22nd Madurai Film Festival 2020 : International Documentaries

22nd Madurai Film Festival 2020

6-10 Dec, Online Film Festival

International Documentaries

1) La conquista de las ruinas
Dir. Eduardo Gómez; 88 min; Spanish with Eng subtitles; Argentina, Bolivia; 2020

THE CONQUEST OF THE RUINS shows the unknown side of the expansion of cities that endangers our future. Paleontologists. Quarry workers. Works in construction and private neighborhoods. The earth unites and separates them all, and each one has an interpretation of what this world is and how it should be inhabited.

2) Katya I Vasya idut v shkolu
Dir. Yulia Vishnevets ; 90 min; Russian with Eng subtitles; Russia; 2020

LEAVE THE KIDS ALONE? Two young intellectuals, Katya and Vassya, come to a small industrial town to work as teachers. They want to change the system of scholastic education and the social situation in difficult regions. The school is a closed conservative world, where obedience and discipline are of the highest value. Young teachers discover that  nationalism, sexism and homophobia are typical for their new environment. Children see the school as a prison and are completely indifferent to any new ideas. During one school year we observe attempts of our protagonists to bring new practices into the system. Young teachers try to speak with children about feminism, human rights and Russian politics, but the system pushes them out, and a comedy turns into a drama.

3) Ancestral Code
Dir. Volodymyr Lutskiy; 70 min; Ukrainian, Belorussian with Eng subtitles; Ukraine ; 2020

Documentary film «Ancestral Code» is a research of the origins of the Ukrainian people, the search for its identity through the study of the melodism of Slavic ethnographic heritage. Now many talk about brotherhood, spiritual intimacy, affinity. We want to analyze the connection between the neighboring peoples of Ukraine, Lithuania, Belarus and Poland through music and folklore.

4) Stupa
Dir: Kirill Nenashev; 75 min; Russian with Eng subtitles; Russia; 2019

The film is about Konstantin Stupin (or just Stupa) – a rock-n-roll musician from a small Russian town Oryol. At the end of the USSR era Stupa, being a school student, decided to do music. He became a leader of the band Nochnaya Trost. Internal rock-n-roll protest and the height of unfavourable for Russia years – the 90-s – constantly interrupted Stupa’s creative career. He used drugs, was in prison 4 times. After getting out of it he always did music again. On of his songs was shown to The Exploited and legendary Scots named Stupa the best punk of Russia. Though Stupa didn’t consider himself a punk. Today there are more than 60 mln. views on his channel, but Stupa won’t know about it. He went down in history as a real underground musician who played in European style of classic rock-n-roll, punk and heavy metal, but who got through a Russian life.

5)  Linea 137
Dir : Lucía Vassallo ; 82 min; Spanish with Eng subtitles; Argentina; 2019

In Argentina, every 23 hours there is the death of a woman, because of gender  violence, a particular form of “discipline” that certain men exercise against women when they feel that they do not comply with the mandates that “women” – stereotype of the feminine – should comply. A female corpse every 23 hours. This is one of the most serious naturalized everyday situations; embarrassing for the victims, denied by the victimizers. How to account for this emergency? How many times can you see the blows, the statistics, the bruised bodies without the sensibility falling asleep? “Phone Line 137” portrays the lives of 4 social workers and psychologists who decide to be available 24 hours a day, 365 days a year to assist, help and accompany women who suffer cases of gender, sexual and family violence within the City of Buenos Aires.

6) Paper Worlds of Latif Kazbekov
Dir: Sofya Leonidova; 20.53 min; Russian with Eng subtitles; Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Russia; 2019

Portrait of Kazakh-Russian painter Latif Kazbekov. We’ll meet him in the studio - the place where outer world and inner world are mixed together. Where paintings as a result are less important than process itself. Paper reliefs, thoughtful paintings, artisanal paper-making and endless questions. An attempt to look into origins of art and answer the questing: where do paper worlds come from?

7) Architecture of the Blockade (Dr: Maxim Yakubson; Russia)
Dir: Maxim Yakubson; 80 min; Russian with Eng subtitles; Russia; 2020

The documentary film tells about the feat of inhabitants of Leningrad, the work of architects and alpinists, the disguise of the city and the preservation of monuments. Thanks to the unique chronicle, drawings and photographs, eyewitness accounts and analysis of historians, fragments and motifs of the play "Hecatomb. The Siege Diary" the film rediscovers the events of the terrible and holy days of the siege of Leningrad.

8) Der Krieg in Mir
Dir: Sebastian Heinzel; 83 min; German, Russian with English subtitles; Germany, Switzerland; 2019

How much soldier is still alive in me? New research from epigenetics indicates that enormous stress experiences change the genetic make-up. German filmmaker Sebastian Heinzel explores the effects of WWII on his family and follows his grandfather’s path from Germany to Belarus. He discovers unexpected connections to his own past and his war dreams,which have been haunting him for years. Against the background of the global refugee crisis and international tensions, the film tells of the long-term consequences of the war and our task to deal with it in order to make healing and reconciliation possible.

9) Der nackte König
Dir: Andreas Hoessli; 108 min; Polish-Farsi-English-German with Eng subtitles; Germany, Poland, Switzerland; 2019

THE REVOLT LIBERATES US FROM OUR OWN EGO 1979, Revolution in Iran.1980, Revolution in Poland. The fall of the Shah, the “King of Kings” in Iran, mass strikes and the “Solidarnosc” movement in Poland. What happened in the minds of the young women and men who were involved in the revolutions at the time? What happened to them when the revolution was suppressed or – as in Iran – when a religious-authoritarian elite took power? 

«The revolt liberates us from our own ego, from the ego of everyday life, which suddenly seems small, trivial and alien to us», – Ryszard Kapuscinski, journalist

10) Pro geroev i ludei
Dir: Maria Muskevich; 90 min; Russian with Eng subtitles; Russia; 2019

It’s 2018. Russia has just elected its President. A new, old President. Nothing will change during the next six years, and, at first glance, you just have to accept it. This is the way most people think, whilst there are those who feel otherwise. This film is about them. Experienced activists support the youth-led protests against the Russian irremovable crony authorities.

11) Kunashir
Dir: Vladimir Kozlov; 71; Russian with Eng subtitles; France; 2019

Kunashir, one of the main islands of the Kuril Archipelago, situated 16 kilometres from Japan, was occupied by the Soviet army in 1945. A year later, after a short period of cohabitation, 17000 Japanese and Ainus who were living in the Kurils and in Sakhalin were deported to the island of Hokkaido. Since that time Japan has demanded the return of the Kuril Islands.  A peace treaty between the two countries has not been signed to date.

12) Pena
Dir: Ilya Povolotskiy; 85 min; Russian with Eng subtitles; Russia; 2019

SUBPOLAR COWBOYS OCCUPY THE RUINS OF EMPIRE ‘Froth’ depicts the customs and everyday life on the coast of the Barents Sea. At the heart of the narrative are the stories of three ordinary people. The characters are united by an incredible blend of humility, inherent rebelliousness, a very specific moral code, and attitude towards life. Nowhere except for these hills and severe sea can they find peace, while they hustle through the days and the waves making froth.

13) El Padre Medico
Dir: Vytautas Puidokas; 102 min; Portuguese-Spanish-German-French-Lithuanian; Brazil, Lithuania; 2019

WHO ARE YOU – THE LOCAL HERO OF AMAZONIAN JUNGLE AND SAVIOR OR BRUTAL ABUSER AND MURDERER? A Lithuanian doctor, priest and a war refugee Alexander Ferdinand Bendoraitis (1919-1998) resettles to the Amazonian jungle in the 1960's and becomes a local hero: establishes a boat-clinic network, first jungle radio, starts the pacification of local indigenous tribes and builds the most modern hospital in the Amazonia. Yet, as he gets involved in a brutal crime, countless fake narratives that he had created around himself begin to resurface.

14) Long Live King David
Dir: Ido Zand & Yael Leibovitz; 59 min; Hebrew with Eng subtitles; Israel; 2019

Is the Biblical story about David's legendary Kingdom indeed true? The film takes us on a journey to find the answer and reveals unexpected findings – about the present.

15) Vovan
Dir: Alexandra Zaytseva; 12.42 min; Russian with Eng subtitles; Russia; 2019

Vladimir Kolokoltsev, a senior sergeant in Fire Department No. 42, risks his life every day to save people from the fire, despite his family's disapproval.

16) Edit as if I disappeared
Dir: Oksana Timchenko; 15.09 min; Russian with Eng subtitles; Russia; 2019

Young people get to know each other on a film course, make a documentary about suicide together in search of an answer to the question why life is worth living, and fall in love with each other. Six months later, the guy commits suicide, and the girl tries to make him the protagonist of the film, editing from the periphery of the footage: the moments and phrases captured by the camera - by accident or as a joke.

17) Last Kiss
Dir : Eradzh Nidoev; 4.29 min; Russian with Eng subtitles; Russia, Tajikistan ; 2019

We often stop valuing what we have. The director had the idea of creating a social experiment among couples "with troubles", and so to see what would happen if they had to break up for real...

18) 1944. Crimea. Deportation
Dir: Fatima Osman, Yunus Pasha; 62 min; Ukrainian, Crimean Tatar with Eng subtitles; Ukraine; 2019

In 1944 Crimean Tatars has suffered a long road in exile. It was accompanied by famine, illness and loss. In the first years of exile, almost half of deported Crimean Tatars died. But those, who survived, dreamed of only one thing – to return to Crimea. The documentary 1944 tells about the tragedy of all Crimean Tatars through several separate life stories. They are cherished by each Crimean Tatar family and must be remembered by all generations to come.

19) Over the Barriers
Dir : Banu Ramazanova; 60 min; Russian, Kazakh with Eng subtitles; Kazakhstan; 2020 

Horses for us, Kazakhs, have always been symbols of drive and victory. The story of the Soviet conquest of Olympus began with the legendary Absent. And now there are people and horses in Kazakhstan who are ready to storm the Olympic heights.

20) North for Happiness
Dir: Alexander Porotov; 2.04.15 hours; Russian with Eng subtitles; Russia; 2020

 A group of friends goes on a journey from St. Petersburg to Yamal, the name of which translates from Nenets as "the edge of the earth." They are going to find out why the country producing oil, rising gasoline prices and will try to know whether people live happily in regions that produce oil and gas for the whole country, and on what their happiness depends. Spectacular stories about the life and natural riches of the Northern region, exclusive interviews with the direct miners of oil and gas resources, who in the cold in unbearably difficult conditions earn money for the whole country, while representatives of the idle "golden youth" live at the expense of other people's work and the achievements of previous generations. 

21) Quarantine
Dir : Alisher Zhadigerov; 30 min; Kazak with Eng subtitles; Kazakhstan; 2020

The only way to defeat the coronavirus is through quarantine! The main recommendation is to stay at home. But the little hedgehog did not comply with the quarantine regime and went for a walk.

22) Speleonaut / Under the Stone Sky
Dir: Sonja Đekić; 57 min; Serbian with Eng subtitles; Serbia; 2018

On the eve of Man's conquest of the Moon, in the summer of 1969, 34-year-old Milutin Veljković set off to spend the following 15 months in a two-kilometer long cave in the Southeast Serbia, in a company of a dozen of hens and ducks, and a puppy. Veljković wasn’t just interested in beating the record in cave dwelling - he aimed to penetrate into the universe of depth.

This extraordinary deed is first revealed outside - through a series of portraits of interesting characters, all connected to Veljković. Unexpectedly, we enter the underground world. The various narrated fragments from Veljković's detailed cave diary are brought to life: from his daily routines, such as making coffee and collecting insects - to the dramatic events of pulling out his own tooth, craving for a woman, fighting with the flood and hallucinations.

From connecting with primeval ancestors in a disintegrated time and space, all the way to the outer space exploration, Speleonaut is in quest of our purpose.

23) Stalking Chernobyl: Exploration After Apocalypse
Dir: Iara Lee; 58.17 min; English / Ukrainian / Russian with Eng subtitles; Ukraine/Slovakia/USA/Bulgaria; 2020

Exploration After Apocalypse, a documentary from Cultures of Resistance Films, examines the underground culture of the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone. Three decades after the world's most infamous nuclear disaster, wildlife has returned in the absence of human settlements. Meanwhile, illegal hiking adventurers known as 'stalkers', extreme sports aficionados, artists, and tour companies have begun to explore anew the ghostly, post- apocalyptic landscape.

24) From Trash to Treasure: turning negatives into positives
Dir: Iara Lee; 20 min; English; USA/Lesotho/Bulgaria; 2020

In Lesotho—a highland country surrounded by South Africa—an artist named Nthabiseng TeReo Mohanela takes discarded materials and transforms them into unique clothing and accessories. Teaching young people the benefits of recycling and re-creation, she calls her project “From Trash to Treasure.”

25)Ivanova igra
Dir: Tomislav Zaja; 52 min; Croatian with Eng subtitles; Croatia; 2020

IVAN’S GAME is a biographical documentary which covers the life story of one of the greatest Croatian football players of all time: Ivan Gudelj. The film follows Ivan’s meteoric rise and the tragic end of his career at the height of his fame when he got ill from hepatitis B virus that nearly killed him. It is a story of an exceptional man who lost everything because of the  illness, but eventually won his life’s game.