BIFF @ Rockford 2013 Archives - BIFF - Beloit International Film Festival

Place in the World

in BIFF @ Rockford 2013, Documentaries 2013

http://youtu.be/tEPewMBv0X8

Friday: 4:00 pm – Katie’s Cup
Saturday: 1:30 pm – Domenico’s

Category: Documentary
Country: USA
Language: English
Rating: PG-13
Runtime: 89 min.
Director: Adam Maurer
Producer: Marius Crowne
Website: aplaceintheworld.com
Facebook: A Place In The World

A Place in the World’ is a feature documentary about a small charter school called “The International Community School’ (ICS) that takes on an issue that plagues many communities: what to do for the refugee and immigrant populations whose children are falling behind in traditional public schools. ICS’ conclusion: placing these kids together with local American children will allow for a trade-off that, if nurtured and encouraged, will benefit both parties greatly. The school is comprised of about half refugee students, half local American kids.

Today We Saw…

in BIFF @ Rockford 2013, Documentaries 2013

Today we saw the face of God

Filmmaker Attending Thursday: 7:30 pm – Bagels & More
Saturday: 11:00 pm – Wilson Theater

Category: Documentary
Country: Haiti,U S A
Language: English Subtitles
Rating: PG-13
Runtime: 68 min.
Director: Mercedes Kane
Producer: Mercedes Kane
Website: Today We Saw The Face Of God
FaceBook: Today We Saw The Face Of God

In January of 2010, a team of 23 volunteers set off on what should have been an ordinary medical mission. They had no way of knowing the devastation that would inevitably come. On their final evening, the team treated their last patient, gathered their supplies and set off towards their sleeping quarters. Shortly thereafter, they felt a jolt of panic as the world began to shake and tremble violently beneath them. Within hours, the entire team was unexpectedly thrust into the center of one of the worst natural disasters in modern history.

The documentary film, Today We Saw the Face of God transcends viewers from their comfortable homes into the poverty-stricken world that Haitians navigate daily. As the team journeys back, they recount the harrowing reality of being first responders in an unprecedented medical crisis.

A surprisingly hopeful look into a tragedy that shook the world, Today We Saw the Face of God is a true testament to the power of human connection in the face of unimaginable suffering.

Double Feature 5

in BIFF @ Rockford 2013, Double Feature 2013

Thursday: 10:00 pm – Hendricks Art Center
Friday: 11:00 am – Rotary Center
Saturday: 6:30 pm – Katie’s Cup

Suffering Grasses

When elephants fight, it is the grass that suffers.

Category: Short | Double Feature
Country: USA
Language: Arabic w/ English subtitles
Rating: PG-13
Runtime: 52 min.
Director: Iara Lee
Producer: Al-Omariya
Website: Suffering Grasses

Over a year later, with thousands dead and counting, the ongoing conflict in Syria has become a microcosm for the complicated politics of the region, and an unsavory reflection of the world at large. Against the backdrop of the Arab Spring, NATO’s toppling of Moammar Qaddafi in Libya, and the complicated politics of the region, this film seeks to explore the Syrian conflict through the humanity of the civilians who have been killed, abused, and displaced to the squalor of refugee camps.

In all such conflicts, large and small, it is civilians—women and children, families and whole communities—who suffer at the leisure of those in power. While focusing on the plight of those caught in the crossfire of the hegemons, we seek to unravel the conflict by exploring the motivations of its actors—the Ba’athist regime of Bashar al-Assad, the Free Syrian Army and other geopolitical players like the United States, Israel, Russia, China, Iran, Lebanon, Turkey, the Gulf countries… When elephants go to war, it is the grass that suffers. This is a film about the elephants, but made for the grasses.

The Fourth World

Category: Short | Double Feature
Country: USA
Language: English
Rating: PG
Runtime: 55 min.
Director: Mark Volkers
Producer: Mark Volkers
Website: The Fourth World
Facebook: The Fourth World

Jovelyn Alquino-Philippines. Jovelyn is a 16-year-old girl who wants to be a nurse. She lives under a freeway bridge above a canal that empties into the Bay of Manila. Jovelyn, her parents and her four little brothers dig in Manila’s garbage each day looking for items to recycle. She spends her mornings at the local school. She is the only one of the five children that her parents can afford to educate.

Felix Ochieng—Kenya. Felix, 16, lives in Mathare Valley, one of the dirtier and nastier slums in Nairobi. Felix divides his time between school and selling maize in the muddy alleyways of Mathare to help the family finances. A typical day for him starts at 4 a.m. and ends with him earning about $1.40 for a full day’s work.

Selma—Guatemala. Selma’s mother sold her into the sex trade when she was nine years old. Believe it or not, the story gets worse from there.

Tanya—Guatemala. Shot in the spinal cord when she was 15 years old, Tanya now spends her days in a wheelchair at a busy intersection in Guatemala City, begging so she and her ailing father can live. Each morning, her father pushes Tanya out of the La Limonada slum into the city so she can earn the money needed for her medicines, catheter, food and shelter. If beggars are a nameless, annoying “group” to you, Tanya’s story will make you think twice next time you see one.

Paul Collier: In 2010, Paul was named by Foreign Policy magazine to its list of top global honors. In his native England, he was appointed CBE (Commander of the Order of the British Empire. He is Professor of Economics at Oxford University and the director at the, Centre for the Study of African Economies. He is also author of several important books, including:
The Plundered Planet
Wars, Guns and Votes
The Bottom Billion

Soukenya Ndiaye Ba: Soukenya is a former member of the Senegal government and is currently the executive director of INAFI, the International Network of Alternative Financial Institutions. This organization “envisions a world where the poor are empowered and given the opportunity to enjoy sustainable livelihood through affordable alternative financial services and active participation in their own development. A world where even the poorest of the poor enjoy life with dignity, sufficient food and income security to meet basic needs including shelter, clothing, health care and education.”

Mike Davis: Mike is an American Marxist social commentator, urban theorist, historian and political activist who lives and works in Southern California, USA. Mike is a distinguished professor in the department of creative writing at the University of California, Riverside. Mike is the author of several books, including:
Planet of Slums
Dead Cities, And Other Tales
In Praise of Barbarians: Essays against Empire
Buda’s Wagon: A Brief History of the Car Bomb

Having a dozen people on one crew is way too many people when you’re working in the close quarters of a slum, so on these trips, our college students broke up into small teams of about three per team. We laid the ground work months in advance for each team to spend about a week with a Christian NGO to help them develop promotional material to help advance their work.

While a few students worked with Volkers on The Fourth World, the rest worked on helping their NGO tell their story and promote their work among the poor. The end result is that not only are we able to produce The Fourth World, but we have also produced several smaller pro bono pieces to help those organizations that are doing excellent work among some of the world’s poorest people.

Traveling with college students to shoot in some of the most impoverished places on earth was a rare treat not just for the producer, but for the people we encountered on the way. With the world as small as it is, a 20-year-old American can very quickly find common ground with a 20-year-old Kenyan or Guatemalan or Indian or whatever the country may be. It was a two-way street as one challenged the other to see things in new ways, to respond to one another in new ways. Seeing the Fourth World through fresh eyes was a privilege.

Triple Feature 1

in Triple Feature 2013, BIFF @ Rockford 2013

Thursday: 10:00 pm – Cheese People/ Nikki’s Café
Friday: 6:30 pm – Katie’s Cup
Sunday: 5:00 pm – Bagels & More

Sudden Nature

Category: Short Film
Country: Singapore
Language:
Rating: PG-17
Runtime: 20
Director: Isaac Kerlow
Producer: Isaac Kerlow
Website: Sudden Nature

The storyline alternates between the real world of a young couple and the allegorical abstract world of Man and Nature. The narrative starts as the young couple prepares to meet at a picnic in the park later that day. Through a series of flashback we are transported to an imaginary world where the young characters personify Man and Nature. They are happy and playful, but Nature occasionally tricks Man. Man tries to understand Nature by measuring her but his approach is not always successful. The harmony between them disappears when Man is unkind to Nature. Nature strikes back and destruction unravels. The young man and woman drift apart.

Txiki

Category: Short Film
Country: Spain
Language:
Rating: G
Runtime: 27
Director: Sergio SanMartin
Producer: Paranoix Entertainment

TXIKI is a documentary piece structured around artist Txiki Medina (1958) and focused on the creative process of an oil painting. In order to put together his peculiar geometry, the artist takes inspiration from urban spaces and spoilt aspects of Nature, places filled with elements which, rather than sought, have been encountered. There is also a drive towards introspection, towards revealing the human interior where silence plays a key role. The trace that the passing of time leaves on each image. Painting as a metaphor of the velocity of time.

PAULINE, ETIENNE

Category: Short Film
Country: France
Language:
Rating: PG
Runtime: 37
Co-Director: Anne Gilles
Producer: Francoise Bouillon-Pommerolle

Friendship is an art of loving.
Pauline and her best friend Etienne don’t fit anywhere, and are regularly lost. But they go good together and always can find a way. Today they are going to paint a large canvas for Cedric and cannot find the studio. Etienne has got no sense of direction. Pauline cannot admit that she has fallen deeply in love with Cedric.

Duck Hunter – The

in BIFF @ Rockford 2013, Feature Films 2013

Thursday: 7:30 pm – Hendricks Art Center
Friday: 6:30 pm – Franchesco’s
Friday: ADDED — 9:00 pm – Rotary Center
Saturday: 11:00 am – La Casa Grande
Sunday: ADDED — 5:00 pm – Domenico’s

Category: Feature
Genre: Drama
Country: Italy
Language: Italian with English Subtitles
Rating: PG-17
Runtime: 90 min.
Director: Egidio Veronesi
Producer: Egidio Veronesi

I wanted to tell a story about simple people. A story of pure fantasy, nothing autobiographical, nothing that happened in actual fact. With the exceptions of the painter Ligabue and the less known Tajadela, considered one of the best storytellers of northern Italy between the two wars. He’d perform with the accordion at the town festivals along with the blind clarinettist Nadir Bernini, singing ‘Vincere’ (To Win) while walking backwards. Occasionally he’d get beaten by the fascists for this. They were fascinating characters of whom I’ve heard stories from people that met them. I regarded them too interesting to leave them out of the plot of the film.

The fiction is set in the early 40’s and tells of four friends who live their dreams just like young people always did. In their countryside world they can still lead a normal life; the war seems far away and everyone lives the fascist age in a seemingly uninvolved way.

The poor lived in such a way, troubled by the needs of daily life. Up until when the course of History caught up with them, scarring them on their very flesh.

In this same way are the protagonists of the film: they live peacefully day-by-day, until the difficulties of life before and the coming of the war after alter their lives.

When writing the screenplay I especially wanted to avoid any form of rhetoric and any opinions regarding the historical and political events.

‘Il cacciatore di anatre’ is a film about life and feelings. Perhaps it’s soft, because it tackles a lot of topics without any special claims, except that it intends to depict the point of view of simple, but not shallow people, who know how to live bravely and decently.

It’s a work very far from the cliches of many movies, in which the countryside is made up of complaining and hopeless people, who just enjoy the village feast, dancing on the barnyard or waiting for the pork to be killed.
This film is a sort of epic of the rural world in the mid-twentieth century. And I’m sure the people who really lived those times and those places can only say: ‘we were just like that’!

Last Stop: Salvation

in BIFF @ Janesville 2013, BIFF @ Rockford 2013, Feature Films 2013

Friday: 6:30 pm – The Armory
Friday: 9:00 pm – Bagels & More
Saturday: 4:00 pm – Bushel & Peck’s
Saturday: 6:30 pm – Franchesco’s

Category: Feature
Country: Turkey
Language: English Subtitles
Rating: PG-17
Runtime: 100 min.
Director: Yusuf Pirhasan
Producer: Yusuf Pirhasan

The inhabitants of Saadet Apartment are about to get a lesson in grass roots revolution.

A group of women who have become numb to the pain in their lives welcome a new tenant into the building. Little do they know that the heartbroken Eylem will change their lives forever.

When she bought her new flat, the young psychotherapist Eylem never imagined that she would move in under such circumstances. The dream of setting up house with her handsome fiancé Okan and embarking on a life of personal and professional happiness has turned into the nightmare of being dumped two weeks before the wedding and sliding into emotional and financial despair.

Short Slot 1

in BIFF @ Janesville 2014, BIFF @ Rockford 2013, Short Films 2013

Thursday: 2:30 pm – Bushel & Peck’s
Friday: 6:30 pm – Cheese People/ Nikki’s Café
Saturday: 6:30 pm – Speakeasy 2
Saturday: 4:00 pm – Katie’s Cup

Luminaris

Category: Short Film
Country: Argentina, Spain
Language:
Rating: G
Runtime: 6 min.
Director: Juan Pablo Zaramella
Producer: Sol Rulloni

In a world controlled and timed by the light, a common man has a plan that could change the destiny.

CatCam

Category: Short Film
Country: USA
Language: English
Rating: G
Runtime: 15
Director: Seth Keal
Producer: Seth Keal
Website: CatCam The Movie

Mr. Lee, an adopted stray cat, routinely disappeared from his North Carolina home for days on end. Intrigued by Mr. Lee’s whereabouts, his owner Juergen, a German engineer, created a camera designed to fit around the feline’s neck. Engineered to capture continuous photographs, Juergen hoped to discover the mysterious life of his cat. After many unsuccessful attempts, Mr. Lee returned with the camera intact and photographic evidence of his travels. Intrigued by his findings, Juergen published the photographs on the Internet, unaware that his small invention would send shock-waves around the world and alter his life forever.

Old Country Lullaby

Category: Short Film
Country: USA
Language: English
Rating: G
Runtime: 7 min.
Director: Marc Kornblatt
Producer: Marc Kornblatt
Website: Old Country Lullaby

‘…and you shall inscribe them on the doorposts of your home…’

The quote comes from Deuteronomy and is known the world over by Jews as a symbol of home. The words appear in a passage that children learn to recite from early on and are found, hand-written in Hebrew on parchment, inside the mezuzah, a cylinder-shaped container that Jews place on the right side of their doorposts as a sign of their faith..

In OLD COUNTRY LULLABY, my 7:30-minute dramatic short, the past and future merge as Jules and his daughter Mira pack up their last boxes and take down the mezuzahs in anticipation of selling their home. Lunch is waiting for them across town at their new apartment, but Jules has trouble leaving.

Sitting on the floor in his daughter’s empty bedroom, he can’t remember a certain lullaby he used to sing to her when she was a baby. It may be a small matter to Mira, but to Jules the niggun (Hebrew for wordless melody) he learned from his grandfather seems significant. To him it represents his connection to his ancestors, the old country they left behind and the culture they brought to America.

Singing the tune in its entirety strikes Jules as an important way of holding onto his past as he himself grows older and moves on. He needs Mira’s help to remember.

Transthreeded

Category: Short Film
Country: Spain
Language:
Rating: G
Runtime: 2 min.
Director: Andres Vidal
Producer: Andres Vidal

Earth, the next target.

Quest for Energy

Category: Short Film
Country: USA
Language: English
Rating: G
Runtime: 10 min.
Director: Vinit Parmar
Producer: Ryoya Terao

QUEST FOR ENERGY encourages us to think about our energy consumption and way of life to get closer achieve zero impact on our environment.

Four million islanders want electricity. For eons, they had survived in the dark, lit by dim kerosene lamps. They still burn wood for fire. Millions live like this around the world.. The people of the Sunderbans live less than hundred miles away from Kolkata, India, residing in the largest wetland in the world adjacent to one of the most populated urban areas.

This World Heritage site boasts about two hundred fifty wild, white Bengal tigers, only fifty-two of the hundred-two islands are human-inhabited. These islanders have witnessed massive flooding and realize their islands will be under water because of rising sea levels from climate change. Two islands recently disappeared. The UN reports that 75% of the landmass will be under water due to climate change. Four million islanders risk losing everything, their homes, farmland, animal stock, and their lives.

In the 1990s, the West Bengal government commissioned the West Bengal Renewable Energy Development Agency to electrify its off-grid population without contributing to the degradation of the tender wetland ecosystem. Low cost coal is not an option.

The residents voted to acquire clean energy. Now, three of the fifty-two occupied islands have electricity from a hybrid mini-grid power plant that uses wood to make a biogas, without producing climate-changing emissions. Replenishment of used wood through plantation of new trees makes this process sustainable. But, only about six hundred homes enjoy an electrical connection. How about the other forty-nine islands?
These islanders power their CFL bulbs, fans, television sets, DVD players, cell phones, computers and other appliances from large renewable charged batteries.

Solar panels purchased from local solar shops can be seen on rooftops and straw huts. A local hospital’s solar panels has permitted emergency operations using simple lights and modern vital-sign machines and cured illnesses by administering vaccines kept in cold storage.

For cooking – burning firewood and kerosene, caused burns and even deaths and smoke inhalation problems. Now, manure pits supply ample natural cooking gas from fermented cow manure for a safe and fast cooking experience. It produces zero emissions.

Simple sustainable technology has saved lives, and transformed an off-grid village into a thriving city of entrepreneurs, bustling with energy, and the conveniences of appliances. Imagine what can be done for the rest of the off-grid world still living in the dark.

Cracked

Category: Short Film
Country: USA
Language: English
Rating: G
Runtime: 5 min.
Director: Terence Campbell
Producer: Terence Campbell
Website: Terence Campbell
Facebook: Cracked

Every shot is a pan of broken eggs.

Kaloo School

Category: Short Film
Country: USA
Language: English
Rating: G
Runtime: 11 min.
Director: Sahra Mosawi
Producer: Asmita Shrish
Website: Kaloo School
Facebook: Kaloo School

In between the famous Mountain in rural north Afghanistan there is a village with 2500 families with just two schools for children. Every child spent about 5 hours everyday to go to the school, which is hard and sometimes impossible especially for girls in unsafe environment. But now people in Afghanistan are more aware about education and have freedom of giving their children a full privilege of education. People from villages understand the importance of educating their children regardless of boy or girl.

This documentary is a symbol of present Afghan life, with some hope for their future trying to build better country and explores life of the people in a period of time to show how their way of life change in a positive way after NATO invasion. The aim is to bring to light the human stories in the world’s most dangerous and deprived regions. To show how they live in this situation, fighting for the better tomorrow.

Milo

Category: Short Film
Country: Italy
Language: n/a
Rating: G
Runtime: 9 min.
Director: Simon Pietro De Domenico
Producer: Simon Pietro De Domenico

The storm of silence will be a very common weather phenomenon in 2012. Milo, a boy of 7 years, lives in a world all its own and he does not like ‘outside’ interference. For this reason, one day he decides to record the storm of silence in order to isolate himself in his world.

Old Angel

Category: Short Film
Country: Taiwan
Language: Taiwanese w/ English subtitles
Rating: G
Runtime: 5 min.
Director: Dony Chiang
Producer: Dony Chiang

Old Angel once hurt his wings. He came to the forest to mend his wings among the colossal trees. His wings have healed, but he’s been here for a long, long time.

So long that he’s forgotten how it feels to fly. But he just can’t forget, the last time he tried to flap his wings, that excruciating pain, that crushing despair he felt. Time and again he’s walked to the edge of a cliff, at the edge of the trees, but he’s never summoned enough courage to fly.

The autumn leaves have nearly all fallen, and migrating littleangels arrives near the Colossal Forest. Dim rays of light piercing from the forest catch the eye of one Little Angel. He feels an mysterious force pulling on him, as if it is saying, something needs him. He halts in his tracks, before starting toward its source. . .

Smile

Category: Short Film
Country: Italy
Language: English
Rating: G
Runtime: 8 min.
Director: Matteo Pianezzi
Producer: Matteo Pianezzi

Behind a clown’s makeup there is always a man with his story: the story of his life, that could be happy or not funny at all, even if his clothes and his makeup let us think something definitely smiley. If the Clown is a mime too, it would not be possible to ask him to tell us his story: he would not answer us. The only thing left to do is follow him to see where he takes us, and understand where he is going. We will find out that the Clown, the Mime and the Man are the same person, inevitably.

Bottle

Category: Short Film
Country: USA
Language: English
Rating: G
Runtime: 6 min.
Director: Kirsten Lepore
Producer: Kirsten Lepore

Animated on location at a beach, in snow, and underwater, this stop-motion short details a transoceanic conversation between two characters via objects in a bottle.