Absence of Mind (2024)

Patch Adams

The true story of Dr. Hunter "Patch" Adams, who in the 1970s found that humor is the best medicine, and was willing to do just anything to make his patients laugh—even if it meant risking his own career.

Lawrence & Holloman

Lawrence is an optimistic suit salesman for whom everything always goes right-until he takes the suicidal credit collector Holloman under his wing, and everything starts to go wrong. Very wrong.

Tribe: The Untold Story of the Making of Vice Cops

Two brave young men set out to create the greatest film drama of all time. What comes next turns out to be much bigger than they ever expected.

Semicolon

Timo is gay. Because a boy in his class came out publicly, he gathers the courage to tell his friends but they don’t react the way he had hoped for. On top of that, his homophobic parents also find out. As he then also starts receiving anonymous threats, he doesn’t see any way out of this mess.

Sidekicks

An otherwise rejected or ignored boy creates a fantasy pal from his martial arts movie hero.

Patients

After a serious sport accident in a swimming pool, Ben, now an incomplete quadriplegic, arrives in a rehabilitation center. He meets with other handicapped persons (tetraplegics, paraplegics, traumatized crania), all victims of accidents, as well as a handicapped since his early childhood. They go through impotence, despair and resignation, with their daily struggle to learn how to move a finger or to hold a fork. Some of them slowly find a little mobility while others receive the verdict of the handicap for life. Despite everything, hope and friendship help them endure their difficulties.

The Curse of the Cat People

Amy, the young, friendless daughter of Oliver and Alice Reed, befriends her father's late first wife and an aging, reclusive actress.

Wilby Wonderful

A day-in-the-life dark comedy concerning a group of islanders, their respective secrets, and one man's plan to kill himself quietly.

Wer kann etwas verändern?

Short film tackling depression and it‘s causes in teenagers and young adults.

The Secret Life of Walter Mitty

Walter Mitty, a daydreaming writer with an overprotective mother, likes to imagine that he is a hero who experiences fantastic adventures. His dream becomes reality when he accidentally meets a mysterious woman who hands him a little black book. According to her, it contains the locations of the Dutch crown jewels hidden since World War II. Soon, Mitty finds himself in the middle of a confusing conspiracy, where he has difficulty differentiating between fact and fiction.

The Dreamlife of David L

“The Dreamlife of David L.“ is a fictional feature film that takes inspiration from a key point in the life of director David Lynch: the time he spent as a student in a fine arts college. Initially attracted to painting, David Lynch ends up choosing the medium of film to express his talent. Far from being an attempt at biography, this film is an imaginary vision where the action could take place today. Which encounters or events leave their mark on the young David L. during this year as a student? “The Dreamlife of David L.” is a dreamlike journey that leads the viewer through the meanderings of this art school. There’s no need to be familiar with the cinematographic works of Lynch to follow the young David L. step by step, going behind the scenes with him.

Bliss

A mind-bending love story following Greg who, after recently being divorced and then fired, meets the mysterious Isabel, a woman living on the streets and convinced that the polluted, broken world around them is just a computer simulation. Doubtful at first, Greg eventually discovers there may be some truth to Isabel’s wild conspiracy.

Diary of a Lost Girl

Thymian Henning, an innocent young girl, is raped by the clerk of her father's pharmacy. She becomes pregnant, is rejected by her family, and must fend for herself in a harsh, cruel world.

Make Up

After Ruth moves in with her boyfriend in a remote holiday park, tensions rise as she makes an unsettling discovery that lures her into a spiral of obsession.

The Hedgehog

Paloma is a serious and highly articulate but deeply bored 11-year-old who has decided to kill herself on her 12th birthday. Fascinated by art and philosophy, she questions and documents her life and immediate circle, drawing trenchant and often hilarious observations on the world around her. But as her appointment with death approaches, Paloma finally meets some kindred spirits in her building's grumpy janitor and an enigmatic, elegant neighbor, both of whom inspire Paloma to question her rather pessimistic outlook on life.

Dancer in the Dark

Selma, a Czech immigrant on the verge of blindness, struggles to make ends meet for herself and her son, who has inherited the same genetic disorder and will suffer the same fate without an expensive operation. When life gets too difficult, Selma learns to cope through her love of musicals, escaping life's troubles - even if just for a moment - by dreaming up little numbers to the rhythmic beats of her surroundings.

I feel fine.

Ozzy Taylor, a charismatic high school teen, discovers he can't control his intrusive thoughts of suicide, setting off a life-changing shift in his destiny.

Wild Tigers I Have Known

A lyrical telling of the coming of age of a 14-year-old boy who learns to cope with his new found sexuality and his unrequited love for the cool kid in school.

Rêver sa Vie

Plot unavailable

How to Save a Dead Friend

Marusya is 16 and, like many Russian teenagers, is determined to end her life. Then she meets her soulmate in another millennial, Kimi. They spend a decade filming the euphoria and anxiety, the happiness and misery of their youth, muzzled by a violent and autocratic regime in the midst of a “depressed Russia”. This film is a cry from the heart, a tribute to an entire silenced generation.

The Grandfather

After his son dies, an elderly man comes back to Spain from the US and hopes to find out which of his granddaughters is true, and which one is bastard.

Body

A busy attorney, worried that his anorexic daughter Olga, who is still grieving her recently deceased mother, might try to harm herself, sends her to see a psychiatrist who's dealing with her own loss in an unusual way.

Glenn & Gloria

Glenn and Gloria are a couple who seek escapism via their daydreams.

Innocent Killers

Garralda is a troubled college student who only has to pass one last subject to obtain his academic degree. When his teacher catches him copying on a test, he requires him to perform a very unethical task in exchange for passing and thus achieving his goal.

Trevor

Upon hitting puberty, a high school boy realizes that he is homosexual and faces prejudice from his homophobic parents and friends.

The Dream of a Ridiculous Man

An animated short film based on the 1877 short story written by Fyodor Dostoyevsky. It chronicles the experiences of a man who decides that there is nothing to live for in the world, and is therefore determined to commit suicide. A chance encounter with a young girl changes his mind.

The Human Voice

A woman watches time passing next to the suitcases of her ex-lover (who is supposed to come pick them up but never arrives) and a restless dog who doesn't understand that his master has abandoned him.

The Secret Life of Walter Mitty

A timid magazine photo manager who lives life vicariously through daydreams embarks on a true-life adventure when a negative goes missing.

Kékhalál

Plot unavailable

A Long Way Down

Four lost souls—a disgraced TV presenter, a foul-mouthed teen, an isolated single mother, and a solipsistic muso—decide to end their lives on the same night, New Year's Eve. When this disillusioned quartet of strangers meet unintentionally at the same suicide hotspot, a London high-rise with the well-earned nickname Topper's Tower, they mutually agree to call off their plans for six weeks, forming an unconventional, dysfunctional family. They become media sensations as the Topper House Four and search together for the reasons to keep on living.

Faz Todo Sentido Chover

Plot unavailable

Summer Survivors

A psychology postgraduate student escorts two patients and their nurse to a seaside psychiatric clinic. Along their journey, they break through each other's barriers, delve into the sources of their various traumas, and discover the lasting imprints left on their fragile souls.

On the Bus

Teenage years, the best and worst years of our lives. Jeremy is an ordinary teenager, living an ordinary teenage life. Because of his shyness, he fantasizes conversations with his crush, Sean. But what happens when he loses control of something completely in his mind?

Two Pictures

Two strangers - Ruth, a burn unit nurse and Conrad, a shipyard worker - cross paths over a strange weekend in Seattle.

The Ringing Bell

Judah is a young man with a condition - he dreams while he's still awake. His imagination makes it difficult for him to process the loss of an important person in his life, so when his cousin contacts him with a ridiculous scheme to get at the riches of their eccentric Uncle Airmid who has disappeared, Judah agrees to go along with it.

Sometimes I Think About Dying

Fran likes to think about dying. It brings sensation to her quiet life. When she makes the new guy at work laugh, it leads to more: a date, a slice of pie, a conversation, a spark. The only thing standing in their way is Fran herself.

Daydream Obsession

Clayton has a problem with his roommate Brian... he's secretly in love with him! Blinded by passion, he can't tell the difference between his daydream fantasies and reality. Can he control his desire or will he cross the line?

The Girl from the Wardrobe

This is the story of three characters (brothers Tomek and Jacek and their neighbor Magda), each of them is in their own way lonely and alienated. The title character makes herself secluded. Tomek's alienation results from his neurological disease, and Jacek contacts the world mainly via the Internet. This is also a film about love. Love of one brother to the other and of one alienated human being to the other. All together it creates a very universal picture with a Polish entourage.

Americana

A group of online friends meet in person for the first time and discover their host is an enigmatic entity who molds a private world just for them. Through surrealistic individual battles with regret, trauma, failure, and mental disorder, each must decide if laboring through life is a worthwhile effort.

Le clown est triste

This documentary attempts to understand why so many comedians experience mental health issues, a condition that stands in stark contrast to their profession. Anxiety, depression, suicidal thoughts: these are the heavy subjects they dare to tackle on stage. Cathy Gauthier, Coco Belliveau, Jean-François Mercier, Mario Jean, Maude Landry, Preach and Simon Gouache testify.

MY TRUTH

Plot unavailable

A Legacy of Whining

Former high school classmates reunite and rehash old rivalries.

All Monsters Attack

Ichiro Miki is a child living in the industrial district of Kawasaki, where his parents' constant struggle to make ends meet often leaves the schoolboy alone. Constantly teased by a bully nicknamed Gabara, his only friends are toy consultant Shinpei and fellow classmate Sachiko. Ichiro turns to escapist dreams of Monster Island where he befriends the equally bullied Minilla.

A Better Place

Jeremy Rollins, a shy and underdeveloped young man with an uncanny condition, learns how to cope with life in a small corrupt town.