Nepal European Union Virtual Film Festival 2021 (17 Sept to 25 Sept)
To watch the films: https://www.festivalscope.com/page/neuff/
This site will be activated starting 17th Sept at 5:30 pm to 25 Sept, 2021
European Films
1. Acasa my home
Title: Acasa my home
Year of Release: 2020
Country: Romania, Finland, Germany
Duration: 1 hr 26 min
Language: English, French, Spanish and Italian
Director: Radu Ciorniciuc
Synopsis:
In the wilderness of the Bucharest Delta, nine children and their parents lived in perfect harmony with nature for 20 years–until they are chased out and forced to adapt to life in the big city.
Awards: Sundance 2020 World Cinema Documentary Competition - Special Jury Award for Cinematography, Sarajevo 2020 Documentary Competition - Human Rights Award
2. Aurora
Title: Aurora
Year of Release: 2019
Country: Finland
Duration: 1 hr 47 m
Language: English, French, Spanish and Italian
Director: Mila Tervo
Synopsis:
Aurora, a commitment-phobic party animal, meets Iranian Darian one night at a hot-dog stand in Lapland. Darian is running from death and Aurora is running from love. They need each other in order to finally stop running.
Awards: Edinburgh International Film Festival 2019 – Best International Feature Film, Jussi Awards 2020 – Best Film, Best Actress, Best Direction
3. Bad Poems
Title: Bad Poems
Year of Release: 2018
Country: Hungary, France
Duration: 1 hr 30 min
Language: English, French, Spanish and Italian
Director: Gábor Reisz
Synopsis:
33-years old Tamás Merthner is heartbroken, after his girlfriend Anna, who is on a scholarship in Paris, breaks up with him. While wallowing in self-pity, Tamás takes a trip down memory ...
Awards: Black Nights 2018 Official Selection, Torino Film Festival Winner 2018 AVANTI! Award
4. Fire Will Come
Title: Fire Will Come
Year of Release: 2019
Country: Spain, France, Luxembourg
Duration: 1 hr 26 min
Language: English, French, Spanish and Italian
Director : Oliver Laxe
Synopsis:
Amador is a notorious Galician arsonist who has been accused of causing a new fire. Lois, a young firefighter, explores the depths of a forest on fire. Their destinies are linked by the power of a mysterious fire.
Awards: Cannes 2019 Un Certain Regard - Jury Prize
5. Her Job
Title: Her Job
Year of Release: 2018
Country: Greece, France and Serbia
Duration: 1 hr 30 m
Language: English, French, Spanish and Italian
Director: Nikos Labôt
Synopsis: An oppressed woman discovers a new sense of self when she gets her first job as a cleaning woman in a shopping mall.
Awards: Toronto International Film Festival 2018 Official Selection, Thessaloniki Film Festival 2018 – Best Actress
6. My Brother Chases Dinosaurs
Title: My Brother's Chases Dinosaurs
Year of Release: 2019
Country: Italy, Spain
Duration: 1 hr 41 min
Language: English, French, Spanish and Italian
Director: Stefano Cipani
Synopsis:
Jack (Gheghi) always wanted a little brother, and when Gio (Sisto) is born, he believes his parents when they tell him that Gio is a superhero with amazing powers.
As he grows up, however, Jack realizes that his brother actually has Down syndrome, a condition that Jack decides to keep secret from his high school friends. When the truth comes out, Jack learns that his brother's energy, vitality, and unique perspective can indeed change the world - just like a superhero.
Awards: Giornate degli Autori - Special Events
Awards: Venice 2019
7. Oleg
Title: Oleg
Year of Release: 2019
Country: Latvia, Belgium, Lithuania, France
Duration: 1 hr 28 min
Language: English, French, Spanish and Italian
Director: Juris Kursietis
Synopsis:
Belgium, today. Oleg is a young Latvian butcher. He arrives in Brussels in the hope of getting a better salary in a meat factory. His experience turns short after being betrayed by a colleague. Alone in a country where he doesn’t belong, he quickly falls under the yoke of Andrzej, a Polish criminal.
Awards: Cannes 2019 Directors' Fortnight, Tallinn Black Nights 2019 - Baltic Film Competition
8. Our Struggles
Title: Our Struggles
Year of Release: 2018
Country: Belgium, France
Duration: 1 hr 39 m
Language: English, French, Spanish and Italian
Director: Guillaume Senez
Synopsis:
Olivier does the best he can to fight injustice at work. But from one day to the next, when his wife Laura abandons the family home, he is left alone to juggle between the children’s needs, life’s daily challenges and his job. Faced with these new responsibilities, he struggles to find a balance. Because Laura’s not coming back.
Awards: Cannes 2018 Critics’ Week - Special Screenings
9. Perfumes
Title: Perfumes
Year of Release: 2019
Country: France
Duration: 1 hr 40 min
Language: English, French, Spanish and Italian
Director: Grégory Magne
Synopsis:
Anne Walberg is a master in perfumes. She creates fragrances and sells her incredible gift to many companies. She is a diva, selfish and temperamental. Guillaume is her new driver and the only one who dares facing her. This is probably why she does not fire him.
Awards: Cannes 2018 Critics’ Week - Special Screenings
10. The Audition
Title: The Audition
Year of Release: 2019
Country: Germany, France
Duration: 1 hr 39 min
Language: English, French, Spanish and Italian
Director: Ina Weisse
Synopsis:
A violin teacher takes an intense interest in a student; as they practice for his upcoming exam, pressure mounts and things go awry.
Awards: Toronto Film Festival 2019 Discovery, San Sebastián 2019 Competition
11. Title: Women on the Run
Year of Release: 2019
Country: Czech Republic
Duration: 1 hr 33 mins
Language: English, French, Spanish and Italian
Writer/Director: Martin Horsky
Synopsis:
Vera has lived a wonderful life with Jindrich, and she is fully determined to fulfill his last wish - running a marathon. The emancipated and spirited mother of three daughters doesn't think that doing so will be a problem. She and her daughters will split up the route into four parts, and they'll overcome the over 42-kilometer-long challenge as a family relay team. Of course, the fact that neither of them has ever ran even a meter poses no problem.
Nepali Films
1. Aama Khando
Title: Aama Khando
Year of Release: 2019
Country: Nepal
Duration: 1 hr 38 m
Language: Tibetan
Director: Dhondup Tsering
Subtitle: English
Synopsis:
A single-mother treks over rugged mountains, along with a family of winter-migrants, to give up her only son to foster care.
Awards:
- Ama Khando premiered at the Busan International Film Festival (2019).
- Nominated for the UNESCO-ICFT Gandhi Medal at the International Film Festival of India Goa (2019).
- Won the Audience Award at the Kathmandu International Film Festival (2019).
- Won both the National Best Feature and Best Director awards at the Nepal International Film Festival (2021).
2. Bulbul
Title: Bulbul
Director: Binod Poudel
Year of Production: 2019
Country of Production: Nepal
Duration: 2 hrs
Original Language: Nepali
Subtitle: English
Synopsis:
A young mother waiting for her husband to be back for years falls in love with a guy while she looks after her paralyzed father-in-law.
Awards:
- 'Bulbul' bagged multiple honors at the country's National Awards, winning best director for Paudel and best actress Swastima Khadka.
- Bulbul' as its entry for the Oscars' International Feature Film category at the 2020 Academy Awards.
3. Co-Husband
Title: Co-husband
Title in Nepali : Sahayek Shreeman
Year of Production: 2020
Country of Production: Nepal
Duration: 35 Minutes
Original Language: Nepali
Subtitle: English
Director: Ganesh Panday
Synopsis:
This film revolves around the polyandry custom prevalent among the Lama communities living in the mountain region of Nepal. Among Lamas of Humla district of Nepal, there is still a very strange tradition, which may be a matter of great surprise to many. Lama brothers, no matter what in numbers they are, just marry a girl (have a common wife). They not only share their love and work, they also share a wife among them.
Awards:
- Best Documentary Film Award, 17th February, 2020, Nepal International Film Festival (NIFF)
4. Sarita- Tell Me Who I am
Title: Sarita-Tell me who I am
Director: Sergio Basso
Logline: "Sing your past, dance your future"
Duration: 1hr 30 min
Year of Release: 2020
Language: Nepali
Synopsis:
In 1990, one sixth of the population of Bhutan was exiled because they demanded greater democratic rights from the ruler. The film follows the story of Sarita, a 13-year-old girl born in Khudunabari, a refugee camp in Nepal where over 100,000 Bhutanese exiles live. Now they will be "relocated": thousands of families will be forced to emigrate and their Lotshampa identity will disappear forever.
Sarita and her friends will not tell us their odyssey: they will dance and sing it.
Film Festival
- Hamburg Film Festival_Germany 2019 and also Nominee_Hamburg Producers Award
- Vancouver Interntional Film Festival, Canada 2020
- Nominated for The Italian Awards, David Di Donatello 2021
5. Split Ends
Title: Split Ends
Year of Release: 2016
Country: Portugal
Duration: 26 min
Language: Nepali
Director: Rajan Kathet
Synopsis:
Barbershop becomes the window into the life of Nepalese migrants living in Portugal.
Awards:
- Kathmandu International Mountain Film Festival, KIMFF, Nepal (Dec. 2016)
- Film SouthAsia 2017, Kathmandu Nepal
- Mumbai International Film Festival of Documentary, Short and Animation Films (MIFF 2018)
- Bangalore International Film Festival (BIFFES) 2018
Environmental Films
1. Europe's Last Wild Horses
Title: Europe's Last Wild Horses
Year of Release: 2011
Country: Germany
Duration: 48:48 min
Language: English
Director: Christian Baumeister
Synopsis:
This programme, shot in stunning cinema-quality HD with well-directed application of elaborate slow-motions, aerials, camera-drives, macro-photography and underwater-cameras, celebrates wildlife in a cultural landscape where nobody would expect such a richness in rare species and behavior. Apart from the horses' behavior in the course of one year, the film features moor frogs in their blue mating colour, the mighty Eurasian eagle owl nesting and hunting in extreme slow-mo, the elusive European otter hunting and swimming, extreme macro-photography of carnivorous sundew plants, the European hedgehog making acquaintance with the wild horses before going into hibernation, amongst others. Surely one of the most stunning and rarely if ever filmed sequences is the European viper in their mating display and later giving birth to live young.
2. Fire Fox Guardian
Year of Release: 2018
Country: India
Duration: 14:00 min
Language: English and Nepali
Director: Gunjan Menon
Synopsis
Red Panda numbers are dangerously decreasing and there could be less than 2500 red pandas left in the wild. But an unconventional warrior has devoted her life to fight all forces that are against her and her beloved Red Pandas.
3. Global Warning-Kashmir Chapter
Year of Release: 2016
Country: India
Duration: 28:42 min
Language: English
Director: Jalal Ud Din Baba
Synopsis:
This film showcases how Kashmir is becoming prone to effects of global warming by well documenting the effect on ice-capped mountains and local practices contributing to environmental degradation.
4. I cannot give you my forest
Title: I cannot give you my forest
Year of Release: 2015
Country: India
Duration: 29:00 minutes
Language: Kui
Director: Nandan Saxena and Kavita Bahl
Synopsis:
‘I cannot give you my forest’ clearly states the Kondh advasis’ determination of not letting go of their revered forests. They perceive themselves as custodians of the treasure handed down by their ancestors. They live with the cycles of nature and understand that it is bountiful, only taking what is necessary for their sustenance. The forest is a metaphor to the adivasis of their sovereignty. The film lays bare the futility of man-nature conflict since the latter is willing to cater to former’s needs but not its greed.
Awards: National Film Award for Best Agriculture Film
5. India's healing forests
Title: India's healing forests
Year of Release: 2018
Country: India
Duration: 52 minutes
Language: English
Director: Nitin Das
Synopsis:
The film unfolds through inspiring stories of people whose lives are intricately woven with forests. Through their experiences we learn about the remarkable healing powers of nature.
6. India's Wandering lion
Title: India's Wandering lion
Year of Release: 2015
Country: India
Duration: 47:33 min
Language: English
Director: Praveen Singh and Martin Dohrn
Synopsis:
After a brush with extinction, the Asiatic lion has rebounded to a population of over 400. However, their success has surpassed the natural capacity of the Gir Forest Sanctuary, forcing lions to spill over its borders and seek new homes, thereby getting nearer to human settlements. Can lions and people truly settle their differences and coexist without conflict?
7. Koti Banal
Title: Koti Banal
Year of Release: 2018
Country: India
Duration: 12:18 min
Language: Hindi
Director: Shriniwas Oli
Synopsis:
Koti banal is a Documentary about traditional architecture in Himalayan Region. The whole Himalayan region is very sensitive to seismic activities. In some areas of Uttarakhand and Himachal Pradesh, there has been a tradition of Earthquake-Resistant Architecture. These houses are made of wooden and stone and some are also of four and five floors. This style of building is known as the Kotibanal Architecture. Many earthquakes have occurred in the past in Himalayan Region. Some severe earthquakes have caused a catastrophe in this area. Despite the frequent earthquakes, the buildings of Kotibanal style remained safe.
8. Losing Ground
Title: Losing Ground
Year of Release: 2015
Country: India
Duration: 29: 41 min
Language: English
Director: Rishu Nigam
Synopsis:
India has 130 towns and cities in 84 coastal districts. Climate science is increasingly warning us about the likely impacts of sea-level rise and cyclones on these cities. But are we paying heed? ‘Losing Ground’ maps out the climate vulnerability of two coastal cities in India- Panaji and Visakhapatnam, and builds a case for all coastal cities to start climate proofing their infrastructure and services without losing any more time.
9. Malettam
Title: Malettam
Year of Release: 2015
Country: India
Duration: 1:22:16
Language: Malayalam
Director: Thomas Devasya
Synopsis:
Hari nicknamed as ‘Kolumban’, a cowherd boy lives in a hut on a hilltop which is under a serious threat of forced eviction.
The ‘mountaineering game’ annually played by children during winter traps Kolumban in an inescapable servitude to Akku, the boy who has lately become the king through this game. But playing with other children and engaging in merry-making on the meadows are a relief from the extreme alienation that Kolumban feels. Kolumban's most precious possession is a bag of seeds in which he keeps all kinds of seeds he collects from forest. At last, when Kolumban's hut is destroyed along with the indigenous culture and nature, what remains is his small bag of seeds"
10. Manas, return of the gaints
Title: Manas, return of the giants
Year of Release: 2016
Country: India
Duration: 54 minutes 38 sec
Language: English
Director: Praveen Singh
Synopsis:
Manas National Park, a World Heritage Site was destroyed by a two-decade war between the militants and government, resulting in an almost complete loss of wildlife especially the elephants. With the help of scientists, armed rangers and technology, animals are gradually increasing in number. With the complete return of all of its endangered giant animals, Manas will once again return to its former glory. The film tells the story of a paradise lost and regained.
11. Point and shoot
Title: Point and Shoot
Year of Release: 2016
Country: India
Duration: 25:04 min
Language: Hindi, English and Yimchunguru
Director: Harsimran Kaur Anand
Synopsis:
The film attempts to understand the relationship of a traditional hunting community, the Yimchungrü tribe of Nagaland with the animals and birds found in the forests around their village, Fakim. It shows the significance of hunting in a tribal society and the dilemma it faces in a rapidly changing cultural and ecological landscape.
12. Solar Energy, A cash crop for Gujrat Farmers
Title: Solar Energy, A cash crop for Gujrat Farmers
Year of Release: 2015
Country: India
Duration: 14 minutes 30 sec
Language: Gujarati and Hindi
Director: Video Volunteers India
Synopsis:
Until 2012-13, Dhundi, a village in Gujarat's Kheda district, was unelectrified, with the homes and fields shrouded in darkness. The farmers would use diesel water pumps to irrigate the fields, spending a huge amount of money on diesel and maintenance.
This film is a collection of interviews with the farmers telling their story of using solar powered pumps in farming which brought down the high irrigation costs. In fact, they produced surplus income by selling water and electricity to the Gujarath Electricity Board. With the surplus income, these farmers are investing in the village's infrastructure by building borewells, community wells and better irrigation canals.
13. The Moor
Title: The Moor
Year of Release: 2012
Country:
Duration: 50:04 minutes
Language: English
Director: Jan Haft
Synopsis:
The moors and bogs are oases in the cultivated landscape of Central Europe. Nature holds many surprises in a moor: It seems as if some of the most bizarre and colourful members of our native species live in the bog. Plants that eat animals live here and mushrooms that suck the live out of plants. The rutting dance of the Great snipes and the hatching of a great crane chick are just a few of the miracles happening in a moor every season. Today- the European Union is runner-up world champion in setting free hazardous greenhouse gases through the destruction of moors and bogs. The film shows the biodiversity of the often rarely recognized habitat - and it is a quiet appeal: Save and preserve the last intact moors!
Award: The film won the Best Environment and Conservation award category of Wildlife Vaasa Festival in 2014.
14. Title: The race to save the Amur Falcon
Year of Release: 2016
Country: India
Duration: 20:14 min
Language: English
Director: Shekhar Dattatri
Synopsis:
In the state of Nagaland in India’s far northeast, a small team of conservationists discovered something that was both enthralling and alarming. They witnessed local hunters capture and slaughter tens of thousands of beautiful little raptors- The Amur falcons for consumption. This is the story of the investigative documentation that followed, and the campaign that was launched to save the migrating falcons. In a world where conservation successes are few and far between, this campaign to save the Amur falcon shows us how a small group of determined people can make a big difference.
15. Walking with the Wolves
Title: Walking with the Wolves
Year of Release: 2014
Country: India
Duration: 58 min 41 sec
Language: English
Director: Senani Hegde
Synopsis:
The film explores the enduring relationship between nomadic herders and wolves. Against the backdrop of a human-dominated landscape, where most other wild animals have failed to survive, the documentary reveals how both shepherds and wolves defy the pressures of the modern world and manage to cling to a fragile existence.
16. A Sunny Day
Title: A Sunny Day
Year of Release: 2019
Country: Morocco
Duration: 10 min
Language: No dialogue
Director: Fauzi Bensaïdi
Synopsis:
Under the impacts of a changing climate, the world changes, it has already changed. In a distant and near future, both fantastic and absurd, men and wo-men survive as they can. Following a man, a slender figure between Tati and Buster Keaton, we discover through scenes of his daily life how devastating the effects of climate change are on humans and nature. How do we barricade against excessive heat or cold? How will it be to go to a supermarket, or a zoo filled with different animals and species? A disturbing and hilarious ride in the future, that is already our present.
17. Hungry Seagul
Title: Hungry Seagul
Year of Release: 2019
Country: China
Duration: 06:00 minutes
Language: No dialogue
Director: Leon Wang
Synopsis:
On an island not far from the mainland, the young father seagull is anxiously guarding the new born gulls by the nest and awaiting the return of the mother seagull. The mother seagull has given up everything she has, but the baby seagull is still hungry. The father seagull had flown away in search of more food...The main diet of black-tailed gulls is pelagic fish in the sea, molluscs and aquatic insects in coastal wetlands and estuaries. However, with the overfishing of offshore fish and the pollution of the marine environment, seagulls can catch fewer and fewer small fish in the upper layer.
18. In One Drag
Title: In One Drag
Year of Release: 2016
Country: Germany
Duration: 3:05 min
Language: No dialogue
Director: Alireza Hashempour
Synopsis:
It’s late in the evening. A man leaves a building, lights a cigarette and smokes it in one drag. He casually flicks the stub away – everything as always. Only this time... all the cigarette butts in the city become alive.
Awarded
19. Kokota: The Islet of Hope
Title: The Islet of Hope
Title: Kokota: The Islet of Hope
Year of Release: 2016
Country: Canada
Duration: 29 minutes
Language: French, English
Director: Craig Norris
Synopsis:
The Islet of Hope tells the story of Mbarouk’s quest to help Kokota. This short, 30 minutes documentary introduces viewers to the resilient people living on the front lines of climate change and explores how these unlikely heroes have managed to innovatively adapt to a warming climate while reforesting their island. This inspirational film promises to leave audiences around the world believing that simple solutions really can have huge impacts.
20. Olmo
Title: Olmo
Year of Release: 2019
Country: Italy
Duration: 08:00 minutes
Language: Dutch
Director: Silvio Soldini
Synopsis:
Olmo, eighty years old, looks out of the window of a building in the suburban area of a city. His eighty-year-old grandson Giulio is reading him an article from the newspaper about melting glaciers, the greenhouse effect, methane and CO2... “What is C-O-2?” asks the child. “Do you remember the carbon dioxide we studied?” says Grandpa. “The one the trees breathe?” asks Giulio. The day after, they’re leaving for a short tour instead of going to school, searching for an old tree.
21. Qurut
Title: Qurut
Year of Release: 2019
Country: Afghanistan
Duration: 05:00 minutes
Language: Finnish
Director: Shahrbanoo Sadat
Synopsis:
It is dawn. Rural central Afghanistan, far away in a village. A young wo-man is milking a goat while her little boy is assisting her by holding the horns of the goat. There is a flock of goats and sheep waiting to be milked before the young shepherd takes them to the mountains to graze all day long. She cooks Quruti, one of the most popular meals in the entire Afghanistan but especially central Afghanistan. For some years people have been making less and less Quruti as they struggle to feed their animals because the mountain pastures have dried up. Climate change has affected rain patterns and soil fertility in the whole region.
22. Tant de Forests
Title: Tant de Forests
Year of Release: 2014
Country: France
Duration: 3 min
Language: French
Director: Burku Sankur and Geoffrey Godet
Synopsis:
The short film is based on a poem of Jacques Prévert. The poem speaks of the irony of the fact that newspaper warn us about deforestation although they are made of paper themselves.
23. Tua Ingugu
Title: Tua Ingugu
Year of Release: 2019
Country: Brazil
Duration: 08:00 minutes
Language: Portuguese
Director: Daniela Thomas
Synopsis
As the Xingu indigenous live in close symbiosis with water, rivers in Sao Paulo are perishing due to worrying levels of water pollution from chemicals used in the agro business industry and plastic. This short movie captures the relationship between the Xingu community and their river, and the emotions of one of them when he is taken to see Sao Paulo rivers. A poetic movie to denounce water pollution and the challenging prospects for the future of both indigenous people and city folks.
