OPENING FILM
TIMM THALER
The main role in the movie, Timm Thaler is a boy who trades his enchanting laughter to the mysterious Baron in exchange for the ability to win any bet he makes. However, Timm soon realizes that a person Is not complete without laughter, but Lefuet is not that easy to outwit when he tries to regain this gift of laughter.
CLOSING FILM
HARMONIUM
Toshio operates a machine shop in his garage when suddenly an old acquaintance of Toshio, Yasaka arrives to help out at the shop. Yasaka had just been released from prison and so without a permanent place to say, Toshio takes Yasaka in as an assistant. Yasaka reveals to Akie that he was imprisoned for eleven years as a result of murder, asks for forgiveness for not mentioning this earlier and slowly and Yasaka becomes a greater part of the family.
SPECIAL SCREENING
AFTER THIS OUR EXILE
In hopeless pursuit of happiness, Shing is a man who desperately attempts to hold on to the dwindling threads of his family. Shing’s machoistic ego overrides any reasonable logic for change, which forces Lin, his wife to leave Shing repeatedly. After finally managing to escape, Shing is left with nothing but his son, Lok-Yun. With each passing day, the bond of love is threatened with Shing’s unrepentant ways.
REDHA
A Malaysian couple are unsure what to do when they discover that their eight-year-old son is autistic — the mother wants to learn more about the disorder, while the father remains in denial. In time, they try their best to care for their son’s needs. It is about family, denial, courage, and sense of believing that it will get better after every fall.
BLIND WAY
Sorehead singer Zhao Liang drifts around all day long. Someday in underpass he encounters a blind girl Jing Jing who is under control by a criminal scrounger gang. Jing Jing cannot endure beating-up from gang leader Guo Wei and escapes. Through all obstacles and difficulties, Zhao Liang and Jing Jing get to trust each other and rediscover their meaning of life. But the past dose not let them go easily and so does Guo Wei.
COMPETITION SCREENING FILM
HEMA HEMA: SING ME A SONG WHILE I WAIT
Somewhere deep in a forest of Bhutan, there is a gathering every twelve years of men and women chosen by the Old Man to enjoy a few days of anonymity. Masked silhouettes participate in rituals, performances and dances. One man attends this event for the first time and enters the experiences like a new born. He stumbles clumsily through the first day, but quickly adapts and he becomes totally intoxicated with her. But his desire will lead him down a dangerous path.
I AM NOT MADAME BOVARY
Li Xuelian stages a sham divorce to secure an apartment only for her husband to unexpected remarry. Li protests to the courts without success since the divorce paperwork is in order. When her husband further defames her, she sets out on an absurd ten-year journey to reclaim her reputation.
I, DANIEL BLAKE
A 59 year old carpenter recovering from a heart attack befriends a single mother and her two kids as they navigate their way through the impersonal, Kafkaesque benefits system. With equal amounts of humour, warmth and despair, the journey is heartfelt and emotional until the end.
INTERCHANGE
“Interchange” follows a man named Adam, a forensics photographer who is dragged by his best friend, Detective man, into an investigation of a series of macabre ritual murders in the city. Adam soon befriends Iva, a woman who is on a mission to rescue the souls of the people in her tribe that have been trapped inside a glass plate negative. That tribe’s spirit, played by Nicholas takes on the form of a human in order to help Iva.
MAD WORLD
The film begins with a father picking up his bipolar son from a mental hospital. Both men are in deep remorse for the accident that killed the mother. The tension and anxiety boil as they stick with each other in a tiny flat. As time passes, they realise that their pain is due to the cruel and unjust society.
PERFECT STRANGE
Seven long-time friends (three married couples and a divorcee) are having a dinner. They decide, as a playful game, to put each one’s mobile phone on the table and reveal every text message or phone call they would receive that evening, to prove that nobody has anything to hide. Hilarity and drama ensue together as everyone’s secrets are unveiled and the seven friends find themselves perfect strangers to each other.
ONE NIGHT ONLY
One Night Only depicts an overnight romance story between an addicted gambler, Gao Ye and a prostitute, Mo Mo. Gao Ye got himself into a gambling debt threat after being released from prison. Gao Ye forced Mo Mo to start a black market underground boxing with him using her bondage savings. They go through a series of events—kidnapping, car-racing and killing, only to realize the need to decide which path they want to take before sunrise.
THE WAILING
An old stranger appears in a peaceful rural village, but no one knows when or why. As mysterious rumours begin to spread about this man, the villagers drop dead one by one. They grotesquely kill each other for inexplicable reasons. The village is swept by turmoil and the stranger is subjected to suspicion.
WHITE ANT
Bai Yide can’t control his desire for lingerie. Few days after stealing some, he receives a clip of his misdemeanour. It’s from Tang. While looking for her ex-boyfriend, she accidentally records his act of stealing. She takes out her anger on him, sending him the video. Her “righteous” act soon snowballs into something else.
MA’ ROSA
Ma’ Rosa has four children. She owns a small convenient store in a poor neighbourhood of Manila where everybody likes her. To make ends meet, Rosa and her husband, Nestar, resell small amounts of narcotics on the side. One day, they get arrested. Rosa’s children are ready to do anything to buy their parents’ freedom from the corrupt police.
THE ROAD TO MANDALAY
The traffickers have a well-established route: from Burma into Thailand across the Mekong river, passing bribed police checkpoints and into Bangkok, where the illegal migrants are on their own. Lianqing is one of those who travel this route. A fellow migrant called Guo is kind to her, and their fates become entwined.
HAPPINESS
After his mother’s death, Chan Kai-yuk feels so alone that he leaves Guangzhou for Hong Kong to look up the father who abandoned him and his mom. Alone and homeless, Yuk is taken in by Auntie Fen, a middle-aged recluse who leads a solitary existence. At first, their different habits and personalities lead to numerous squabbles. As time goes on, Yuk learns Fen is in the early stages of Alzheimer’s. The discovery unexpectedly serves as a catalyst for the young man’s growth as a caring friend.
SINGING IN GRAVEYARDS
Pepe, a 68-year-old impersonator of a Filipino rock legend, lives alone on the borders of reality, imagination and mysticism. One day, he is finally given the chance to open for the rock legend’s concept but he must do something neither of them has done before – write a love song.
THE SALESMAN
The Salesman tells the story of a young people Emad and Rana who play the lead roles in a local rendition of Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman. Meanwhile, their personal relationship takes a hit after moving into a house that was previously inhabited by a woman who allegedly pursued a career in prostitution.
THE SUMMER IS GONE
In the early 1990s, Xiaolei, who lives in a small village in western China, longs for a summer holiday without homework after he graduated from primary school. However, it is filled with boring routine, and Xiaolei feels the anxiety around him. When his father has left, Xiaolei realizes that his life is completely changed.
TONI ERMANA
A practical joking father tries to reconnect with his hard working daughter by creating an outrageous alter ego and posing as her CEO’s life coach.
SOULMATE
30 year-old working woman Li Ansheng’s life in Shanghai is suddenly disrupted by the publication of a novel, entitled “Qiyue and Ansheng”, a chronicle of her friendship with Qi Yue during her youth. Coupled with an accidental encounter with Su Jia Ming, a past love, her long repressed memories are unleashed with the force of a tsunami.
APPRENTICE
Inevitably, a transfer to a maximum security prison will eventually challenge the integrity and ethics of a young correctional officer on his way to become a chief executioner.
