In his day, Bambino was the last frontier of flamenco, an artform he rescued and brought closer to the general public. An artist of artists, idol of roadside bars, a Lorca of bulerías, his inimitable style, irresistible stage presence and heart-breaking personality have already passed into legend, a myth of the king without a kingdom, of a 20th-century musical giant.

Dancer and choreographer Urška Centa and a contemporary flamenco avant-garde artist, Marco de Ana, continue their fruitful creative partnership with a sequel to their project Stories of Birds (premiered in July 2021). The project relates to the work of the Chilean poet, writer and visual artist, Juan Luis Martínez, who found his creative inspiration in birds. This time, Marco de Ana co-choreographs Urška Centa’s solo, seeking simple and raw beauty in the movement of a bird and its vocal interaction with the environment.

A story from postwar Germany, a time when the authorities continued to imprison homosexuals despite the fall of the Nazi regime. 

In postwar Germany Hans is imprisoned again and again for being homosexual. Behind prison bars is the only place where he can seek love. The one steady relationship in his life becomes his long-time cell mate, Viktor, a convicted murderer. What starts as revulsion grows into something called love. For 123 years, Paragraph 175 criminalized homosexuals. Those convicted were sentenced to prison terms of up to ten years. During the postwar years 100,000 men were brought to trial in West Germany alone.

A lavish screen adaptation of Balzac's eponymous novel, Lost Illusions is a tale of love, desire, driving literary ambitions and the power of media and money.

19th century France. Lucien is a young unknown poet living in the provincial town of Angouleme. He has great hopes and wants to forge his destiny. He works in the family printing house during the day, writes poems and makes love to an aristocratic patroness of the arts, Louise, in the evenings. He leaves his native province to try his luck in Paris on the arm of his benefactor. Quickly left to fend for himself in this fabulous town, the young man will discover what goes on behind the scenes in this world devoted to the law of profit and pretence. 

Two-time Academy Award winner Asghar Farhadi returns to his native Iran with yet another exquisitely written tale of morality and dignity that won the Grand Prix at the Cannes Film Festival.

Rahim is on a two-day leave from prison in the Iranian city of Shiraz, where he’s serving a sentence for a debt. The money owed to a shopkeeper still hangs around his neck like the proverbial albatross. During his brief release from jail, there seems to be a way out of his predicament when Farkhondeh, the girl he intends to marry, finds a lost handbag at a bus stop containing 17 gold coins. Rahim considers selling the find, however, as his conscience nudges him, he makes an effort to find the owner of the bag, a dignified act that sees him celebrated by a television report. Yet there are plenty of skeptics milling about as doubt is thrown on Rahim’s story via social media gossips.

François Ozon’s film focuses on the hardest thing a father can ask from his daughter: to help him die. 

When André, 85, has a stroke, Emmanuele hurries to her father’s bedside. Sick and half-paralyzed in his hospital bed, he asks Emmanuele to help him end his life. The stroke and his request bring up memories from Emmanuele’s childhood and her times spent with her father. But rather than a nostalgic look back at happier times, the few flashbacks that punctuate the film are all examples of cold parenting, foundational wounds which the now grown-up Emmanuele is clearly still hurting from. But because she still loves him, Emmanuele looks at all the options available. André thus spends his final hours enjoying the last small pleasures and hoping for an end to his suffering.

Iconic director Wes Anderson’s latest star-studded feature film pays homage to the journalistic profession and French cinema.

The magazine "The French Dispatch" has its editorial offices in the fictional French town of Ennui-sur-Blasé. Here, a cranky publisher and his even crankier authors commit the strangest stories to paper. Whether painting murderers, poisoned cornichons, or stormy student revolutions – the writers of the French Dispatch take a very idiosyncratic look at the world in their articles. In his eccentric filmmaking style, playfully alluding to a series of recent history’s cultural and social phenomena, Wes Anderson gives a vivid portrayal of the business of journalism.
 

The Divide (La fracture)
France, 2021, 98’

Directed by: Catherine Corsini
Screenplay: Catherine Corsini, Agnes Feuvre, Laurette Polmanss
Cast: Valeria Bruni Tedeschi, Marina Fois, Pio Marmai, Jean-Louis Coulloc'h

Two women on the verge of a breakup, in a hospital, are further stressed on the night of a big demonstration by the overwhelmed staff and by angry, injured protestors who land up besieging the building. 

The Queer Palm 2021 LGBTI prize in the official competition of the 74th Cannes Film Festival.

Short preceding the main feature: Sisters
Slovenia, 2021, 23’

Directed by: Katarina Rešek-Kukla
Screenplay: Katarina Rešek-Kukla
Cast: Mia Skrbinac, Mina Milovanović, Sarah Al Saleh, Skrbinac, Tin Troha

The sisters from the title – Sina, Mihrije, and Jasna – are three best friends in their early twenties. The three tomboys, always wearing loose grey sweatsuits and tying their hair into low ponytails stuffed in their sweaters, train martial arts and keep to themselves. Their lifestyle often brings them into conflict with the local boys. During one of their scuffles, a fragile young girl, who is in fact only becoming one, saves them from total humiliation.

The film won the Grand Prix at the Clermont-Ferrand International Short Film Festival.
 

17:30

Godspeed, Los Polacos!
USA, 2020, 88'
By: Adam Nawrot
Best film in the Mountains, Sport and Adventure category

Five kayakers on the edge of adulthood find themselves on an expedition in the Americas with a six-wheeled military truck, homemade equipment, and little to no white-water skills. The story follows their epic two-year journey that culminates in the record-breaking first descent of the world’s deepest canyon, and finds the kayakers in Soviet

20:00

To Be a Woman in the Himalayas
Poland, 2019, 44'
Directed by: Eliza Kubarska
The unforgettable Wanda Rutkiewicz personifies the perfect example for younger generations of Polish mountaineers. Maya Sherpa from Nepal shares the same feelings: women's achievements must be recognized in the same way as those by their male counterparts. We are all equal when we face the mountain.

Everest – The Hard Way
Slovakia, 2020, 52'
Directed by Pavol Barabas
Best film in the Alpine Style category and RTV Award

Is it possible to climb the hardest route on Mount Everest in Alpine style? Sir Chris Bonington, the most famous British climber, named this route The Hard Way and stated it is impossible. It became a challenge for four Slovak climbers. In 1988 they started their hardest way with no escape.

A tragicomical meditation on what makes us human, I’m Your Man explores our perceptions of love and longing.

Alma is a scientist at the famous Pergamon Museum in Berlin. In order to obtain research funds for her studies, she accepts an offer to participate in an extraordinary experiment. For three weeks, she is to live with a humanoid robot whose artificial intelligence has been designed to allow it to morph into that of her ideal life partner. Enter Tom, a machine in (handsome) human form, created to make her happy. What could possibly go wrong?