Pyre (2023)

End of Days

On 28 December 1999, the citizens of New York City are getting ready for the turn of the millennium. However, Satan decides to crash the party by coming to the city and searching for his chosen bride — a 20-year-old woman named Christine York. The world will end, and the only hope lies within an atheist named Jericho Cane.

A Story of the Forest: Mavka

Mavka, a water nymph, loves Lukash, a country youth. Their brief happiness ends when Lukash is forced to marry the shrewish Kilina. The Spirit of the Forest turns Lukash into a wolf as punishment for his infidelity. The strength of Mavka's love breaks the spell, but Kilina curses the nymph, transforming her into a weeping willow. This beautiful and tragic story is based on a play written in 1912 by Lesya Ukrainka, a Ukrainian poet, writer and political, civil and female activist, and includes mythological characters taken from Ukrainian folklore.

Leda + Swans

“Leda + Swans” depicts an infernal, mythic birth of cinema, dredging the violence and horror from Wallace McCutcheon’s comic short film “Photographing a Female Crook” (1904). Leda, who may or may not be a falsely accused young woman, is brought in for a mugshot by two officers. She first attempts to avoid the camera’s gaze, and, when overpowered and manhandled, contorts her face to ruin the photograph. However, her small rebellion proves futile; she was already being recorded, objectified, mapped, and co-opted by the Godhead of the director. As her body and image are repurposed and transmuted ad infinitum, the filmic universe also explodes into a supernova. What is born out of this suffering and manipulation is another example of our sublime medium and modern muse. She will not be last the Leda, and she may not even be the first. Who is the guilty party here? Is beauty a chimera in traditional cinema? Has the ephemeral cinema of the attractions and distractions era gone anywhere?

The Scary Movie

Martina and Sonja, cross-dress in vampire capes and werewolf claws, re-enacting familiar horror tropes. A corresponding soundtrack of stock screams and "scary" music suggests that the girls' toying with gender roles and power dynamics may have dire consequences.

Stranger Than Fiction

Harold Crick is a lonely IRS agent whose mundane existence is transformed when he hears a mysterious voice narrating his life.

Inland Empire

An actress’s perception of reality becomes increasingly distorted as she finds herself falling for her co-star in a remake of an unfinished Polish production that was supposedly cursed.

Barbara

Previously lost exploitation film which chronicles the sexual journey of a teenager who introduces her own family to the liberated ways of the free love rebellion.

Now They Experience It All the Time...

The newest film by SamHel

Pokémon 4Ever

In order to escape a greedy Pokémon hunter, Celebi must use the last of its energy to travel through time to the present day. Celebi brings along Sammy, a boy who had been trying to protect it. Along with Ash, Pikachu, and the rest of the gang, Sammy and Celebi must encounter an enemy far more advanced than the hunter, with the fate of the forest hanging in the balance.

The Source of a River, a Night Stream

A woman slowly fades into darkness waiting to see her son one last time.

Mildew

'Elise' comes to terms with a 'being' that possesses their house, discovering and accepting why they have allowed this presence to linger while overcoming the issues it has imposed on their life.

Oxymoron Life...

The wanderer Rascal embarks on a psychotic and contradictory journey to break out of the ego bubble in which his self-loathing and isolation have inserted him in. After his metamorphosis, his soulmate, Paloma, makes him realize that life is as complicated as it is simple - and that all that's left to do is to live.

Fresh

Frustrated by scrolling dating apps only to end up on lame, tedious dates, Noa takes a chance by giving her number to the awkwardly charming Steve after a produce-section meet-cute at the grocery store.

River

The one-hundred-year-old Fujiya inn stands in the quiet region of Kyoto. Mikoto is standing in front of the Kibune river at the back of the building when she is called back to work. But two minutes later, she finds herself back at the river again. The whole inn seems to be stuck in a time loop!

I Am Here Now

An abstract horror artefact conceptualising trans doubt and dysphoria as a physically invasive force - a virus. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ewaVwmReGKM

HOLGER

Described as 'a fairytale with its roots in the worlds of dadaism and surrealism'.

Magic Conch Shell

Estranged lovers reconnect through the power of the Magic Conch Shell.

Son of the White Mare

A horse goddess gives birth to three powerful brothers who set out into the Underworld to save three princesses from three evil dragons and reclaim their ancestors' lost kingdom.

Friend of the World

After a catastrophic global war, a young filmmaker awakens in the carnage and seeks refuge in the only other survivor: an eccentric, ideologically opposed figure of the United States military. Together, they brave the toxic landscape in search of safety... and answers.

My Neighbor Wants Me Dead

The Tenant continuously fails to escape his deadly apartment under five minute time limit as his blood-thirsty neighbor threatens to break in and exterminate him.

Slipped Grasp

Memories trip themselves on threading details, looped my embellishment and deterioration until their separate origins are fused together into a sense. Inaccurate by recollection, reestablished through the abstraction of their obsession- reaching a new understanding through the slipping of their grasp.

Gadis Cantik di Bangku Taman

Plot unavailable

Grieve

A man engulfed in the suffocating grip of loss finds his life fragmented. Struggling to navigate through his emotional fog, his mother suggests a retreat to her cabin – but an ancient entity that thrives on sorrow has taken root. The New England winter punctuates this love letter to creeping horror and slow cinema.

INFRASTRATA

Amongst the contemplative static shots of decaying architecture weaves an abstract narrative unveiling the life-cycle of a higher perception, too large to perceive. Shot at various sites across south-east England, INFRASTRATA is a study on the concept of super-organisms, and the relationship between structure and nature.

Linton Falls - A Study of the Force of Water

An experimental film documenting a river leading up to a waterfall, depicting both its natural beauty and its inherent danger.

3STIGIA

Plot unavailable

Those Who Wander

What are they? What do they seek? When all the lights go out, they will wander. And you will never see them.

Iloveyou, Iloveyou, Iloveyou (...)

In a distant world ruled by a queer dictatorship, a non-binary couple's decision to marry challenges societal norms, blurring the lines of gender and love in a universe where inversions are the norm and limitations are mere illusions.

VAZIO

A painter struggles with an empty canvas as a void grows inside of her.

The Begotten Cycle

Themes of death, rebirth and mythology combine in this compilation of the subversive and surreal experimental films "Begotten", "Din of Celestial Birds" and "Polia & Blastema."

Olympus Reborn - Dream

Experimental shots with some continuity with a gritty raw surrealist style

Cormorant

A 16mm experimental short film loosely following a cormorant as it attempts to dry its wings.

Skinamarink

Two children wake up in the middle of the night to find their father is missing, and all the windows and doors in their home have vanished.