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The sense of discovery that fuels film festivals becomes particularly acute when the focal point centers on the search for unknown talents who demonstrate a natural gift for storytelling. The New Directors Showcase features a selection of international directors who are clearly emerging as major talents. SIFF programmers choose films from around the world to be spotlighted for special attention and competition. Each of the films must be a debut or second feature by the selected director, and each is chosen on the basis of its original conception, striking style and overall excellence. The films must also be without U.S. distribution. The jury for the New Directors Showcase, composed of film industry professionals and journalists, chooses the award-winning director on the final weekend of the Festival. The winner will be awarded a $5,000 cash prize, to be announced at the Filmmakers Awards Brunch and at the Closing Night Gala on June 18.
Hong Kong, 2005, 89 min.
Two Hong Kong schoolgirls are nearing the cusp of adulthood in a sleepy fishing village. One nostalgically prepares to leave for university, while the other returns from a tough existence in the city to find that time has quietly tarnished her former friendships. …
Denmark, 2005, 88 min.
In order to recover a secret from his past, a perfectionist piano maestro must enter “The Zone,” a mysterious section of Copenhagen where lost memories take on tangible shape. Christoffer Boe’s (Reconstruction) visually stunning, narratively crooked fantasy is a real trip, in every sense of t …
Russia, 2005, 75 min.
Is it Sci-Fi? Documentary? Mockumentary? This original film mixes real and flawlessly fake archival footage revealing the “secret” story of the Soviet cosmonauts who tried to beat the Americans to the moon by thirty years. In true Russian style, humor and menace rub against each other. …
Bosnia and Herzegovina, 2005, 97 min.
Gay lovers Kenan, a Muslim cellist, and Milan, a Serbian student, fight to survive the brutal inter-ethnic wars of early-’90s Bosnia and Herzegovina. Dreaming of peace, happiness and acceptance, they travel west with one of them disguised in drag, in a film that provocatively addresses subjects once …
China, 2005, 109 min.
A Korean-Chinese woman struggles to bring up her son alone by selling homemade kimchi to factory workers. When a tragic misadventure befalls the child, her revenge on the uncaring neighbors is extreme and pitiless, in this melodrama with a social conscience that is reminiscent of Fassbinder. …
Slovenia, 2005, 103 min.
Pero (a Gene Wilder lookalike) earns his living by making speeches at funerals. He and his eccentric family—two sisters, a nephew and his father (who devises elaborate plans to off himself)—live together in a typically Balkan world of black humor and irony, where tragedy always looms. …
South Korea, 2005, 92 min.
A cynical, divorced intellectual has a bizarre life-changing (and life-saving) encounter with a stoic evangelist, who turns out to have his own problems. From amusingly varied viewpoints, the two bond and start to take a stand against the oppressing forces in their lives. …
Peru, 2006, 122 min.
For one devout Peruvian village, God dies on Good Friday and is born again on Easter; between those days there is no sin. During these strange Holy Days young Madeinusa (Magaly Solier) falls for a gringo stranger against her father’s wishes, in this stunningly photographed take on the classic Americ …
Mexico, 2005, 90 min.
Diego is a very ordinary man, but Blanca loves him with a carnal passion spicier than anything on the evening soap operas they watch together. When caught between his jealous wife and a daughter from an earlier marriage in desperate need of guidance, Diego acts in ways he never dreamed possible. …
Japan, 2006, 98 min.
This gothic supernatural mystery successfully recreates the milieu familiar to fans of acclaimed Japanese writer Haruki Murakami. The walls between fantasy and reality break down as salaryman Arisu falls under the spell of the Darkland, a sinister creation of mystery novelist Jo Koruda. …
France, 2006, 94 min.
The lovelorn Ariane scripts word balloons for a photo-novella in the magazine YOU AND ME. She is accustomed to seeing L’AMOUR in her fiction, and this colors how she sees her own relationships. Meanwhile, her cellist sister is dealing with her own romances in this charming look at the female side of …
