A Tale of Old Cities (2024)

Ten Wells

In the 1980s, Kim Hyunsook was an integral part of a collective of young women activists who focused their efforts on fighting urban poverty in some of Incheon's most disadvantaged neighborhoods. These women not only lived in these communities but also worked alongside the urban underprivileged. She introduced me to some of her former colleagues from that era. Thus, I began this film journey by visiting Ahn Soonae, a close confidante and associate of Kim's, whom Kim affectionately described as ‘a foul-mouthed woman with a huge ass.’ Soon after, I had the privilege of meeting other members of the collective, now elderly women in their 60s.

string pieces

A young student lives in a mini-apartment in Incheon, in the North-West of South Korea. Wandering around the neighbourhood, she immerses herself in her family’s past, piecing together forgotten fragments of history. Using drawings and clay animation, visual artist Vatae Kimlee creates a flowing visual collage, a captivating animated graphic novel that brings back to life memories erased by the country’s accelerated transformation.

Silmido

On 31 January 1968, 31 North Korean commandos infiltrated South Korea in a failed mission to assassinate President Park Chung-hee. In revenge, the South Korean military assembled a team of 31 criminals on the island of Silmido to kill Kim Il-sung for a suicide mission to redeem their honor, but was cancelled, leaving them frustrated. It is loosely based on a military uprising in the 1970s.

Failan

After losing both her parents, Failan emmigrates to Korea to seek her only remaining relatives. Once she reaches Korea, she finds out that her relatives have moved to Canada well over a year ago. Desperate to stay and make a living in Korea, Failan is forced to have an arranged marriage through a match-making agency.

Take Care of My Cat

When one girl from five close school friends moves to Seoul after school is over, the other four try and deal with the loss of her moving and them drifting apart.

Green Night

Two lone female fighters who have learned to rely on no one but themselves venture into Seoul's underworld. In search of the big hit that could mean liberation from their useless husbands, these disparate women grow closer.

Super Nova

Kidong is an exploration crew member of ASA (not NASA), aka Asia Space Administration. He leaves ASA to raise his daughter, Kyujin, after his wife and colleague, Sunho, dies during childbirth. One day, he has a mysterious experience meeting Sunho from a different dimension and decides to go back to space to search for her. He boards the secret spacecraft, Super Nova, based on the blueprints left behind by Sunho.

Coin Locker Girl

A child abandoned in a subway coin locker is sold to a ruthless and calculating loan shark and gangster boss dubbed Mother, who runs an organ-harvesting ring in Incheon’s Chinatown. Named Il-Young, the baby girl grows into Mother’s loyal right-hand enforcer and is groomed to be her eventual successor. But when Il-Young’s loyalty to Mother wavers, the clash between the two unleashes a merciless tidal wave of blood-soaked retribution and strife.

Like a Virgin

A chubby high school student participatee in a sports competition to win a cash prize for sex change surgery.

The Roundup: No Way Out

Detective Ma Seok-do changes his affiliation from the Geumcheon Police Station to the Metropolitan Investigation Team, in order to eradicate Japanese gangsters who enter Korea to commit heinous crimes.

Deliver Us from Evil

A retired contract killer goes on a bloody rampage when a young girl finds herself at the mercy of gangland human traffickers and only one man can come to her rescue, with an arsenal of weapons and years of experience in the art of killing.

Abenko Green Beret

Abengo Corps is under the direct control of headquarters of Gen. Douglas MacArthur. In order to conceal the Inchon Landing Operation, Abengo is assigned to the Wonsan Landing Operation as a decoy mission. With the operation soon at hand, the members of this operation go on a special vacation to Busan. Among them is Il-gyu. He meets with Bae Su-na, a refugee, and they spend a passionate, touching night of love together. The members perform their duties as ordered. Lieutenant Colonel Koh receives a coded message from the headquarters. Koh realizes that his men are a diversion for the Inchon Landing Operation. Lieutenant Koh is angered and resentful. And Lieutenant Sung is chosen to enter the battle instead of Lieutenant Colonel Koh. During the January 4 Retreat, Lieutenant Sung meets Su-na, who has had Il-gyu's son. Lieutenant Sung helps her out.

Inchon

Gen. Douglas MacArthur leads a Korean War campaign, and the war tests a married couple's relationship.

Pawn

A debt collector who looks intimidating, but actually has a warm heart, ends up becoming the guardian of a child, who has been left behind as collateral by her illegal immigrant mother.

Operation Chromite

A squad of soldiers fight in the Korean War's crucial Battle of Incheon.

Not Out

Gwang-ho, a prospect on his high school baseball team, is not drafted by a professional baseball team. His desire to continue playing baseball strains his relationship with his team members. Gwang-ho eventually begins selling fake gasoline with his friend Min-cheol.

Lessons in Dissent

A vivid portrait of a generation of Hong Kongers committed to creating a new more democratic Hong Kong. Schoolboy Joshua Wong dedicates himself to stopping the introduction of National Education. Whilst former classmate Ma Jai fights against political oppression on the streets and in the courts. Catapulting the viewer on to the streets of Hong Kong and into the heart of the action. The viewer is confronted with Hong Kong's oppressive heat, stifling humidity and air thick with dissent. Filmed over 18 months this is a kaleidoscopic, visceral experience of their epic struggle.

Revealed: Ben Roberts-Smith Truth On Trial

Explosive documentary Ben Roberts-Smith Truth On Trial follows Nick McKenzie and Chris Masters’s quest to uncover the truth behind rumours that Australia’s most decorated living soldier, Ben Roberts-Smith, committed war crimes in Afghanistan.

The Artist’s Garden: American Impressionism

Taking its lead from French artists like Renoir and Monet, the American impressionist movement followed its own path which over a forty-year period reveals as much about America as a nation as it does about its art as a creative power-house. It’s a story closely tied to a love of gardens and a desire to preserve nature in a rapidly urbanizing nation. Travelling to studios, gardens and iconic locations throughout the United States, UK and France, this mesmerising film is a feast for the eyes. The Artist’s Garden: American Impressionism features the sell-out exhibition The Artist’s Garden: American Impressionism and the Garden Movement, 1887–1920 that began at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts and ended at the Florence Griswold Museum, Old Lyme, Connecticut.

Prison. Correct Me If You Can

A two-part documentary film about the state of Russia’s prisons today. In-depth interviews with former inmates of all stripes, including those convicted of political, economic, and violent crimes.

Sacred Ground

Some time ago they would come here to walk their dogs, play with their kids or jog. Today they are two hostile parties fighting over a patch of ground in a park. Every Sunday half of them come to pray by a wooden cross, and another half is there to defend a small spot of land, which they want to stay public. Who could have imagined such a confrontation in a country which had been fully secular, even atheistic for decades? Still, a collision between orthodox believers and local dwellers, who don’t want to have a new church instead of a park or a public garden is quite common in the Russian capital these days. “200 Churches” development project started by Russian Orthodox Church in cooperation with Moscow government provoked several severe conflicts in the city.

Waiting for a Miracle

A woman’s greatest joy is giving the gift of life to a new human being. Her deepest sorrow – the loss of a child. This very personal and touching film is not about death, it is about the beauty of life and how miraculous it is that we are alive. Waiting for a miracle was never planned to be filmed. It was dictated by the unique unusual situation, and life was the main scriptwriter. The director hopes that her work can be therapy for people in similar situations.

Always

Deep in the lush mountains of Hunan province, Youbin lives with his father and two grandparents. He is 8 years old and he is a poet. The family is poor and lives on what they can grow. But at the village school, the children are taught Chinese poetry, and Youbin discovers the magical power of language to describe one’s feelings and place in the world.

The Last Misfits by The Golden River

This film follows the human fates of a 150-year-old gold miner community living in the distant Lapland wilderness beyond telephone networks. Their peaceful life comes to an end when a new law forces them to abandon their way of living. Depicted through painting-like visual expression, this warm, bittersweet, and universal story tells about the only permanent thing there is: change.

Rikki

A centenary celebration of the life and legacy of Rikki Fulton, one of Scotland’s most beloved comic actors. Ashley Jensen narrates an affectionate tribute to one of Scotland’s funniest comedians, Rikki Fulton. It’s 100 years since Rikki first made an entrance on to the world stage and 20 years since he bowed out. For decades, he’s been making the nation laugh with his rubber face, razor sharp wit and laconic demeanour. His influence is still felt in new generations of comics, and clips of his sketches still make us laugh to this day.

Blue Rodeo: Lost Together

"Lost Together" is an engaging dive into the world of one of Canada’s most beloved bands, Blue Rodeo. With the unmistakable voices of Jim Cuddy and Greg Keelor guiding the way, this documentary blends humour, honesty, and heart to tell the story of their incredible 40-year journey. As Blue Rodeo continues to hit new creative highs, "Lost Together" takes you behind the scenes of their extraordinary adventure.

Nanook of the North

This pioneering documentary film depicts the lives of the indigenous Inuit people of Canada's northern Quebec region. Although the production contains some fictional elements, it vividly shows how its resourceful subjects survive in such a harsh climate, revealing how they construct their igloo homes and find food by hunting and fishing. The film also captures the beautiful, if unforgiving, frozen landscape of the Great White North, far removed from conventional civilization.

Olympia Part One: Festival of the Nations

Starting with a long and lyrical overture, evoking the origins of the Olympic Games in ancient Greece, Riefenstahl covers twenty-one athletic events in the first half of this two-part love letter to the human body and spirit, culminating with the marathon, where Jesse Owens became the first track and field athlete to win four gold medals in a single Olympics.

Olympia Part Two: Festival of Beauty

Part two of Leni Riefenstahl's monumental examination of the 1938 Olympic Games, the cameras leave the main stadium and venture into the many halls and fields deployed for such sports as fencing, polo, cycling, and the modern pentathlon, which was won by American Glenn Morris.

Workers Leaving the Lumière Factory

Working men and women leave through the main gate of the Lumière factory in Lyon, France. Filmed on 22 March 1895, it is often referred to as the first real motion picture ever made, although Louis Le Prince's 1888 Roundhay Garden Scene pre-dated it by seven years. Three separate versions of this film exist, which differ from one another in numerous ways. The first version features a carriage drawn by one horse, while in the second version the carriage is drawn by two horses, and there is no carriage at all in the third version. The clothing style is also different between the three versions, demonstrating the different seasons in which each was filmed. This film was made in the 35 mm format with an aspect ratio of 1.33:1, and at a speed of 16 frames per second. At that rate, the 17 meters of film length provided a duration of 46 seconds, holding a total of 800 frames.

Woman and the Glacier

The Lithuanian scientist Ausra Revutaite has spent 30 years in the Tian Shan mountain range in Central Asia, straddling the borders between Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and the autonomous Chinese region of Xinjiang. Some 3,500 meters above sea level with only her faithful dog and gray cat for company, she studies climate change on the Tuyuksu Glacier at an old Soviet-era research station. She loves the solitude and silence that her painstaking work brings her. Magnificent shots of her surroundings and everyday work are interspersed with archive footage of the people who preceded her by a century. Not much seems to have changed.

Inês

Triggered by congressman Jair Bolsonaro’s homage to the torturer Carlos Alberto Brilhante Ustra, during president Dilma Rousseff’s impeachment hearing in 2016, Inês, a 70 year-old actress, starts a fragmented narrative of her own history, transforming the memories of her youth as an artist and guerrilla fighter during the military dictatorship into performances. Using as a starting point her participation in Teatro Oficina's 1967 production of the play "King of The Candle", by Oswald de Andrade, Inês creates a manifesto in defense of art's political strength, intertwined with memories of lost love and resistance.

Eu Não Sou Napoleão!

What is it to be crazy? What does it mean to be normal? Was madness a disease or a form of expression for the human soul? A disturbing and exciting dive in one of the largest psychiatric hospitals in operation in Latin America!

Roland-Garros: Building the Legend

Filmed within the Roland-Garros stadium during the construction from 2016 until the roof completion in 2020, this exclusive documentary offers an immersive view of the process.

Dancing with the Birds

Some of the world's most majestic birds display delightfully captivating mating rituals, from flashy dancing to flaunting their colorful feathers.

When Hitchcock met O'Casey

It was a collaboration between one of Ireland’s most noted playwrights and cinema’s greatest directors, yet the 1930 release of Juno and the Paycock is often neglected in the repertoire of both men. Brian O’Flaherty’s documentary aims to find out why. Featuring extensive, incisive interviews with family members, academics, directors and actors, including Shivaun O'Casey, Prof Charles Barr, and Peter Sheridan, it tells the story of how these two iconic figures met and the legacy of the film.

It's Yours: A Film on Hip-Hop and the Internet

By the dawn of the 21st century, hip-hop sales had reached an all-time high, but one thing has remained the same. The doors were still locked, and the music industry held the keys. Young artists began to self-market on the Internet, ultimately helping to collapse the music industry as we knew it. It’s Yours explores how it became possible to become a rap star through a Twitter account, YouTube site or Myspace page. It tells this story through the unique perspectives of numerous artists, producers, record industry insiders, and music and cultural critics.

Spirits in the Forest

A look at Depeche Mode's final moments of their 2017 Global Spirit Tour, featuring intimate stories from select fans.

Keyboard Fantasies

As a sci-fi obsessed woman living in near isolation, Beverly Glenn-Copeland wrote and self-released Keyboard Fantasies in Huntsville, Ontario back in 1986. Recorded in an Atari-powered home-studio, the cassette featured seven tracks of a curious folk-electronica hybrid, a sound realized far before its time. Three decades on, the musician – now Glenn Copeland – began to receive emails from people across the world, thanking him for the music they’d recently discovered.

Ztracen 45

The story of one of the most important Czech artistic families of the 20th century, as revealed in the personal and travel diaries of Josef Čapek's wife.

Squid Jigging Fishing Boat

Every December to January, almost a hundred squid fishing boats from Ch'ien-chen Fishing Harbor in Kaohsiung will sail from East 120 to West 60 to work at Falkland Islands in the South West Atlantic. The sailing takes 35-40 days and crew members named it "waterway." January 1st, 2015, a 65 meter long, 11 meter wide fishing boat began its journey to Falkland island. This is a documentary about 60 crew members from south-east Asia to work far away from Taiwan.

With Closed Windows

A biographical film about the popular rap artist Detsl, whose real name is Kirill Tolmatskiy. The rap artist passed away at the age of 35 in 2019.