WU Haohao, a worshipper of MAO Zedong, describes himself as a video producer. He shoots a lot of videos, mostly with sexual content. He and his girlfriend try to function in an open relationship, which suits only one of the partners, while the other suffers and longs for a family life. The possibility of emigration to America is a hope, but it is gradually receding due to the worsening political situation.
Soy Libre
Just released from a juvenile detention centre, Arnaud longs for just one thing: unconditional freedom. The energetic young outsider, who grew up trapped between social housing and foster families, constantly struggles to be what he should have been. Free. The film subtly paints an intimate portrait of the filmmaker's younger brother searching for his place in society and provides unique insights into their extraordinary sibling relationship.
Odoriko
Odoriko are dancers of the dying art of Japanese strip theatre. Once a popular form of entertainment, today all but 20 strip clubs have closed nationwide. Like dancers' bodies disappearing into darkness when the stage spotlight dims at a show's end, the future of the strip theatre seems destined to follow. Deliberately filmed on mini-DV tape in an archaic frame ratio, this is a poignant and artful portrait of a vanishing culture behind the curtains.
Epicentro
An immersive and metaphorical portrait of post-colonial, ‘utopian’ Cuba, and its resilient people a century after the explosion of the USS Maine in Havana, the event that ushered in the American Empire alongside a modern form of world conquest: cinema as propaganda. In Epicentro, SAUPER explores a century of interventionism and myth-making together with the extraordinary people of Havana to interrogate time, imperialism and cinema itself.
All Light, Everywhere
An exploration of the shared histories of cameras, weapons, policing and justice. As surveillance technologies become a fixture in everyday life, the film interrogates the complexity of an objective point of view, probing the biases inherent in both human perception and the lens.
TIDF Selection
A handpicked selection of acclaimed titles from the 2022 TIDF to take you once again on journeys to the most unexpected corners in the world.