After 30 years of war and Taliban rule, the first music talent show, Afghan Star, was organized in Afghanistan. Over 2,000 people were auditioned and even three women have come forward to try their luck. Millions watched and voted for their favorite singers. In Afghanistan today, however, music is controversial. Considered sacrilegious by the Mujahideen and banned by the Taliban, music has come to symbolize freedom for the youth of the country. The film follows two men and two women during the three-month process from the regional auditions to the final in Kabul as they risk all to become the nation's favorite singer. The competition takes a disquieting turn when a young woman dances on stage, risking not only her own safety but also the future of the show.

producers: Martin Herring, Mike Lerner, Jahid Mohseni
editor: Ash Jenkins
camera: Phil Stebbing
sound: Phil Stebbing
music: Simon Russell

production info:
Roast Beef Productions
22 Denmark Street
London WC2H 8NG
tel.: +44 207 240 2885
info@roastbeeftv.com
www.afghanstardocumentary.com

filmography:
The Crippendales (2007) / The Great Relativity Show (2006)

Arriving on the shores of France is merely the beginning of a labyrinthian journey for more than 50,000 refugees seeking asylum through the municipal reception center in Paris each year. Cultures collide as refugees from the Congo, Chechnya, Sri Lanka and Ethiopia meet with well-intentioned but overwhelmed European social workers. Asylum seekers hoping to leave behind a life filled with war and famine, persecution and poverty find themselves forced to comply with a bureaucratic logic that resembles another kind of torment, and their social workers, faced with dwindling reserves of options and patience, are at risk of collapsing under the sheer number of new applicants. The film investigates CAFDA, the municipal reception centre for asylum-seeking families, by following the daily life of the asylum seekers and simultaneously exposes the persecution, political oppression and human misery outside Europe.

producer: Serge Lalou
editor: Stéphanie Goldschmidt
camera: Patrice Chagnard
sound: Pierre Carrasco
music: Pierre Carrasco, Ali Farka Touré

production info:
Les Films d'ici
62 bld Davout 75020 Paris
tel.: +44 522 323
courrier@lesfilmsdici.fr
www.lesfilmsdici.fr

selected filmography :
CLAUDINE BORIES
And Our Dreams (2007) / Women of the Twelve Frontiers (2003) / Juliette from the Men's Side (1999) / Sir Against Madam (1999) / Every Other Saturday (1998)
PATRICE CHAGNARD
And Our Dreams (2007) / In the Red Truck (2006) / Jean-Paul Kauffmann (1997) / The Convoy (1995) / Swami-Ji, an Inner Voyage (1983)

The commune of Otto Mühl, the acclaimed Vienna Actionist, was one of the most controversial artistic and social experiments of the 1970s. In the countryside, in the grounds of the Friedrichshof, unrestrained sexuality, common property, body art, and the consistent removal of any permanent relationships served as the foundation for this project. The most ambitious aim of this Austrian commune was Mühl 's third generation project — child production — which aimed to create a completely new human being. Twenty years later, in the summer of 1991, Mühl was arrested for child abuse and the community dissolved. The company's experiment was a dramatic failure. Through the eyes of these children, the film looks back at the community and examines what has become of the children of Mühl's utopia.

producer: Titus Kreyenberg
editor: Barbara Gies
camera: Sandra Merseburger
sound: Florian Matzku, Juri von Krause
music: Andy Simanowitz, Pop-Metzger, Attila Mühl

production info:
Unafilm Cologne
Alteburger Str. 2, D - 50670 Cologne
tel.: +49 (0)221 3480 280
fax: +49 (0)221 3480 281

Coffee Futures weaves individual fortunes with the story of Turkey's decades-long attempts to become a member of the European Union. Promises and predictions made by politicians, both foreign and domestic, are juxtaposed with the rhetoric and practices of coffee fortune-telling. The widespread custom of coffee fortunetelling in Turkey is an everyday communication tool. Coffee fortunes are a way of dealing with hopes, fears and worries, as well as a method of indirectly voicing matters usually left unspoken. The filmmaker flips her cup for dozens of people, both friends and strangers. These amateur fortune tellers all read her individual fortune as they might any other day, except that she also asks for their opinions on the future of Turkey and Europe. Coffee Futures attempts to render the emotional texture of a society whose fate has been nationally and internationally debated, often in relation to Europeaness, over a very long period of time, to hint at the psychology of collective waiting and anticipating a national future.

producer: Umut Gürsel, Zeynep Devrim Gürsel
editor: Ebru Karaca
camera: Görüntü Yöntemeni
sound: Ses Miksaj

production info:
Zeynep Devrim Gürsel
tel.: +1 (917) 846 0010
zdgursel@gmail.com
www.coffeefuturesfilm.com

From the 1950s onward, Estonia was the battleground for a peculiar information war, where the Soviet regime went head-to-head with Western pop-culture. Even at the height of the Cold War, the Iron Curtain couldn't stop the people from reaching out for the forbidden cultural fruit on the other side. Despite a ban on western media, many Estonians were able to pick up Finnish radio and television broadcasts from across the border with homemade antennas. They watched Western TV programs like "Dallas," soft porn like "Emmanuelle," science-fiction "Star Wars," and footage of disco dance music that drifted over the Iron Curtain via airwaves from a super-tall Finnish broadcast tower not more than 50 miles away. Jaak Kilmi's father, an electronics engineer, even started up his own secret business inserting decoders into Estonian and Russian TV sets. These broadcasts became windows to a world of dreams that the authorities could not fully close. Disco and Atomic War depicts the incomparable role that the "soft power" of Western popular culture played in shaping the worldview of Soviet children.

producers: Kiur Aarma, Aleksi Bardy, Annika Sucksdorff
editor: Lauri Laasik
camera: Manfred Vainokivi
sound: Olger Bernadt, Horret Kuus
music: Ardo Ran Varres

production info:
Eetriüksus & Helsinki Filmi Oy
EETRIÜKSUS
Kiur Aarma
kiur.aarma@ruut.com
www.Ruut.com
HELSINKI FILMI OY
Vanha talvitie 11 A, 00580 HELSINKI
tel.: +09 774 0300
first.last@helsinkifilmi.fi

selected filmography:
The Art of Selling (2006) / Touched by the Unkonw (2005) / Revolution of Pigs (2004)

The Khmer Rouge slaughtered nearly two million people in the late 1970s. Yet the Killing Fields of Cambodia still remain unexplained. A young journalist whose family was killed by the Khmer Rouge spends a decade making friends with those who directed and perpetrated the Killing Fields. He obtains ground-breaking accounts from the most senior surviving leader, Nuon Chea, Brother Number Two under Pol Pot, who talks for the first time in detail about the killing of party members considered to be "enemies of the people". Sambath's remarkable work further uncovers a network of killers, now ordinary fathers and grandfathers, who implemented the policy of terror in the provinces. The confessions that emerge create a watershed account of Cambodian history. A personal journey into the heart of the Killing Fields, this film is heartfelt quest for closure on one of the darkest episodes of the 20th century.

producer: Rob Lemkin, Thet Sambath
editor: Stefan Ronowicz
camera: Rob Lemkin
music: Daniel Pemberton

production info:
Old Street Films
67 Hurst Street
Oxford OX4 1HA
England, UK
tel.: +44 1865 241772
rob@oldstreetfilms.com
www.enemiesofthepeoplemovie.com

selected filmography:
ROB LEMKIN
The Real Dr Evil (2003) / Bearers of the Sword (2002) / China: Handle with Care (2001) / Malaya: The Undeclared War (1998) / Who Really Killed Aung San? (1997)

A cinematic quest for the truth behind one of the most mysterious Nazi propaganda films, shot inside the Warsaw Ghetto in May 1942. A rough draft of a silent film juxtaposes meticulously staged scenes of Jews enjoying a life of luxury in the ghetto with chilling images that required no staging at all. Ironically, after the war, filmmakers and museums used bits and pieces from the film as objective, general illustrations of the narratives collected from survivors and written documents. Few people were aware of the cynical manner in which these images were created and invaluable witness they bear. The film interweaves diary entries written by ghetto inhabitants during the filming, the testimonies of living survivors, and the transcript of the interrogation of a German cameraman, testifying about his role in the making of the film. By juxtaposing the filmed scenes with their behind-the-scenes' layered reality, A Film Unfinished challenges the authenticity of archival images and the way the past is perceived.

producer: Noemi Schory, Itay Ken-Tor
editor: Joëlle Alexis
camera: Itai Neeman
sound: Aviv Aldema
music: Isahi Adar

production info:
Belfilms
20 Ben-Avigdor Street, Tel-Aviv, Israel
tel.: +972 3 624 0780
belfilms@netvision.net.il
www.afilmunfinished.com

Filmed over four years, Garbage Dreams follows three teenage boys born into the trash trade and growing up in the world's largest garbage village, a ghetto located on the outskirts of Cairo. It is a world folded onto itself, an impenetrable labyrinth of narrow roadways camouflaged by trash; it is home to 60,000 Zaballeen, Egypt's "garbage people." The Zaballeen survive by recycling the city's waste. For generations, the residents of Cairo have depended on the Zaballeen to collect their trash, paying them only a minimal amount for their garbage collection services. These entrepreneurial garbage workers recycle 80% of all the garbage they collect, creating what is arguably the world's most efficient waste disposal system. When the city they keep clean suddenly decides to replace them with multinational garbage disposal companies, the Zaballeen community finds itself at a crossroads. Face to face with the globalization of their trade, each of the teenage boys is forced to make choices that will impact his future and the survival of the whole community.

producer: Mai Iskander
editor: Jessica Reynolds, Kate Hirson
camera: Mai Iskander
sound: Paul O'Connor
music: Raz Mesinai

production info:
Iskander Films, Inc
338 Prospect Place Apartment 4g
Brooklyn, NY 11238—4017
tel.: +1 646 515 5995
info@garbagedreams.com
www.garbagedreams.com

Google Baby is a journey across three continents telling the story of the up and coming baby production industry — a story about outsourcing pregnancy. Doron, an Israeli entrepreneur with a high-tech background proposes a new service — baby production. He provides customers with a cost-effective solution: outsourcing pregnancy to India. The preferred genetic material is selected by the clients and the rest is left in the hands of the producer: sperm and eggs are purchased on-line and multiple embryos are produced and frozen. Packed in liquid nitrogen, only the embryos that fit the customer's preferences are shipped by air to India, where they are implanted into the wombs of local women who are paid for pregnancy and delivery and who renounce any rights to the babies they give birth to. The customers arrive only at the end of the nine-month pregnancy period to pick up their babies. Today, technology has turned "making a baby" into an act independent of sex. And globalization is making it affordable. All you need is a credit card. But what is the price paid by the women whose bodies are used for this flourishing enterprise?

producer: Zvi Frank, Zippi Brand Frank
editor: Tal Rabiner
camera: Uri Ackerman
music: Karni Postel

production info:
Brandcom Ltd.
Zippi Brand Frank
tel.: +972 3527 7522
z.n.brand@gmail.com

The Méndez family has been living in a makeshift wooden cabin in the hills outside Bogotá for 40 years, yet they can be evicted any time. Every day they walk down to the city to collect scrap materials to sell, and leftovers from restaurants to feed their pigs. Victor has been married to Marta for ten years, but Elvira, his mother, has never come to like her. The clash between these two women forces Victor to take sides and comes in the way of their efforts to earn a living. The conflict further escalates when an armed neighbor claims their land. A distressing yet hopeful insight into a world of social tensions and existential helplessness on the outskirts of the Columbian capital, this film bears witness to the persistence of dreams for this family of scrap merchants.

producer: Fanny Guerrero Riascos
editor: Carlos Rufete
camera: Tayo Cortés
sound: Carlos Rufete
music: ChocQuibTown, Los Diablitos, Aries Vigoth

production info:
Devenir Producciones & Andoliado Producciones
ANDOLIADO PRODUCCIONES
Carrer Sant Guillem 17, 17, 1º-1ª
08006 Barcelona
tel.: +34 932 090 897
info@andoliado.com
www.andoliado.com

filmography:
Close to Greenaway (2005)

A lonesome middle-aged bachelor, a divorced single mother, and a jovial young mullah are the protagonists of this intimate account of gender relations in Iran. Their stories revolve around the institution of temporary marriage, a Shia practice that has been around for 1400 years and allows a man and a woman to legally marry for a fixed period of time ranging from one hour to 99 years. Religiously sanctified prostitution or a loophole for couples to have a relationship within the rigid Islamic laws? The film reveals traditional and modern perspectives on the market value of marriage partners. Issues of power and relationships are openly and sometimes humorously debated. Overshadowed by the ubiquitous visual presence of religion, In the Bazaar of Sexes tells personal stories about love, lust, money; about the yearning for happiness and the struggle for survival.

producer: Oliver Neumann, Wolfgang Bergmann
editor: Oliver Neumann
camera: Arastoo Givi, Majid Gorjian
sound: Farrokh Fadai

production info:
Freibeuter Film
Kellermanngasse 1-3/1/6, 1070 Vienna
tel.: +43 720 346510
welcome@freibeuterfilm.com
www.imbazar-derfilm.at
www.freibeuterfilm.com

filmography:
Children of the Prophet (2006)

Jaffa, The Orange's Clockwork provides a novel perspective on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict by focusing on the symbolic significance of the Jaffa orange, one of the internationally most recognized export products of the area. The film not only traces the history of the fruit's cultivation in Palestine, starting as early as the mid-nineteenth century, but also examines the increasing political complexity of the role the orange has played both economically and as a cultural sign of Israeli success and Palestinian loss. Interviews with those who have grown the orange for generations are juxtaposed with commentary by art critics, historians, film scholars, and the poet Haim Gourin to elucidate how both Orientalism and Zionism in various European narratives have helped destroy the initially quite benign cooperation between Palestinian and Jewish cultivators. Visually captivating and politically bold, the film weaves in rich archival material and striking interviews, ultimately asking what the Jaffa's past might tell us about the future in Palestine/Israel.

producer: Arik Bernstein, Osnat Trabelsi, Frank Eskenazi
camera: David Zarif
editor: Audrey Maurion
sound: Oren Raviv, Jean-Jacques Quinet, Asher Saraga

production info:
Trabelsi Productions
Sarah Kirshner
10 Tiomkin St.
65783 Tel Aviv, Israel
tel.: +972 3 566 0398
info@trabelsiproductions.com
www.trabelsiproductions.com

selected filmography:
Happy Birthdays, Towards a Common Archive (2008) / Citizens K - The Twin Brothers (2007) / Faces of the Fallen (2005) / I Love You All (2004) / Route 181, Fragments of a Journey in Palestine-Israel (2003) / On the Top of the Descent (2001) / The Specialist (1999) / Jerusalem(s), Borderline Syndrome (1994) / Israland (1991) / Izkor, Slaves of Memory (1990) / Aqabat-Jaber, Passing Through (1987)

There are about 2.5 million Turkish minority members in Germany. Every year at least a dozen Turkish women are beaten to death by their husbands or other relatives. In Turkey, more than 300 so-called honor killings are committed annually while 40% of wives are victims of domestic violence. Little Bride reveals the story of a Turkish girl who was sent to Germany and forced to marry when she was 13 years old. Soon after her arrival her husband started abusing and beating her regularly. After several years of maltreatment she finally managed to escape and is now in hiding from both the tyrannical man and her family whom, according to traditional Turkish "family values," she dishonored by running away. Unable to rely on her Turkish kin, afraid to appeal to the German authorities, will she be able to pick up the shreds of her life?

producer: Katarzyna Ślesicka, Adam Slesicki, Anna Wydra
editor: Jakub Kossak, Bartek Pietras, Lesław Dobrucki
camera: Piotr Rosolowski
sound: Zofia Golebiowska

production info:
Krakow Film Foundation
ul. Morawskiego 5 (Room 434)
30-102 Krakow, Poland
tel.: +48 12 294 6945
info@kff.com.pl
www.kff.com.pl

filmography:
The Booth of Fortune (2008) / The Crew (2007)

Shortly after the honeymoon of 18-year-old Alisher and his 17-year-old wife Dildora is over, Dildora gets pregnant. But how is Alisher going to take care of his wife and the baby, being unemployed in Kyrgyzstan? Like many inhabitants of the Kyrgyz Republic Alisher decides to try to make it big in Moscow. One out of four men in Kirgizia leaves the country — mostly for Russia. The migrant workers often have a hard time. The twelve to sixteen million foreign workers in Russia get the worst paid jobs and live squeezed together in small apartments. To make things worse, Alisher is cheated by the agency which acts as an intermediary between him and his Russian employers. Meanwhile, his family is desperately waiting for the money from Moscow to arrive. Will the love between Alisher and Dildora last, now that 2,500 miles separate them? A film about love, hope, migration and the daily struggle for survival in a part of the world rarely explored.

producer: Magnus Gertten, Lennart Ström
editor: Jesper Osmund
camera: Jon Rudberg
sound: Alexander Thörnqvist
music: Magnus Jarlbo

production info:
Auto Images
Monbijougatan 17 E
211 53 Malmö, Sweden
tel.: +46 40 661 01 60
auto@autoimages.se
www.autoimages.se

filmography:
MAGNUS GERTEN
Rolling Like a Stone (2007) / Get Busy (2004) / The Way Back, True Blue 2 (2002) / True Blue (1998)

The film explores different visions of the common past in the Balkans and how those differing visions impact the present and the future of the region. The film is a journey through the past, present and future, from Slovenia to Macedonia, via Croatia, Bosnia and Serbia. The main protagonists are two writers, Miljenko Jergović from Croatia and Marko Vidojković from Serbia. They share the driving in a Yugo car, the ultimate symbol of their common past, and drive it from one end to the other of the road once known as the "Highway of Brotherhood and Unity." They aim to look at their common past, find out how history has set them apart, ask where the present is leading them — and have a lot of fun while they are about it. As the Yugo dodges lorries, fast cars and queues at endless border checks, they take a wry look at the state of the Balkans. They sing along to nostalgic Yugoslav favorites, comment on the radio news and above all stop to ask those who can tell them how they got there and where the highway of history is taking them next.

producer: Dušan Gajić
editor: Pavle Žikić
camera: Miodrag Trajković
sound: Goran Stifanic
music: Vlada Divljan

production info:
SEETV
95 Avenue du Diamant
1030 Brussels, Belgium
tel.: +32 736 0120
d.gajic@seetv-exchanges.com

selected filmography:
I Will Mary the Whole Village (2010) / Kosovo Diary (2008) / The 21st Second (2008) / Muharem: Music — The Eyes of Life (2005) / My World (2002) / From Nis to Serbia: It's Now or Never (2000)

Margareth and Eric are in love. They belong to Kenyan families from different ethnic backgrounds — she is a Kikuyu and he is a Luo. These two largest tribes of Kenya are engaged in an ancient cultural and political conflict, which proves to be a persistent obstacle in the way of their future together. Their parents in particular are against their relationship, yet in spite of everything they hold on to each other. Another problem arising is their differing attitude towards marriage and the role of women. While Eric has no doubts about the institution of marriage as it is, Margareth is split between tradition and modernity, emancipation and submission, inner rebellion and helplessness. Can they find a way to overcome their challenges, stay together, and grow as individuals? A film about two young lovers trapped in a society dominated by restrictive traditions.

producer: Daniel Mahlknecht
editor: Caroline Leitner
camera: Maria Weber
sound: Eva Lageder
music: Margareth Karie Kinutha

production info:
Da Palmer Film
Fagenstrasse 25, Bozen
39100 Italy
tel.: +39 329 273 3222
daniel@dapalmerfilm.com
www.dapalmerfilm.com

New Socialist Climax examines various levels of reality in China's recent state-sponsored red tourism, a national campaign which brings people, especially government employees and the young, to the old communist revolutionary bases. On the surface, red tourism is a win-win for all parties involved: the Party gets to boost its ideological propaganda in support of its fading legitimacy, the tourists get to splurge on a free trip and to exhibit political loyalty to the establishment, and the locals get to cash in nicely with floods of tourists coming and spending (often extravagantly, if the government is covering their expenses). Made up of four chapters, the film is based on footage shot around the four key dates of the year for red tourism: June 1 (International Children's Day), July 1 (Chinese Communist Party Day), August 1 (People's Army Day) and October 1 (National Day for the People's Republic of China). New Socialist Climax epitomizes the fast-changing and often confusing realities of China today, with its mingling of capitalism and communism, rural economic stimulus and state-sponsored ideology.

producer: Jian Yi
editor: Song Ling

production info:
ARTiSIMPLE Studio
2 –303, Zhujianglvzhou, 18 Jian'guo Rd.
Chaoyang, Beijing 100024, China
tel.: +86 136 0112 5272
artisimple@gmail.com

selected filmography:
What's for Dinner (2009) / Super, Girls! (2007)

The story of one man's frustration with his generation of young Arabs who appear to have succumbed to western ideologies and have attended the best western schools, yet prove to be more conservative than traditional Arabs when it comes to accepting or even addressing taboos like homosexuality. The half-Palestinian half-Lebanese director, who grew up in Dubai, puts himself on the line by speaking out about the hypocrisy of the society that prefers to ignore him and defines homosexuals as "eccentrics" with temporary deviances. This film is a confession and an angry outcry at the same time, trying to decipher a society trapped half-way between tradition and modernity.

producer: Jan Vandierendonck, Ignace Collin
editor: Frederik Jan De Pickere, Katharina Türle
sound: Park Roker
music: Park Roker

production info:
Epeios Productions
Leopold de Vriesstraat 27
B—2600 Antwerp
Belgium
tel.: +32 3 248 5885
epeios@skynet.be

Focusing on four Chechen refugees and their families scattered around Europe, the film explores the effects of the European refugee policy on asylum seekers. Journalist Ali, 39, laments the situation of refugees in his smoky room in a refugee camp in Poland; Waha, 50, has been granted asylum status in Austria as a political activist, but his son is persecuted in Russia; Tamara, 55, lives in Vienna with her husband and disabled daughter under constant threat of deportation; Ruslan, 33, is stuck in Ukraine without legal documents or money but hopes to bring his family to Western Europe soon. Each of the protagonists had to flee Chechnya because their lives were at risk. Over a period of one year, the film follows the main characters and offers an intimate look at their search for a new home in Europe.

producers: Michael Truckenbrodt, Marcin Wierzchoslawski, Jacek Kucharski
editor: Karoline Schulz
camera: Piotr Rosolowski, André Frenzel, Jakub Bejnarowicz
sound: Magnus Pflüger, Grzegorz Rózycki, Matthias Borchfeldt

production info:
time prints & Metro Films & ZDF/3sat & TVP S.A.
TIME PRINTS
Karlsgartenstr. 21, 12049 Berlin, Germany
tel.: +49 30 2758 2138
www.timeprints.de
METRO FILMS
Ul. Dominikanska 9, 02—738 Warszawa, Poland
tel.: +48 22 8432172
www.metrofilms.com.pl

filmography:
My Dear Muslim (2005)

The village of Osadné lies on the farthest eastern border of the European Union. Local Orthodox priest Peter Soroka has buried 50 people in the past five years and baptized only two children. The village mayor Ladislav Mikuláško is a political record-holder who has been running the village for 36 years. These two unusual local patriots decide to take the future of Osadné into their own hands and, with the help of Ruthenian activist Fedor Vico, seek help from the highest authorities. In his "document-toury movie," Marko Škop follows the protagonists on a journey to the European Parliament in Brussels where he witnesses their efforts to involve a friendly European deputy in strengthening the tourist industry in order to save it from collapse. A touching story of "non-globalized" individuals attempting to make their voices heard.

producer: Marko Škop, Ján Meliš, František Krähenbiel, Filip Remunda
editor: František Krähenbiel
camera: Ján Meliš
sound: Marián Gregorovič, Ján Ravasz

production info:
ARTILERIA
23 Drobného, Bratislava
84101 Slovak Republic
artileria@artileria.sk
www.artileria.sk

selected filmography:
Other Worlds (2006) / Roma House (2001) / Protection of the office (1999)

Once the seat of the Russian Empire, the historic center of St. Petersburg is up for sale. Having had its architectural jewels hacked up into kommunalka's during the Communist era, the city is now experiencing a boom of reconstruction, where communal property promises capitalist-sized profits. In one flat on Marat Street, each of the four rooms is inhabited by a different family, all of whom share the bathroom and kitchen. When one owner decides to put her room on the market, she must also convince the others to sell. Enter the self-interested real estate agents and impatient buyers, and a frenzied unraveling of the already tenuous relationships ensues. As witness to the many intrigues involved in the sale, filmmaker Christiane Büchner brings us along for a sardonic ride with intractable neighbors through the cramped quarters, peeling-paint hallways, and water-damaged ceilings of Russia's new economy, which in the end head-butts against its Byzantine past.

producer: Tobias Büchner
editor: Gesa Marten
camera: Irina Uralskaya
hang/sound: Alexej Antonov
music: Dietmar Bonnen, Andreas Schilling

production info:
Tobias Büchner
Büchner Filmproduktion GbR
Moltkestrasse 30, Köln 50674 Germany
tel: +49 221 321 701
tobias@buechner-filmproduktion.de
www.buechnerfilm.de

selected filmography:
Neighbors of the Kremlin (2003) / You'll Never Walk Alone (Tobias Büchner, 1996) / I Went to Russia (1993)

The documentary looks at the world of the "petitioners," people who come to Beijing from all over China to visit the Complaints Office and plead their case against injustices. The great majority of petitioners travel far to the capital and typically end up waiting desperately in decrepit shantytowns for their cases to be settled. All types of cases are represented: peasants thrown off their land, workers from factories which have gone into liquidation, small homeowners who have seen their houses demolished but received no compensation. Often they are chased and pressured to return home by thugs hired by local governments to dissuade the petitioners, lest the municipality get a bad name for corruption. Following the saga of a group of petitioners over the years of 1996 and 2008, Petition reveals the story of those unwilling to accept defeat. Seemingly unable to do anything but wait, the petitioners enter a strange and often terrifying zone, gradually losing touch with family and friends back home and with the cruel reality of their situation. This was filmed surreptitiously from the point of view of the petitioners until the petitioner's village was destroyed to make way for a new train station in time for the 2008 Beijing Olympics. A unique testimony about China today.

producer: Zhao Liang
editor: Shun Zi , Sylvie Blum, Bruno Barwise , Zhao Liang
camera: Zhao Liang
sound: Laurent Thomas

production info:
Institut national de l'audiovisuel
4 avenue de l'Europe
94360 Bry sur Marne, France
tel.: +33 149 832 992
mgautard@ina.fr
www.ina.fr

selected filmography:
Crime and Punishment (2007) / Farewell Yuan Ming Yuan (2006) / Return to the Border (2006) / Paper Air Plane (2001)

Presumed Guilty uncovers staggering facts about the Mexican judicial system: 93 percent of defendants never see a judge; 93 percent of inmates are never shown their arrest warrant; 95 percent of verdicts are "guilty"; 92 percent of verdicts are based on no physical evidence; police officers are rewarded for the number of arrests they make; and any court official can preside over court hearings (not just judges). The film focuses on the case of Jose Antonio Zuniga Rodriguez, who was incarcerated in 2005, accused of killing someone he claims he did not know, and sentenced to 20 years in prison. Two young Mexican attorneys attempt to exonerate the wrongly convicted man by making a documentary. A film about the contradictions of a judicial system that presumes suspects guilty until they are proven innocent.

producer: Roberto Hernández, Yissel Ibarra
editor: Felipe Gomez, Roberto Hernández
camera: Amir Galván Cervera, John Grillo, Lorenzo Hagerman, Luis Damián Sánchez sound: Iyari Huerta, Tania Negrete
music: Alejandro de Icaza, Lynn Fainchtein

production info:
Instituto Mexicano de Cinematografia
Av. Insurgentes Sur No. 674, Colonia del Valle
Delegación Benito Juárez. México D.F. 03100.
tel.: +52 5448 5300
www.imcine.gob.mx
www.presuntoculpable.org

filmography:
GEOFFREY SMITH
The English Surgeon (2007) / Your Life in Their Hands (2004)

In pursuit of their ultimate dream, multimillionaires are traveling to Kazakhstan to the remote, hidden rocket launch site Baikonur and accompanying training centre, Star City. Here, Soviet cosmonauts celebrated their achievements until Gorbachev pulled the plug on the space program in the late 1980s. Nowadays, to finance trips into space, the Russians sell the third seat in the capsule to wealthy Americans, who with a ticket costing $20 million cover almost half of the cost. American businesswoman Anousheh Ansari is one of these travelers. Space Tourists shows how she prepares for the journey by Soyuz rocket to the International Space Station. In the meantime, Magnum photographer Jonas Bendiksen is searching for space debris for a photo series. The inhabitants of the neighboring, isolated villages on the steppes earn a little extra from the waste, use the titanium tanks as soup pans, and sell the rest to China, where it is used to make aluminum. The worlds of the cosmonauts and the shepherds hardly touch at all. With extraordinary access the film investigates the emotional oscillations of an expensive enterprise and questions the meaning and boundaries of the human spirit and our hunger for adventure and discovery — and the price we are willing to pay for it.

producer: Christian Frei
editor: Christian Frei, Andreas Winterstein
sound: Florian Eidenbenz
music: Jan Garbarek, Steve Reich, Edward Artemyev

production info:
Christian Frei Filmproduktionen GmbH
Josefstrasse 176
8005 Zürich Switzerland
tel.: +41 44 481 7066
christianfrei@gmx.ch
www.space-tourists-film.com

filmography:
The Giant Buddhas (2005) / War Photographer (2001) / Ricardo, Miriam and Fidel (1997)

The Bulgarian town of Varshets is the site of a staggering social experiment. Many of its women work as "badanti" in Italy, taking care of elderly and ill people. The social structure of Varshets is changing and the transformations — some dramatic, others humorous — are everywhere: in the pubs, the families, in the local brass band. The men look after the children, do the cooking and the washing and wait for money from their wives. A film about the new realities in today's Europe, The Town of Badante Women tells the story of a small town transformed through the role its women play on the growing market for care-giving services across the continent.

producer: Stephan Komandarev
editor: Nina Altaparmakova
camera: Anton Bakarski
sound: Blagomir Alexiev

production info:
ArgoFilms
Iantra Str. 5b
1124 Sofia
tel.: +359 2944 9648
argofilms@hotmail.com
www.badantewomen.com

selected filmography:
The World Is Big and Salvation Lurks around the Corner (2008) / The War (2008) / Alphabet of Hope (2004) / Bread Over the Fence (2002) / The Way of Harmony (2001) / Dogs' Home (2000)

A young Ugandan boy's desperate desire for an education in the face of seemingly insurmountable odds: forty years ago, tribal elders buried a pen, placing a curse on the written word. Even longer ago, white men came and took away the children to make them fight in their wars, using the pen to enlist them. The boy still suffers from the cultural consequences of this symbolical curse. Unearthing the Pen is an intimate portrait of a boy's struggle to reconcile tradition with his desire to learn.

producer: Carol Salter
editor: Carol Salter
camera: Carol Salter
sound: Peter Hodges

production info:
Rock Salt Films
tel.: +44 207 722 9335
info@rocksaltfilms.com
www.unearthingthepen.com

filmography:
Mayomi (2008) / Sunday (1998) / Missing the Traffic (1998)

Virtual JFK investigates one of the most debated "what if" scenarios in the history of US foreign policy: what would President John F. Kennedy have done in Vietnam if he had not been assassinated in 1963, and had he been re-elected in 1964? The resulting film employs what Harvard historian Niall Ferguson calls "virtual history," assessing the plausibility of counterfactuals – "what ifs" – and the outcomes they might have produced. The film makes use of an array of resources including recently declassified and never-before-seen archival footage, documents, and audio tapes, and testimony from a critical oral history conference including Kennedy and Johnson administration officials. The heart of the film deals with the question: does it matter who is president on issues of war and peace?

producer: Peter O. Almond, James G. Blight, Koji Masutani, Janet M. Lang, David A. Welch
editor: Koji Masutani
camera: Edward Huff, Koji Masutani, Curt Worden
sound: Kevin Kalunian
music: Joshua Kern

production info:
A Global Media Project
The Watson Institute for International Studies
info@virtualjfk.com
www.virtualjfk.com

selected filmography:
The Japanese Textbook Controversy: Through the Eyes of the Next Generation (2005) / Ward No. 6 (2004) / Bobby Goodfella (2003)

Wagah is a small village in the disputed province of Kashmir. Split by the border between India and Pakistan, it is the Berlin of Asia. Independence in 1947 saw British India separated into two states, one Hindu and one Muslim. And Wagah was divided too, its eastern half in India and its western half in Pakistan. The village's main road now leads to the only border crossing point for many miles. Every evening, the flag is lowered on either side of the border, an impressive theatrical display that attracts large audiences. Thousands of people gather to witness the ritual closing of the border, and while either side claims to be better, bigger, have a more powerful army and a more beautiful flag, after the ceremony the masses try to get as close as possible to the gate to greet their former neighbors. This "festival" is therefore a celebration of the partition, but also a virtual point of contact between the two countries.

producer: Henning Kamm, Fabian Gasmia
editor: Sziliva Ruszev
camera: Ranu Ghosh, Najaf Bilgrami
sound: Hartmut Teschemacher, Amedeo Malagia, Simone Weber

production info:
DetailFilm Production
Inez Schiller
tel.: + 49 40 6688 4790
info@detailfilm.de
www.detailfilm.de

selected filmography:
SUPRIYO SEN
Next Big Thing (2009) / Rupban — The Beautiful (2008) / Hope Dies Last in War (2007) / Way Back Home (2003) / The Nest (2000) / The Dream of Hanif (1997) / Wait Until Death (1995) / Partition Trilogy
NAJAF BILGRAMI
Shama (2009) / One Way Traffic (2009) / Mind the Gap (2005)

Hossein and Shaima fell in love as children, but as teenagers they were separated by war. The illiterate Hossein went to war with the Taliban in order to make money to live, while Shaima was ordered by her father to become the third wife of a man a full 40 years her senior. Nevertheless, years later their paths have crossed once again. Though Hossein has lost a leg in the war and Shaima has a daughter of five, their love for one another has not faded. But they cannot live together. Shaima has filed for divorce, though neither her family nor Hossein's approve of their love. Caught on the horns of a dilemma, and in constant fear of revenge on the part of the male members of both families who adhere to the harsh tribal laws handed down from the Middle Ages, Hossein and Shaima struggle under the most difficult circumstances to hold on to their love. A sober but intimate portrait of a Romeo and Juliet-style drama in a war-ravaged country.

producer: Zoran Solomun, Helga Reidemeister
editor: Marzia Mete
camera: Lars Barthel
sound: Nic Nagel, Katherine Geinitz

production info:
Ohne Gepäck filmproduktion
Liselotte-Herrmann-Str. 6
D-10407 Berlin
tel.: +49 30 44739676
info@ohnegepaeck.de

selected filmography:
Texas — Kabul (2004) / Gotteszell — A Women's Prison (2001) / Lights from Afar (1998) / Women in Black (1997) / Rodina is Home (1992) / Location Berlin (1987) / Is This Fate? (1979)