Long Story Short (2008)

Empire of the Sun

Jamie Graham, a privileged English boy, is living in Shanghai when the Japanese invade and force all foreigners into prison camps. Jamie is captured with an American sailor, who looks out for him while they are in the camp together. Even though he is separated from his parents and in a hostile environment, Jamie maintains his dignity and youthful spirit, providing a beacon of hope for the others held captive with him.

Polaris

Work. Eat. Sleep. And back to work. For a long time skippers in the North East of Scotland could not find locals to work on their fishing vessels. That was until Filipino fishermen started coming to town for work. Both nationalities strive to shorten the distance between two very different worlds.

The Golden Era

The story of writer Xiao Hong comes alive through memories of her great love affair, literary influence and escape from China during World War II.

Gangs of New York

In early 1860s New York, Irish immigrant Amsterdam Vallon is released from prison and returns to the Five Points, seeking revenge against his father's killer, William Cutting, a powerful anti-immigrant gang leader. He knows that revenge can only be attained by infiltrating Cutting's inner circle. Vallon's journey becomes a fight for personal survival and to find a place for the Irish people.

Latvian Coyote

An absurd game of “finding happiness” is being played by local Latvian coyotes* and illegal immigrants on the Russian and the European Union border. It is a game with no winner – all participants are driven to play by the sense of despair. While one side leaves home and undertakes a perilous journey to the other side of the globe, hoping to spend the rest of their lives in a free country, the other side risks their freedom to earn a chance to stay right where they are, in their homeland. *coyote – someone who smuggles illegal immigrants

Under Capricorn

A British ex-convict in colonial Australia and his fragile wife, haunted by the past crime that binds them, struggle to rebuild their lives when a young newcomer stirs long-buried passions and secrets.

The Human Condition III: A Soldier's Prayer

After the Japanese defeat to the Russians, Kaji leads the last remaining men through Manchuria. Intent on returning to his dear wife and his old life, Kaji faces great odds in a variety of different harrowing circumstances as he and his fellow men sneak behind enemy lines.

The Betrayal (Nerakhoon)

Co-directed by acclaimed cinematographer Ellen Kuras and subject Thavisouk Phrasavath, this haunting documentary chronicles a refugee family’s epic journey from Laos in the aftermath of the secret war waged by the United States there to New York, where they find themselves fighting a different kind of war on the streets of Brooklyn. Filmed over the course of 23 years, THE BETRAYAL is a visually and emotionally stunning look at the complex ways in which the political shapes the personal.

Spellbound

This documentary follows 8 teens and pre-teens as they work their way toward the finals of the Scripps Howard national spelling bee championship in Washington D.C.

God Grew Tired of Us

Filmmaker Christopher Quinn observes the ordeal of three Sudanese refugees -- Jon Bul Dau, Daniel Abul Pach and Panther Bior -- as they try to come to terms with the horrors they experienced in their homeland, while adjusting to their new lives in the United States.

Bethune: The Making of a Hero

True story of Norman Bethune, a medical doctor who fought for justice in China during Mao's rise to power.

The Jade Pendant

Fleeing an arranged marriage in China, the independent Peony signs a contract to work as a “flower girl” in America, where she meets Tom, an American Born Chinese cook whose father works on the Transcontinental Railroad. Thwarted by a Hong Kong Triad boss seeking to extend his power into America, theirs is the tale of the first great Chinese immigration to the United States – a story of romance, bigotry, passion, food and a search for everlasting love – set against the largest mass lynching in American history, in Los Angeles’ Chinatown, in 1871.

Displaced Perssons

Per Persson left Sweden 40 years ago. In Pakistan he fell in love and became the father of two daughters. Trouble starts when the girls grow up and the family decides to emigrate to Sweden. When they end up living in a caravan outside Hässleholm, all their expectations are dashed.

Saffron Kingdom

After her husband is abducted in Kashmir, a traumatised woman flees to the United States with her young son to rebuild their lives.

The Human Condition I: No Greater Love

After handing in a report on the treatment of Chinese colonial labor, Kaji is offered the post of labor chief at a large mining operation in Manchuria, which also grants him exemption from military service. He accepts, and moves to Manchuria with his newly-wed wife Michiko, but when he tries to put his ideas of more humane treatment into practice, he finds himself at odds with scheming officials, cruel foremen, and the military police.

Sacco & Vanzetti

Boston, 1920. Italian immigrants Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti are charged and unfairly tried for murder on the basis of their anarchist political beliefs.

America America

A young Anatolian Greek, entrusted with his family's fortune, loses it en route to Istanbul and dreams of going to America.

The Passion of Ayn Rand

Author Ayn Rand becomes involved with a much younger and married man, to the dismay of those close to her.

Questa notte è ancora nostra

When a producer refuses to cut Massimo and his band a record unless they hire an "ethnic" singer to spice up the act, he tries to seduce Jing, a Chinese girl with a beautiful voice disinterested in both him and rock, to get her on board. She pretends to cave in in order to escape an arranged marriage, but in the weeks preceding the concert the two begin to grow closer, complicating the secretly fake nature of their relationship.

Madeleine

Every week, two friends born 67 years apart share their life stories in a senior home's living room. The younger friend convinces the 107-year-old lady to join her in an adventure: a road trip to the sea.

Detained

A documentary from within the Swedish Migration Board's locked repository where people are in custody awaiting forced deportation. Prisoner and guard are in close proximity around the clock. Converses during sleepless nights and playing football during hot summer days. We follow Sophie, 29, who loves her job at the repository, Sami, 20, the young rebel who is locked up but free inside, and Aina, 47, who were separated from her children and kept locked up while the police are stepping up efforts to enforce their expulsion order.

American Factory

In post-industrial Ohio, a Chinese billionaire opens a new factory in the husk of an abandoned General Motors plant, hiring two thousand blue-collar Americans. Early days of hope and optimism give way to setbacks as high-tech China clashes with working-class America.

Hamilton

Presenting the tale of American founding father Alexander Hamilton, this filmed version of the original Broadway smash hit is the story of America then, told by America now.

Petit-Frère

A dialogue between the collective and the personal, a living memory that combines the dreams and realities of the Haitian community residing in Chile. This dialogue is guided by the voice of Wilner Petit-Frère, a Haitian immigrant who observes and captures, in a print publication, the society where he ended up living in this stage of his life.

Nationality: Immigrant

A Mauritanian worker, Sidi, works in France. Like most immigrant workers, he is employed to do the most difficult and dangerous jobs. Sidi and his comrades are exploited systematically and permanently, as much by their employers as by their own countrymen who are constantly able to offer false working papers, slums where immigrants buy at high cost their right to sleep. But faced with racism and economic exploitation, immigrant workers communicate, organise...

… And the Pursuit of Happiness

In 1986, Louis Malle examines the immigrant experience in America by interviewing newcomers from various professions nationwide, highlighting their struggles in a multicultural society.

Paddy O'Day

A wealthy, eccentric collector of stuffed birds and a beautiful Russian singer provide refuge to an orphaned Irish child who has arrived illegally in New York.

Nai Nai

Nai Nai follows the story of a Chinese immigrant grandmother, Chu-Ming Wu. Known as “Nai Nai,” Chu-Ming has always been a woman of control. But her grasp of reality and the control of her own mind is slipping away. Told through the lens of her grandson, the film focuses on the joyful, heartbreaking and intimate moments in the last chapters of her life.

Cabrini

Italian immigrant Francesca Cabrini arrives in 1889 New York City and is greeted by disease, crime, and impoverished children. Cabrini sets off on a daring mission to convince the hostile mayor to secure housing and healthcare for society's most vulnerable. With broken English and poor health, Cabrini uses her entrepreneurial mind to build an empire of hope unlike anything the world had ever seen.

Lost, Lost, Lost

Drawn from footage shot between 1949 and 1963, Jonas Mekas’s autobiographical diary film chronicles his early years in exile, capturing the struggle to build a new life in New York and his gradual discovery of a vibrant artistic community.

Nowhere Home

In 2009 the Norwegian government introduced several measures to restrict immigration. One of the measures was to provide unaccompanied asylum seeking children temporary residence permits. They should be returned to their country of origin when they turn 18. In Norway child welfare custody of their children without close caregivers. This does not apply to unaccompanied asylum-seeking children between 15 and 18 years.

Nidhal

Between reality and animation, the story of Nidhal is told, a young homosexual Tunisian who defended individual freedoms in Tunisia through his work in radio. He found himself under a lot of pressure which forced him to leave the country and seek asylum in the Netherlands.

Fearlessli

After her gender identity was denied in her homeland, Lee Li, a transgender asylum seeker, was forced to leave her country, family, and language to embark on a journey toward belonging, freedom, and self-empowerment.

The Brutalist

When an innovative modern architect flees post-war Europe, he is given the opportunity to rebuild his legacy. Set during the dawn of the modern United States (in Pennsylvania), his wife joins him, and their lives are forever changed by a demanding, wealthy patron.

Purple Bells

30 years after their emigration, Danni interviews his family and tries to learn their story to reconcile with the past.