Pitching du Réel – Selected Projects 2017

Freight Train Freedom

by Arno Bitschy     
France – Les films du balibari | 90' / 52’
Expected release: September 2018

America. Today. 20-year-old Karen lives as a hobo, a vagabond: all alone, she hops from train to train, with no particular destination or constraints. And her eyes sparkle with freedom...
40-year-old Ivy runs an art-therapy workshop for homeless women in San Francisco. Like Karen, years before, she crisscrossed America on freight trains.
Amid the fracas of these metallic beasts, the life-journeys of these two women intersect and respond, as they both try to find a place in this world.

Girls of Tomorrow

by Nora Philippe   
France – Gloria Films | 90'/52'
Expected release: December 2018

At an all-female college in New York City, students from diverse backgrounds are reinventing politics, gender and activism - their feminism is innate and their battle cry is “now”. I follow Talia, Evelyn, Anta, Lila and Cauveri over a year in their 20 year-old lives, while they fight for women's rights, racial and climate justice, against Trump's agenda. A feminist college movie, Girls of Tomorrow also tells an inspiring coming-of-age story.

Hamada

by Eloy Dominguez Seren   
Sweden, Germany – Momento Film, Ma.Ja.De | 78' / 52'
Expected release: May 2018

Filled with vitality, humor and unexpected situations, Hamada paints an unusual portrait of a group of young friends living in a refugee camp in the middle of nowhere. They are known as the worlds most forgotten people but refuse to become invisible.

I left without a closer look

by Arami Ullón    
Switzerland, Paraguay – Cineworx Filmproduktion, Arami Ullón | 90’
Expected release: January 2019

Me fui sin mirarte de cerca is a journey film that dives into an unknown reality, in one of the remotest corners of the world: the Paraguayan Chaco. It addresses the complex meaning of identity and sense of belonging through the experience of the Ayoreo natives who were stripped of their territory and fundamental elements that constitute their culture. During this journey I will again approach that country, Paraguay, that I left behind, perhaps without having looked at it closely enough.

Last Stop Cinema Pamir

by Aboozar Amini     
Netherlands, Afghanistan – Silk Road Film Salon | 90' / 55'
Expected release: December 2017

Buses in Kabul have been running since over 40 years, starting from the time of Dawood-Khan, the king of Afghanistan. They carry bullet holes, blood and memories of the past and present. A bus ride from west-Kabul to the last stop Cinema Pamir encounters a multitude of historical places and passengers that tell stories. The documentary is a straight visual cut through of the Afghan society.

Merry Christmas, Yiwu

by Mladen Kovačević      
Serbia, Netherlands – Horopter Film Production, Revolver Amsterdam | 90' / 52'

Expected release: Spring 2018

Sixty percent of all Christmas decorations in the world are made in the Chinese city of Yiwu. A place of surreal craftsmanship, where Christmas is celebrated by no-one. Merry Christmas, Yiwu is a poetic observational documentary with alluring visual esthetic worthy of Christmas, where intimate moments from the lives of the workers of Yiwu complement the surprisingly entertaining story about the strange place where Christmas is made.

Missing Women and the Bachelor Time Bomb

by Antje Christ, Dorothe Dörholt   
Germany –   Bildersturm Filmproduktion GmbH | 90’ / 52’
Expected release: June 2018

Today, 150 million women are missing in Asia. A gender imbalance phenomenon that will have global consequences. A film about the insane lack of women in Asia as a result of politically motivated population control policies imposed by the West. About the desperate attempt of thousands upon thousands of men to find a wife. About all the women whose value is not increasing because of this, but who are instead becoming more of a commodity than ever. And about a bachelor time bomb in the making…

My Dearest Sister

by Kyoka Tsukamoto    
Canada, Japan – Ciné Qua Non Média | 80' / 60'
Expected release: January 2018

A feature documentary by Kyoka Tsukamoto, filmmaker originally from Tokyo, now based in Montreal who embarks on a personal journey to reconnect with her sister, a successful potter living in the ruins of Fukushima after the tsunami and nuclear meltdown. The chaos ensues when trust is broken... by abuse, by lies, even by philosophical shifts. This is true of individual humans but also of whole societies. We become disillusioned, resentful, fill up with hate. Is there hope? For you or anyone?

My father, Tinder, and I

by Eva Zornio   
Switzerland – Lomotion | 85'
Expected release: April 2018 

Giancarlo is 53 years old, single and owns a pub in a small Swiss town. His spends his days smoking pot and watching TV. He is bored of his "shitty life" and decides to buy a camper van. He wants to travel abroad in search for love. He sets up an account on Tinder, a mobile dating app and sets off on a road trip across Europe. I'm his daughter and I’m going with him.

Samuel, the Absent Hero

by Tamara Stepanyan   
Armenia – Visan | 70’ / 52’
Expected release: January 2018

An essay to explore a village in Armenia where the kingdom is ruled by women. Men are absent, men are gone to earn a living in Russia.
Men are the phantoms of the village, the absent heroes’. A country so closed and controlled. A village which looks like a prison with open doors. In it, beautiful and sad  women and children.
Women fix the bikes, cut the wood, milk the cow, plough the field and make decisions.And all this in a patriarchal society, a paradoxal reality to explore.

Solid Ground

by Sofie Benoot    
Belgium, Sweden, Netherlands – Inti Films, Pieter van Huijstee Film, LittleBig Productions | 90'
Expected release: September 2018

Solid ground is an essayistic documentary investigating the relationship between humans and stone. A dizzying journey in which the most diverse things – from kidney stones to falling pieces of satellite, from astronauts’ earstones to stone quarries in Palestine and volcanoes in Iceland – are all interconnected.

The Icarus Balance

by Jean Patric   
Belgium, France – Iota Production, Rouge Productions | 80' / 52’
Expected release: June 2018

In the Mediterranean, a place that is imaginary and real. Where Icarus threw himself to burn his wings. Where ocean liners cross fishermen, migrants fleeing disaster, rescuers and scientists studying the consequences of warming on the seabed. Where signs can be seen: has our ability to measure and interpret the world not fallen into technological excess, making us lose the meaning of things and burn our wings? The film takes us on a sensual, philosophical and poetic journey on a mythical island

The Village

by Claire Simon   
France – Petit à Petit Production | 90' / 7 x 26’
Expected release: December 2018

In Lussas, this small village of southern Ardeche, crossed by a single street, a handful of people prepare the launch of a television channel. From this sweet rural utopia to the launch of an ultra modern work tool broadcasted on the web, Claire Simon proposes to follow an adventure singularly rooted in the tune of time.

Through Our Eyes

by Tamara Erde
Germany, Israel, France – Katuh Studio, Monogram Film, Gloria Films | 90' / 52'

Expected release: March 2018

A multi-generational journey exploring the archives of the director’s grandfather Ephraim Erde, an official Zionist photographer from the 30's, confronted to the director’s current vision, in an attempt to create an utopia of her own. 

Xaraasi Xanne

by Raphaël Grisey    
France – Spectre productions | 90'
Expected release: May 2018

Xaraasi Xanne is the story of the emancipation of a group of immigrant workers, whom in 1977 decided to create an agricultural cooperative in Mali, land of emigration, and to regain control of their repressed rural origins. A voice-over, belonging to a fictionalised protagonist, navigates between the cooperative archives and unveils a larger cine-geography of the colonial enterprise, of the immigrant workers’ struggle, and of the liberation movement of the 1970’s.