's nervous breakdown causes him to leave his wife and live in his attic for several months.
A massage therapist looking to overcome her addictions and reconnect with her son, whose father is an anthropologist in South America studying the Yanomani people, moves in with a wealthy ex-client in New Jersey.
20 men are chosen to participate in the roles of guards and prisoners in a psychological study that ultimately spirals out of control.
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.
A deranged man hides in the attic of a new house and becomes obsessed with the unsuspecting family that moves in.
Jim is an average New Yorker living a peaceful life with a well paying job and a loving family. Suddenly, everything changes when the economy crashes causing Jim to lose everything. Filled with anger and rage, Jim snaps and goes to extreme lengths to seek revenge for the life taken from him.
After her stay-at-home husband leaves her, a workaholic lawyer finds that she is not completely up to the tasks of caring for her young son, ailing father and household all by herself.
Held captive for 7 years in an enclosed space, a woman and her young son finally gain their freedom, allowing the boy to experience the outside world for the first time.
A troubled young woman becomes obsessed with her mysterious new neighbor, who bears a striking resemblance to the girl's dead mother.
James White is a troubled twentysomething trying to stay afloat in a frenzied New York City. As he retreats further into a hedonistic lifestyle, his mother's battle with a serious illness faces a series of setbacks that force him to assume more responsibility. With the pressure on him mounting, James must find new reserves of strength or risk imploding completely.
A story of a young woman searching for her biological mother. Set against a backdrop of misogyny, revenge, and longing, Rose undertakes a journey that leads her to revelations that are both devastating and dangerous.
The protagonist Vlad is a man of about forty; he lives and works as watchman in an old sanatorium that is due to be demolished. He obviously needs this work to live the life of a hermit. One night a married couple appears at the sanatorium: Vera and Stas. They are on the run. They are pursued by former friends and business partners of Stas. Vlad decides to help them, because he too is hiding from the past. Each character is threatened with the inevitable payment for wrong choices in the past, but helping each other, they try to expiate these faults.
Housewives Alice and Celine are best friends and neighbours who seem to have it all. However, when a tragic accident shatters the harmony of their lives, guilt, suspicion and paranoia begin to unravel their sisterly bond.
The eldest son of a ruthlessly tough MMA champion must fight his way out of the abusive cycle his father has continued.
A nightmarish evening unfolds for neighbors David and Robert when they accidentally hit a woman on her bike and flee the scene. While David is increasingly plagued by feelings of guilt, Robert shows no remorse and becomes overbearing and possessive.
Trevor, an insomniac lathe operator, experiences unusual occurrences at work and home. A strange man follows him everywhere, but no one else seems to notice him.
Because he's the oldest, Jake has been the man of the house, since his parents divorce. When Mom starts seeing Sam, who always seems to be trying some new way to get rich quick, and declares he's the man of the house now, Jake puts up with it. Until he discovers Sam's illegal activities.
