Higher Education (1988)

Brother of Sleep

In the beginning of the 19th century, Johannes Elias Alder is born in a small village in the Austrian mountains. While growing up he is considered strange by the other villagers and discovers his love of music, especially rebuilding and playing the organ at the village church. After experiencing an "acoustic wonder", his eye color changes and he can hear even the most subtle sounds.

Irreversible

A woman’s lover and her ex-boyfriend take justice into their own hands after she becomes the victim of a rapist. Because some acts can’t be undone. Because man is an animal. Because the desire for vengeance is a natural impulse. Because most crimes remain unpunished.

Heavenly Creatures

Precocious teenager Juliet moves to New Zealand with her family and soon befriends the quiet, brooding Pauline through their shared love of fantasy and literature. This friendship gradually develops into an intense and obsessive bond.

Arlington Road

Threats from sinister foreign nationals aren't the only thing to fear. Bedraggled college professor Michael Faraday has been vexed (and increasingly paranoid) since his wife's accidental death in a botched FBI operation. But all that takes a backseat when a seemingly all-American couple set up house next door.

Princesses

Caye is a young prostitute whose family is unaware of her profession. She meets her striking Dominican neighbour Zulema, an illegal immigrant, after she finds her in the bathroom, badly beaten up. They strike up a close friendship unbeknownst to Caye's xenophobic co-workers.

The Miracle Worker

The true story of the frightening, lonely world of silence and darkness of 7-year-old Helen Keller who, since infancy, has never seen the sky, heard her mother's voice or expressed her innermost feelings. Then Annie Sullivan, a 20-year-old teacher from Boston, arrives. Having just recently regained her own sight, the no-nonsense Annie reaches out to Helen through the power of touch, the only tool they have in common, and leads her bold pupil on a miraculous journey from fear and isolation to happiness and light.

Notes on a Scandal

A veteran high school teacher befriends a younger art teacher, who is having an affair with one of her 15-year-old students. However, her intentions with this new "friend" also go well beyond platonic friendship.

Gloomy Sunday

Budapest in the thirties. The restaurant owner Laszlo hires the pianist András to play in his restaurant. Both men fall in love with the beautiful waitress Ilona who inspires András to his only composition. His song of Gloomy Sunday is, at first, loved and then feared, for its melancholic melody triggers off a chain of suicides. The fragile balance of the erotic ménage à trois is sent off kilter when the German Hans goes and falls in love with Ilona as well.

The Dreamers

When Isabelle and Theo invite Matthew to stay with them, what begins as a casual friendship ripens into a sensual voyage of discovery and desire in which nothing is off limits and everything is possible.

Sex and Lucía

Various lives converge on an isolated island, all connected by an author whose novel has become inextricably entwined with his own life.

Shortbus

In post-9/11 New York City, an eclectic group of citizens find their lives entangled, personally, romantically, and sexually, at Shortbus, an underground Brooklyn salon infamous for its blend of art, music, politics, and carnality.

Cruel Intentions

Slaking a thirst for dangerous games, Kathryn challenges her stepbrother, Sebastian, to deflower their headmaster's daughter before the summer ends. If he succeeds, the prize is the chance to bed Kathryn. But if he loses, Kathryn will claim his most prized possession.

Playing by Heart

In a vibrant tapestry of love and longing, nine interconnected souls navigate romance and heartbreak in L.A., where passions collide and truths unfold, revealing that the heart's desires often lead us where we least expect.

Sliver

A woman moves into an apartment in Manhattan and learns that the previous tenant's life ended mysteriously after they fell from the balcony.

DisOrientation

After a string of incompatible dorm mates, Finn – an unapologetic, collegiate underachiever and extreme party boy – hopes that a new year is going to bring some better luck. But 15-year-old, nerdy, brainiac Toby isn't exactly who he had in mind. After an extremely rough start, the two overcome their differences and team up to exact revenge on campus jock, Landon, and his posse of goons, who think they rule the school.

9 Songs

Matt, a young glaciologist, soars across the vast, silent, icebound immensities of the South Pole as he recalls his love affair with Lisa. They meet at a mobbed rock concert in a vast music hall - London's Brixton Academy. They are in bed at night's end. Together, over a period of several months, they pursue a mutual sexual passion whose inevitable stages unfold in counterpoint to nine live-concert songs.

Dirty Dancing

Expecting the usual tedium that accompanies a summer in the Catskills with her family, 17-year-old Frances 'Baby' Houseman is surprised to find herself stepping into the shoes of a professional hoofer—and unexpectedly falling in love.

Intimates

Foon escapes an arranged marriage by walking the road of a Ji Sor. After an affair with Shing, she becomes pregnant. An attempted abortion nearly costs Foon her life. Wan, the young owner of a silk factory, rescues her. Wan and Foon share their romances, reflecting the experience of women during the 40's.

Ligaya ang Itawag Mo sa Akin

When asked for her real name, the feisty woman in a rural whorehouse would quip, "Ligaya. It means joy. And that's what I sell." Yet the small-town prostitute is not resigned that she would be in the flesh trade forever. She still harbors the dream of getting out of the job someday. She saves money and fancies that someone would come and marry her as if she were clean and never been a whore. That becomes almost a reality when a hardworking farmer enters her life. Under some problematic circumstances, her chances get blown away-but not exactly of her sole doing.

Eating Miss Campbell

A vegan-goth high school student falls in love with her new English teacher and develops a problematic taste for human flesh.

Gestatten, Vögelein im Dienst

The young Robert looking for work and room in Bavaria. Because Robert dares to take a young girl with him to his place, he loses his apartment and the job as an assistant to a bookseller.

Married Life

A very gentle middle-aged man is married, but when he falls in love with another woman, he decides that to divorce his wife would humiliate her too much – so instead he decides to kill her.

21

Ben Campbell is a young, highly intelligent student at M.I.T. who strives to succeed. Wanting a scholarship to transfer to Harvard School of Medicine to become a doctor, Ben learns that he cannot afford the $300,000 tuition as he comes from a poor, working-class background. But one evening, Ben is introduced by his unorthodox math professor to a small but secretive club of five students, Jill, Choi, Kianna, and Fisher, who are being trained by Professor Rosa to count cards at blackjack.

A Life Less Ordinary

A couple of angels, O'Reilly and Jackson, are sent to Earth to make sure that their next supervised love-connection succeeds. They follow Celine, a spoiled rich girl who has just accidentally shot a suitor and, due to a misunderstanding, is kidnapped by janitor Robert. Although Celine quickly frees herself, she stays with Robert for thrills. O'Reilly and Jackson pursue, hoping to unite the prospective lovers.

Meet the Feebles

Heidi, star of the "Meet The Feebles Variety Hour" discovers her lover Bletch the Walrus is cheating on her. And with all the world waiting for the show, the assorted co-stars must contend with drug addiction, extortion, robbery, disease, drug dealing, and murder.

Lower City

Best friends Deco and Naldinho co-own a cargo boat in Brazil's Salvador da Bahia. They give a ride to a sultry prostitute named Karinna, and soon both men fall prey to her considerable sexual charms, pushing the bounds of their friendship to the limit.

Animal House

At a 1962 College, Dean Vernon Wormer is determined to expel the entire Delta Tau Chi Fraternity, but those troublemakers have other plans for him.

Orgazmo

A devout Mormon living in L.A. becomes a pornographic actor after his martial arts moves impress a big-time director.

Erotic Tales

Three women are secretly plush prostitutes. They are successively called by a mysterious person to have sex with three different men and assuage their weird fantasies.

Humboldt County

Peter is a medical student about to graduate and begin his residency. When his professor fails him, he winds up in bed with an actress and singer named Bogart rolling through Los Angeles. He accompanies her to the redwoods of northern California, where he encounters her eccentric family of pot farmers. But when Bogart runs away without a word, Peter is thrust into the picturesque and bizarre world.

Ploy

A husband and wife are locked inside a single hotel room with a stranger named Ploy. Subtle suspicions build up to jealousy as the young woman triggers devastating consequences for the couple.

Cool World

A bizarre accident lands Frank Harris in Cool World, a realm of cartoons. Years later, cartoonist Jack Deebs, who's been drawing Cool World, crosses over as well. He sets his lustful sights on animated femme fatale Holli Would, but she's got plans of her own to become real, and it's up to Frank to stop her.

Crossroads

After eight years apart, three childhood friends - Lucy, Kit, and Mimi - rediscover their friendship on a cross-country trip. With barely a plan, practically no money but plenty of dreams, the girls catch a lift with Mimi's handsome friend Ben in his convertible. Along the way they not only gather experiences that will change their lives, but they also discover how important it is to hold onto their hearts' desires.

The Woman in the Window

A seductive woman gets an innocent professor mixed up in murder.

Battle in Heaven

Set in Mexico City, Carlos Reygadas's sexually explicit drama centers on a man in turmoil over his past actions. Chauffer Marcos feels compelled to reveal a dark secret to his boss's daughter, Ana, a wealthy woman who works as a prostitute just for the thrill of it. Marcos confesses that he and his wife committed a crime that ended in horrible tragedy. Haunted by his past, Marcos searches for redemption.

Dew

Dew is about 2 friends who developed feelings for each other. But they lived in a time when homosexuality wasn't accepted.

The Last Days of Disco

Two young women and their friends spend spare time at an exclusive nightclub in 1980s New York.

After Sex

Sex is a background to examine intimacy and vulnerability. Looks at the complexity of modern day relationships told through eight separate couples. Through dialogue and compromising situations, the film takes us from the beginning of a relationship to the aftermath of one, and examines every stage in between seeing humor within the drama, heartache and confusion of it all.

Love Object

The twisted tale of Kenneth, socially insecure technical writer who forms an obsessive relationship with "Nikki", an anatomically accurate silicone sex doll he orders over the Internet.

Siew Lup

Mia, an ex-prostitute, is trapped in a loveless marriage with the abusive Quan (Sunny Pang, who also stars in Headshot in this year’s Festival lineup), a butcher who runs a roast meat shop. When she meets sensitive funeral director Wu, their passion for one another escalates into an affair. But the path to true love is fraught with jealousy, forcing someone to make a deadly move.

The Ferpect Crime

A playboy has the tables turned on him when he finds himself being used as a plaything by an undesirable woman.

Izo

Izo is an assassin in the service of a Tosa lord and Imperial supporter. After killing dozens of the Shogun's men, Izo is captured and crucified. Instead of being extinguished, his rage propels him through the space-time continuum to present-day Tokyo. Here Izo transforms himself into a new, improved killing machine.

My Friend from Faro

Eternal daydreamer Mel can't wait to quit her sucky catering job and fly to her dream destination: Portugal. Things change when the beautiful Jenny literally crashes into her life when Mel nearly runs her over in her classic BMW. It is love at first sight, however there is just one problem: Jenny mistakenly assumes Mel to be a boy. Despite this, the pair become boyfriend and girlfriend. With Mel attempting to disguise her true gender at every turn, her journey from tomboy to out lesbian is fraught with life-defining dilemmas and sweet surprises.

The House Bunny

Shelley is living a carefree life until a rival gets her tossed out of the Playboy Mansion. With nowhere to go, fate delivers her to the sorority girls from Zeta Alpha Zeta. Unless they can sign a new pledge class, the seven socially clueless women will lose their house to the scheming girls of Phi Iota Mu. In order to accomplish their goal, they need Shelley to teach them the ways of makeup and men; at the same time, Shelley needs some of what the Zetas have - a sense of individuality. The combination leads all the girls to learn how to stop pretending and start being themselves.

Powder

Harassed by classmates who won't accept his shocking appearance, a shy young man known as "Powder" struggles to fit in. But the cruel taunts stop when Powder displays a mysterious power that allows him to do incredible things. This phenomenon changes the lives of all those around him in ways they never could have imagined.

Ridicule

To get royal backing on a needed drainage project, a poor French lord must learn to play the delicate games of wit at court at Versailles.

Teenage Caveman

In a post-apocalyptic future mankind is lives in a prehistoric manner. After killing his father for sexually assaulting his girlfriend, the son of a tribal leader runs away with a group of his teenage friends. They are taken in by Neil and Judith who introduce them to the vices outlawed by their tribes namely sex and drugs.Neil and Judith, however, are genetically altered indestructible mutants who have their own plans for the future of the human race.

Stealing Harvard

John and his girlfriend have vowed to marry once they save $30,000 for their dream house. But the minute they achieve their financial goal, John finds out his niece has been accepted at Harvard, and he's reminded of his promise to pay for her tuition (nearly $30,000). John's friend Duff convinces him to turn to petty crime to make the payment … but Duff's hare-brained schemes spin quickly out of control.

Last Exit to Brooklyn

A gallery of characters in Brooklyn in the 1950s are crushed by their surroundings and selves: a union strike leader discovers he is gay; a prostitute falls in love with one of her clients; a family cannot cope with the fact that their daughter is illegitimately pregnant.

Another Gay Movie

In the dirtiest, funniest, most scandalous gay-teen-sex-comedy-parody ever, four young gay friends make a pact to lose their virginity by the end of the summer. The boys soon face giant sex toys, naked celebrities, masochistic teachers and an uncontrollable romance with a quiche.

Street Kid

Axel is 14 years old, male prostitute, living in Düsseldorf. His mother drinks and her friends abuses him. He is sent to a bar to pick up customers. There he meets Karl-Heinz, and a loving relationship begins.

She Taught Me Serendipity

The romance between a lonely college student and who seems to be the girl of his dreams is burdened by the sudden arrival of cruel fate.