Alexander Pope: Rediscovering a Genius (2021)

The Postman

Simple Italian postman learns to love poetry while delivering mail to a famous poet; he uses this to woo local beauty Beatrice.

The Night of the Iguana

A defrocked Episcopal clergyman leads a bus-load of middle-aged Baptist women on a tour of the Mexican coast and comes to terms with the failure haunting his life.

The Poet and the Boy

Trapped in routine, a Jeju poet finds himself drawn to a boy—and to emotions he’s never dared name.

The Degenerates

A series of bawdy and satirical episodes written during the reign of the emperor Nero and set in imperial Rome. Like the more famous version made by Federico Fellini, an adaptation of Petronius' Satyricon.

Nobel Son

Soon after his insufferably arrogant father wins the Nobel Prize for chemistry, Barkley Michaelson is kidnapped by Thaddeus James, a young genius who claims to be Barkley's illegitimate half-brother. Motivated not so much by money as revenge, Thaddeus tries to convince Barkley to help him carry out a multimillion-dollar extortion plot against their patriarch.

Play Like an 8 Year Old

Youth footballers and professional players are asked the same set of interview questions in this documentary that explores mental health, the academy system and childhood ambition in the world of football.

Leopardi

In 19th-century Italy, Giacomo Leopardi channels his debilitating illness and isolation into poetry.

The Edge of Love

When the Welsh poet Dylan Thomas and his flirtatious wife Caitlin sweep into war-torn London, the last thing they expect is to bump into Dylan's childhood sweetheart Vera. Despite her joy at seeing Dylan after so many years, Vera is swept off her feet by a dashing officer, William Killick, and finds herself torn between the open adoration of her new found beau and the wily charms of the exotic Welshman.

Hello My Dear

The documentary is titled after Arkadaş Z. Özger’s poem “Hello My Dear” which had caused much controversy in the period it was first published. Considered to be in defiance of heteronormativity, the said poem includes references to the poet’s personality, his family, his relationship to the society, and his “unexpected” death, which came three years after its publication. Today, 50 years after it was written, the documentary follows these same lines in the poem utilising cinematic elements. The documentary also rediscovers the poetics; reaches out to the family, the comrades, the friendships, departing from the official historical accounts, cognizant of his experience of otherness, in pursuit of the “lost” portrait of Arkadaş Z. Özger.

The Bad Poet

1936. Giovanni Comini, the youngest Federal in Fascist Italy, is summoned to Rome for a delicate mission: to surveil aging national poet Gabriele D'Annunzio, whose increasingly restless behavior Mussolini fears could damage his alliance with Nazi Germany. However, after spending time with D'Annunzio, Comini finds himself torn between loyalty to the Party and his fascination with the poet, who will put his burgeoning career at risk.

Cyrano de Bergerac

Famed swordsman and poet Cyrano de Bergerac is in love with his cousin Roxane. He has never expressed his love for her as he his large nose undermines his self-confidence. Then he finds a way to express his love to her, indirectly.

Le Divorce

While visiting her sister in Paris, a young woman finds romance and learns her brother-in-law is a philanderer.

Set Fire to the Stars

An aspiring poet in 1950s New York has his ordered world shaken when he embarks on a week-long retreat to save his hell raising hero, Dylan Thomas.

The Young Schiller

The young Friedrich Schiller begins his life as a poet with a dramatic escape. After the sensational success of his first drama "The Robbers", he deserts from the Duke's army. At the Mannheim Court and National Theatre, he initially receives a friendly reception, but his new play "Fiesko" is not well received by the artistic director Dalberg. In the successful actor and author August Wilhelm Iffland, Schiller finds a strong competitor for the position of in-house playwright and vies with him for the love of the same woman. The young poet's situation becomes increasingly precarious; he has no money, suffers from hunger and falls seriously ill. Nevertheless, he works feverishly for recognition and success with no regard for his own health.

My Left Foot: The Story of Christy Brown

No one expects much from Christy Brown, a boy with cerebral palsy born into a working-class Irish family. Though Christy is a spastic quadriplegic and essentially paralyzed, a miraculous event occurs when, at the age of 5, he demonstrates control of his left foot by using chalk to scrawl a word on the floor. With the help of his steely mother — and no shortage of grit and determination — Christy overcomes his infirmity to become a painter, poet and author.

Moulin Rouge!

A celebration of love and creative inspiration takes place in the infamous, gaudy and glamorous Parisian nightclub, at the cusp of the 20th century. A young poet, who is plunged into the heady world of Moulin Rouge, begins a passionate affair with the club's most notorious and beautiful star.

Nin E Tepueian: My Cry

NIN E TEPUEIAN - MY CRY is a documentary tracks the journey of Innu poet, actress and activist, Natasha Kanapé Fontaine, at a pivotal time in her career as a committed artist. Santiago Bertolino's camera follows a young Innu poet over the course of a year. A voice rises, inspiration builds; another star finds its place amongst the constellation of contemporary Indigenous literature. A voice of prominent magnitude illuminates the road towards healing and renewal: Natasha Kanapé Fontaine.

Man on the Train

A man, Milan steps off a train, into a small French village. As he waits for the day when he will rob the town bank, he runs into an old retired poetry teacher named M. Manesquier. The two men strike up a strange friendship and explore the road not taken, each wanting to live the other's life.

Poet and Muse

Semi-fictitious biopic of Finnish poet Eino Leino, made with a large budget to celebrate the 100th anniversary of his birth. The film concentrates on his relationships with first wife Freya Schoultz and later muse, poetess L. Onerva. His friends include equally central figures of the Finnish cultural scene in the early 1900s, such as painters Halonen and Gallén-Kallela, and composer Sibelius.

Jean Sénac, The Blacksmith of the Sun

By ending the life of Jean Senac on August 30, 1973 in Algiers, his assassins believed they would silence him forever. They were wrong since his voice is a little louder every day. Witnesses to these craze: the publication of the complete works of this great poet, the countless conferences and radio broadcasts devoted to him and finally the production of films such as "Jean Sénac, the blacksmith of the sun". The moving and overwhelming testimonies of those who knew him, the unpublished film archives, the generous voice of the poet on the radio, the discovery of his travels in the territories of poetry and politics make this film a precious document on the life of Jean Senac.

Little Ashes

About the young life and loves of artist Salvador Dalí, filmmaker Luis Buñuel and writer Federico García Lorca.

Hoffmanns Erzählungen

Live performance, Bayerische Staatsoper, 2011. The Tales of Hoffmann (French: LES CONTES D'HOFFMANN) is an opéra fantastique by Jacques Offenbach that combines three short stories by E.T.A. Hoffmann into a haunting whole: a melancholy poet reflects on three women he loved and lost in the past: a mechanical performing doll, a Venetian courtesan, and the consumptive daughter of a celebrated composer. One of the questions this opera poses for any director is how to link the 'tales' of Hoffmann's three lost loves together and knit them satisfactorily into the Prologue and Epilogue. In this production, Richard Jones solves the puzzle by turning it into an autobiographical journey which ends with a grand meet-up of all the characters Hoffmann has encountered: for once, Hoffmann is not presented as a rollicking kind of drunken story-spinner, but rather a sad-eyed, sobered-up depressive, who reaches for the bottle only because his disastrous love life has gone wrong yet again.

Total Eclipse

Young, wild poet Arthur Rimbaud and his mentor Paul Verlaine engage in a fierce, forbidden romance while feeling the effects of a hellish artistic lifestyle.

Sylvia

Story of the relationship between the poets Ted Hughes and Sylvia Plath.

Songs from the Second Floor

A monumental traffic jam serves as the backdrop for the lives of the inhabitants of a Swedish city.

The Eyes of Dante

He is considered the greatest European poet of the Middle Ages and his work unfolds the whole panopticon of occidental education – theology, philosophy, sciences, politics and literature. But who has really read it, the “Divine Comedy”? Who knows more of its creator Dante Alighieri than that he had an eagle-like profile and was in love with a woman named Beatrice? 700 years after Dante’s death, the filmmaker Adolfo Conti travels through Italy with Dante’s words in mind and eyes to see the world as Dante did. As the film encounters the beauty of arts and the Tuscan landscape, the forces of nature, a dramatic life story is unfolded.

Reuben, Reuben

A drunken Scottish poet who has not written a word in years feels compelled to regain control of his life and work after meeting a beautiful young woman.

Being in a Place: A Portrait of Margaret Tait

Drawing on a wealth of unseen archival material and unpublished notebooks, the film weaves a complex and personal portrait of Margaret’s life, from the perspective of a fellow artist sensitive to the potential Margaret envisaged for film as a poetic medium.

Bright Star

In 1818, high-spirited young Fanny Brawne finds herself increasingly intrigued by the handsome but aloof poet John Keats, who lives next door to her family friends the Dilkes. After reading a book of his poetry, she finds herself even more drawn to the taciturn Keats. Although he agrees to teach her about poetry, Keats cannot act on his reciprocated feelings for Fanny, since as a struggling poet he has no money to support a wife.

Lost Illusions

Lucien de Rubempré, a young, lower-class poet, leaves his family's printing house for Paris. Soon, he learns the dark side of the arts business as he tries to stay true to his dreams.