Foreign Surface (2024)

Orbit

The sun’s energy circulates throughout the earth, feeding the cycle of life. Everything is connected in a natural loop, which repeats, like the circular discs of magical optical toys. This perfectly balanced rhythm is disrupted by human excess, throwing the cycle out of orbit and temporarily stopping the circulation of energy in nature.

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.

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.

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.

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.

VAZIO

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

Witch's Cradle

The surrealist film shows repetitive imagery involving a string fashioned in a bizarre, almost spiderweb-like pattern over the hands of several individuals, most notably an unnamed young woman and an elderly gentleman. The film also shows a shadowy darkness and people filmed at odd angles, an exposed human heart, and other occult symbols and ritualistic imagery which evokes an unsettling and dream-like aura. Considered an unfinished film.

Crisp.

CRISP., wherein a jealous man's attempt to steal a delicious apple crisp causes reality to break down and begins a chain of events leading to an endless cyclical loop of jealousy and theft.

Other Land

You find yourself in a foreign landscape. Two other people are on the horizon. Something about the world around you is off. It isn't long before something is released from a caged pit. There is limited time left as something ugly consumes the land around you. Is this Earth?

Electroma

Two robots embark on a quest to become human.

PROTOTYPE

As a major storm strikes Texas in 1900, a mysterious televisual device is built and tested. Blake Williams’ experimental 3D sci-fi film immerses us in the aftermath of the Galveston disaster to fashion a haunting treatise on technology, cinema, and the medium’s future.

Birth

During Childbirth, a mother is told the child is stillborn, and she struggles to finish the birth in order to survive.

Kaguya

Under the impetus of the 75th anniversary of the bamboo top-handle bags, the House presents a contemporary retelling of an ancient Japanese story entitled ‘Taketori Monogatari (The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter).’ Makoto Nagahisa stages the plot of finding oneself, along with true love, in a Tokyo betwixt and between reality and a dream. Dressed in looks from the Gucci Love Parade collection, Hikari Mitsushima, Aoi Yamada, and Eita Nagayama star in the story shedding a new light on the Gucci Bamboo 1947 and Gucci Diana Beloved lines.

House

Hoping to find a sense of connection to her late mother, Gorgeous takes a trip to the countryside to visit her aunt at their ancestral house. She invites her six friends, Prof, Melody, Mac, Fantasy, Kung Fu, and Sweet, to join her. The girls soon discover that there is more to the old house than meets the eye.

REW

A man is trapped in a loop somewhere between life and death. Based on Bardo, a Buddhist term for an intermediate state between death and rebirth. This film combines elements of art house, avant-garde, surrealism, and experimental horror.

SILIKA

It follows the filmmaking journey of two filmmakers as they navigate through the urban sprawl of inner KL during the pandemic. It showcases the city in a raw, exposed and gritty fashion but still with a certain charm. Throughout their filmmaking process, they capture the peculiar events in the life of three strangers: the son (Fakhrul Aiman), the outsider (Eli Orkid) and the hustler (Nidusmas). They happen to express themselves in extreme ways at the sight of their own reflection in “the vantablack” -- they snap into a state of mind where they lose all their inhibitions and show their true self in a very physical way: through visceral, almost primal dance movements.

The Shining: Forwards and Backwards

An experimental film comprised of Stanley Kubrick's THE SHINING played forwards and backwards at the same time on the same screen, creating bizarre juxtapositions and startling synchronicities

60 Seconds of Solitude in Year Zero

An anthology of one-minute films created by 51 international filmmakers on the theme of the death of cinema. Intended as an ode to 35mm, the film was screened one time only on a purpose-built 20x12 meter public cinema screen in the Port of Tallinn, Estonia, on 22 December 2011. A special projector was constructed for the event which allowed the actual filmstrip to be burnt at the same time as the film was shown.

Codex

A man on his way to an interview stumbles upon a surreal VOID, ANCIENT TEXTS, and ENIGMATIC FORCES.

Building No. 7

A short by Steven Soderbergh described as “intense sci-fi homage to Godard.”

Red Rocks

A small collection of red rocks from the beach cycle through the primary colours before ultimately losing both their colour and form, abstracted through digital degradation. An experimental short film exploring newfound issues in preservation in the digital age and how this ties to our own memory, fading as the years go by.

The Window

A drifter spends the night in an abandoned house and encounters a Window of Consciousness. This award-winning film combines elements of art house, avant-garde, surrealism, and experimental horror.

Black Mask

A father must face his dark past when his gifted daughter has visions of a young girl reborn from her deceased mother. This award-winning metaphysical thriller combines elements of art house, avant-garde, surrealism, and experimental horror.

Seconds

A depiction of the varying passage of time.

Cremaster 2

CREMASTER 2 is rendered as a gothic Western that introduces conflict into the system. On the biological level it corresponds to the phase of fetal development during which sexual division begins. In Matthew Barney's abstraction of this process, the system resists partition and tries to remain in the state of equilibrium imagined in Cremaster 1.

A Caverna

A bunch of spectators trapped in a cinema theatre.

Exit

Events take a sinister turn one night in London, when two very different couples arrive at a double-booked apartment. Actions have consequences and not all debts are paid for with money. Leaving, it's harder than you think.

Chimera

Lost in the woods, a panicked Griff desperately tries to find his way home, but as he moves deeper into the depths of the woods he faces more nauseating uncertainties. Bewildered and disoriented, he must leave the woods.

ART MADE ME DISAPPEAR

A young artist is caught in a physical and mental battle against a supernatural entity that forces him to free it from its dark prison, ¿or is it just his imagination?

Black Kettle

A student moves into their accomodation, only to find their room already decorated, a strange, inhuman flatmate, and a kettle that won't stop boiling.

Vinyl

Andy Warhol’s screen adaptation of Burgess's "A Clockwork Orange”.

Into The Alternate

Taking place in the fifth reality to be discovered by humanity, Into The Alternate follows an inhabitant and foreign visitor as they struggle to survive within a collapsing ecosystem.

The Act of Seeing with One's Own Eyes

1982. 15'50". A French black and white experimental film. Bloody, violent, and disturbing. Full production credits unconfirmed.

Baby Invasion

In a first person shooter game leaked to the dark web, a group of mercenaries disguised with baby faces invade mansions of the wealthy and powerful with murderous intent. However, as gamers livestream the game, the protagonists’ gang of horrific murders may or may not be happening in real life.

Clarity

"If I can't abandon you, then how can I save you?"