2000s

Review from Cinemascopian.com:
Elad Keidan’s “Himnon” (Anthem), a droll 36 minute observation on a day in the life of a man from Jerusalem who goes out to buy milk and comes back hours later with his life turned around from the bleak into the hopeful, captivated the hearts of the Cinefondation jury Hou Hsiao Hsian, who presided over the jury , must’ve found the film right up his alley: with long takes and extreme long shots it is indeed almost Taiwanese in style. But the quirky storyline and the abundance of heart and belief emanating from the movie may remind viewers of “The Band’s Visit”, last year’s Cannes darling, also made in Israel. This is the first time an Israeli film wins the Cinefondation. But 2nd and 3rd prizes were won four times previously, so this is the fifth prize for an Israeli filmmaker in the competition’s 10 years existence. (This is also the first time a movie from Jerusalem’s Sam Spiegel Film School wins there after all previous Israeli winners were made at The Tel Aviv University Film School.)Read More »

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It’s been four years since Sofia disappeared. Now, for the first time, she will have to tell her story.Read More »

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When brothers Simon and Sergei bungle an important drug deal on behalf of the local crime kingpin, they’re forced to make up for it by retrieving a lost batch of heroin. Trouble is, they have no idea where to begin. This shrewd gangster satire includes some 20 Russian film stars among its ensemble cast, cleverly costuming each big name to leave viewers guessing who’s who.Read More »

Synopsis
Ali is 18. His feet are firmly off the ground. The very idea of marriage seems like a game. But the bride’s parents are ready and willing. Business ventures will be set up between the families; the arrangement will pay off all round. Ali, meanwhile, is more interested in playing with puppets and dressing up as a rooster for the travelling theatre. His fiancée has only so much patience… So what should his parents do? What was that? Hire a Borrowed Bride? Meaning exactly what? Well just that: borrow a bride, as the title of the film suggests…Read More »

Terminal Invasion is a 2002 science fiction television film directed by Sean S. Cunningham and starring Bruce Campbell and Chase Masterson. The plot involves a group of aliens disguised as humans who take over an airport in preparation for an invasion of Earth. A female pilot and a convicted murderer fight back.Read More »

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Independent filmmaker Caveh Zahedi approaches legendary songwriter Will Oldham (Bonnie “Prince” Billy) with the unusual proposition of taking psychedelic mushrooms together, and filming the results. Surprisingly, Will accepts.Read More »

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On February 14th (Valentine’s Day), 1993, Caveh Zahedi, being without a date, decided to ingest 5 grams of hallucinogenic mushrooms. For the first time in his mushroom-taking experience, he had an experience of “divine possession,” in which he felt that a divine being took possession of his body and spoke through him, in a voice that was not his and with knowledge that he himself did not possess. He afterwards tried several times to repeat the experience. I Was Possessed By God is the documentary record of one such experience.Read More »

from the DVD:
Greg Watkins’ romantic black comedy A SIGN FROM GOD depicts a semi-fictional day in the life of independent filmmaker Caveh (Caveh Zahedi) and his girlfriend Laura (Laura Macias) as they struggle with a series of challenges and accidents (including eviction from their apartment, possibly pregnancy, and a car crash) while desperately seeking a sign from God about the future of their troubled relationship. Laura’s increasingly pessimistic attitude — she perceives that the cascading negative events of their lives portend a negative “sign” about the relationship — is offset by Caveh’s serene and abiding faith that everything happens for a reason…Read More »

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Inviting favorable comparison to the overtly political, social realist films of Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne, The Wound is an understatedly affecting, acutely observed, and profoundly sobering portrait of oppression, dehumanization, and exclusion. By incorporating organic, extended plan-sequences and using repeated images of interminable waiting – from Blandine’s detention, to her self-confinement at a derelict tenement, to Papi’s real-time ride through the countryside in the back of day laborer truck – Nicolas Klotz reflects the inherent inadequacy (if not outright failure) of immigration and asylum laws, lax procedural structure, and government-tolerated, often racially motivated policies (and undocumented, obstructive common practices) that willfully hinder or impede the integration and assimilation of immigrants into their adoptive countries. Using the treatment of Blandine’s wound while in French custody as a metaphor for the authorities’ repeated turning of a blind eye to the obvious, visible social problem, the film serves as a harrowing and trenchant exposition on intolerance and systematic marginalization.Read More »