Social & External
The people behind it
Genius musician An He, stuck with writer’s block, meets runaway rich kid Xiao Yu. Bonding over music, they fall in love chasing dreams.
Two young brothers are left alone in a car while their dad paddleboards out at sea. When a mischievous local boy climbs into the backseat, an ordinary beach day takes a dangerous turn.
A young American art student must decide whether to stay in Paris with her boyfriend or go back to the U.S. when her wealthy father arrives to bring her back.
After his father committed suicide, Richard decides to stay in a youth center rather than staying with his mother. There, he finds a bizarre bunch of teenagers. Each of them experienced pain from early on, having their own desires and fighting for happiness with peculiar humor and fantasy. Richard doesn’t want to get involved with any of this – if it weren’t for her: Kyra.
Eli has four children, an unemployed husband and a job with an almost impossible commute. Vale is single and makes ends meet by working in clubs as a dancer. Tied by a profound emotional bond of true sisterhood, the two women's lives are two sides of the same coin, but their mutual solidarity isn’t always enough to lighten the load of their difficult circumstances.
In a seemingly idyllic Cypriot village, twelve-year-old Socrates finds himself in the centre of a murder investigation that exposes a dark family secret and changes his life forever.
Daphne, a teenage judo athlete from a remote Greek island, is ready to spread her wings and follow Sensei Yuri to the big city and ultimately to the next Olympic Games. Yuri, for unknown reasons, has been absent from the world of Judo for the last few years and he is looking for a new beginning, while Daphne transitions from the carefreeness of adolescence into the hard world of adults.
A young girl forms an unlikely bond with the disembodied hand beneath her bed.
Maria grows up in a seedy 1960s working class neighborhood, the daughter of an ambitious emigrant father and soon caught up in her own dangerously one track-minded pursuit of a violinist's career. A rich gallery of highly original characters contribute, for better and for worse, to Maria's coming of age. Based on Kirsten Thorup's critically acclaimed 1982 novel, filmed by Morten Arnfred.
Megan, an aspiring model living in South Florida, reflects upon her dreams for the future and her turbulent relationship with her mother on her 16th birthday.
These five award-winning coming of age short films offer a glimpse of how boys and young men tackle life's difficult desires: confronting one's demons, understanding sexual relationships, gaining the respect of one's father, or simply running away from it all. This is only the start of their complex formative years, where not every question has an answer, and not every answer makes sense. The short films are: Boys [Pojkarna] (2015); Ioana (2015); Kiem Holijanda (2017); Picnic [Piknik] (2015); Tomer & Elias [Tomer en Elias] (2016).
1500 Steps is a transforming journey towards self-belief and brilliance. A cross between Chariots of Fire and The Karate Kid, this high school drama is set in the beautiful, Sydney, beach suburb of Cronulla. Jonas "Jobe" O'Brien, a homely, sixteen year old boy, lives in a struggling single parent family. His mother dead, his father is an alcoholic, who was once a champion runner. Jobe, a misfit and loner, has inherited his father's athletic ability and love for running. After a fatal mistake at a party, Jobe seeks revenge against the perpetrator, as an emotion and power wells within him that he has never experienced before. A retired ex-Olympian, Harry White, sets about mentoring his athletic ability when by chance he sees Jobe run. It is now up to Harry White to encourage Jobe to dig deep and decide what type of man he wants to become.
After a chance meeting in a quiet New York City park, two young women embark on a life changing weekend of romance and regret in this subversive love story
An unfiltered journey into the most intimate sides of friendship. Teenagers Aruna and Chiara navigate love, betrayal, and their descent into womanhood. As the summer winds down, Aruna falls for a troubled boy, Julian, who lives on his own in an RV. As their relationship progresses and Julian's issues start to emerge, Aruna grows increasingly uncomfortable. But when she reaches out to Chiara, it becomes clear the terms of their friendship have changed.
"I can't go back and change the beginning but I can start over and change the end."
In this mother-daughter story, a young woman explores her own mortality through art and poetry as her terminal illness holds her back from a normal life.
Hanging out with friends, smoking a lot, spinning bottles and kissing, making mistakes, playing, refusing to accept, dreaming with open eyes - life as a teenager can be overwhelmingly beautiful and difficult at the same time. In her debut, the Ukrainian director composes a deeply emotional and multi-layered portrait of a generation whilst seamlessly flowing between the fictional and the documental.
When an elaborate surprise starts to unravel, a dynamic friend group must reconvene to problem solve.
An unlikely friendship forms between 21 year-old Jane and the elderly Sadie after Jane discovers a hidden stash of money inside an object at Sadie's yard sale.
A group of literature-loving friends bury letters to be opened 10 years later when they will confront the dreams of their youth with what the future has held in store for them.
Three British teenage girls go on a rites-of-passage holiday—drinking, clubbing and hooking up, in what should be the best summer of their lives.
A unique friendship develops when a little girl and her dying mother inherit a cook - Mr. Church. What begins as an arrangement that should only last six months, instead spans fifteen years.
94-year-old Eleanor Morgenstein tries to rebuild her life after the death of her best friend. As a result, she moves back to New York City after living in Florida for decades.
In Bodeen, Texas, an indie-rock loving misfit finds a way of dealing with her small-town misery after she discovers a roller derby league in nearby Austin.
An aging, out-of-work actress accepts one last job, though the consequences of her decision affect her in ways she didn't consider.
Two teen girls, one from the city, one from the country, try to find the hidden gold of Bear Mountain learning about friendship, loyalty and courage on the way.
Two drifters bum around, visit earthy women and discuss opening a car wash in Pittsburgh.
When seventeen-year-old Hannah stumbles upon a website about Thinspiration--an online community devoted to anorexia as a life choice--she becomes an obsessive follower of the site founder, ButterflyAna. By the time Hannah's family realizes what is happening and get Hannah the help she needs, the disease has fully taken hold and Hannah is refusing to eat. Will this family be able to exorcise the demon of anorexia from their lives?
Fifteen-year-old Mia is in a constant state of war with her family and the world around her. When she meets her party-girl mother’s charming new boyfriend Connor, she is amazed to find he returns her attention, and believes he might help her start to make sense of her life.
James and his three closest lifelong friends go on an ill-advised trip to the stunning coastal area of Barafundle Bay in West Wales. What follows is a touching and comical adventure dealing with friendship, heroism and love.
A teenager faces an uphill battle when she fights to give women the opportunity to play competitive soccer.
After Margaret, a divorcée living in Dublin, loses her teenage son, she develops an unorthodox relationship with Joe, a homeless youth. Their tentative trust is threatened by his involvement with a violent gang and the escalation of her ex-husband's grieving rage.
Four siblings' lives change drastically when their ailing mother takes a turn for the worse over the holiday season.
After several behavior problems, teenager John is admitted to a psychiatric clinic by his family. There he meets Judith, for who he soon falls in love. The problem is that she does not have long to live and they know it. This shall not prevent the emergence of a great romance in the clinic.
A story set in 19th century China and centered on the lifelong friendship between two girls who develop their own secret code as a way to contend with the rigid cultural norms imposed on women.
When the glittering Las Vegas revue she has headlined for decades announces it will soon close, a glamorous showgirl must reconcile with the decisions she’s made and the community she has built as she plans her next act.
JR is a fatherless boy growing up in the glow of a bar where the bartender, his Uncle Charlie, is the sharpest and most colorful of an assortment of quirky and demonstrative father figures. As the boy’s determined mother struggles to provide her son with opportunities denied to her — and leave the dilapidated home of her outrageous if begrudgingly supportive father — JR begins to gamely, if not always gracefully, pursue his romantic and professional dreams, with one foot persistently placed in Uncle Charlie’s bar.
A young man with a bright future suffers a near-fatal accident and recreates his new life with the help of an unlikely animal friend.
