ANTI DISCRIMINATION FILM FESTIVAL 5 - 30 dec in Leiden
organizer - 07.12.2009 17:10
Van 5 t/m 30 december speelt het (anti)discriminatie filmfestival in de Linkse Kerk in Leiden. Verspreid over 10 avonden worden 20 films vertoont. Elke avond heeft een eigen invalshoek. Zie hier het totale programma.
poster
ANTI DISCRIMINATION FILM FESTIVAL
5 - 30 december
Linkse Kerk, Koppenhinksteeg 2b in Leiden.
more info: www.eurodusnie.nl
Program:
05/12/09
Embodying racism
20:30 - Bamboozled
2000, by Spike Lee, English (Dutch subtitles), Comedy/Drama, 135 min., color, 1 win & 6 nominations
It’s Sinterklaas evening! Similar to the ‘entertaining’ zwarte pieten that the Sint uses for his work, North America had the minstrel shows throughout the 19th century in which white and later black people blackfaced themselves and entertained with their stereotypes of black people. In tonight’s Bamboozled especially for you, a revival of the minstrel shows! It’s a dark, biting satire, focusing on an educated black writer at a major television network. Frustrated that his ideas for a "Cosby Show"-like take on the black family has been rejected by network brass, he devises an outlandish scheme: reviving the minstrel show. The hook: instead of white actors in black face, the show stars black actors in even blacker face. The show becomes an instant smash, but with the success also comes repercussions for all involved.
23:00 - Manderlay
2005, by Lars von Trier, English (Dutch subtitles), Drama, 139 min., color, 1 win & 15 nominations
In 1933, after leaving Dogville, while traveling to the south of USA, Grace Margaret Mulligan sees a slave ready to be punished in a property called Manderlay. The slavery had been abolished seventy years ago, and Grace becomes revolted with the attitude of the owners of Manderlay, keeping slaves in their cotton fields and following predetermined despicable rules called "Mam's Law". Grace decides to stay in Manderlay and give notions of democracy to the slaves and to the white family. When harvest time comes, Grace sees the social and economical reality of Manderlay.
09/12/09
US 60's
20:00 – Hairspray
2007, by Adam Shankman, English (Dutch subtitles), Comedy/Musical/Romance, 117 min., color, 12 wins & 21 nominations
It's 1962 and teenagers Tracy and her friend Penny are watching the Corny Collins show. When the chance to dance on the show arrives, Tracy quickly takes the opportunity. With all of the help of her friend Seaweed, Tracy makes it on the show, not thanks to the Van Tussle’s who are not only competitive but also racist since they don’t allow black dancers onto the white show. Tracy then decides that it's not fair that the black kids can only dance on the Corny Collins Show once a month, so she and her new friends start revolting.
22:00 - Malcom X
1992, by Spike Lee, English(Dutch subtitles), Biography/Drama/History, 202 min., color, 13 wins & 7 nominations
Malcolm X divides the life of the African-American activist Malcolm X into three sections. Born Malcolm Little, his father (a preacher) was killed by the Ku Klux Klan. He becomes a gangster, and while in jail discovered the Nation of Islam writings of Elijah Muhammad. He preaches the teachings when let out of jail, but later on goes on a pilgrimage to the city of Mecca, there he converts to the original Islamic religion and becomes a Sunni Muslim. He changes his name to El-Hajj Malik Al-Shabazz and stops his anti-white teachings. He is later on assassinated.
10/12/09
Boneheads
20:30 - Skin
2008, by Hanro Smitsman, Dutch (English subtitles), Drama/History, 106 min., color, 1 win & 1 nomination
Skin takes place in the beginning of the 80’s in a working class quarter. It tells the story of a boy in his puberty who develops into a neonazi. He is the son of his Jewish father who it heavily traumatized by the war. When his mother turns ill and the father can’t manage anything anymore, the boy starts making ‘friends’ with neonazi’s. The setting is one of the well-known roaring 80’s including the squat scene in those days. The movie was inspired by the story of Kerwin Duinmeijer, the Antillean boy who was stabbed to death in august of ’83 by the neonazi Nico Bodemeijer. The death of Kerwin is seen in The Netherlands as the first racist murder after the WWII.
22:30 - American History X
1998, by Tony Kaye, English (Dutch subtitles), Drama/Crime, 119 min., black and white/color, 2 wins & 11 nominations
This flashback-laden film delves into the world of Derek Vinyard. He returns from prison to find his younger brother, Danny, caught in the same web of racism and hatred that landed him in prison. After Derek's father is killed in the line of duty by a minority, Derek's view of mankind is altered, but while in prison, he discovers that there is good and bad in every race. The task before him now is to convince Danny of his newfound enlightenment.
11/12/09
Homophobia meets other phobia
20:30 - Fremde Haut (Unveiled):
2005, by Angelina Maccarone, German/Persian/English (English subtitles), Drama, 97 min., color, 1 win & 3 nomination
Fariba flies from Teheran to Germany expecting to have asylum, since she is persecuted in Iran due to her lesbian relationship with her beloved Shirin. However, her application is denied by the authorities and Fariba has to return to her home country. When something happens to her recent acquaintance Siamak, Fariba finds an own way to gain the status of political refugee and is sent to a refugee camp in a German village. The new Fariba is confronted with keeping secrets, love, prejudice and with being illegal in an European country.
22:30 – The crying game
1992, by Neil Jordan, English (Dutch subtitles), Crime/Romance/Thriller, 112 min., color, 19 wins & 17 nominations
An unlikely kind of friendship develops between Fergus, an Irish Republican Army volunteer, and Jody, a kidnapped British soldier lured into an IRA trap by Jude, another IRA member. When the hostage-taking ends up going horribly wrong, Fergus escapes and heads to London, where he seeks out Jody's lover, a hairdresser named Dil. Fergus adopts the name "Jimmy" and gets a job as a day laborer. He also starts seeing Dil, who knows nothing about Fergus' IRA background. But there are some things about Dil that Fergus doesn't know, either...
16/12/09
Out of the closet
20:30 - En la ciudad sin límites (The city of no limits)
2002, by Antonio Hernández, Spanish/French (English subtitles), Drama, 125 min., color, 7 wins & 12 nominations
Victor is a man who gets to Paris to join his family around their seriously ill father, Max. As the chance of selling the family business begins to disrupt the family relationships, Victor is desperately asked for help by Max. What seems in the beginning mere delusions of an old man losing his mind, begin to show traces of some sort of real 'secret' that is troubling Max's last days. Victor decide to help his father to find that something (maybe just peace) he is searching for.
22:45 - Legaturi bolnavicioase (Love sick)
2006, by Tudor Giurgiu, Romanian (English subtitles), Drama, 86 min., color
Love. It just happens. No rules. It's deep and it hurts. For everyone, Alexandra and Kiki are just good friends. They happen to be two girls experiencing another kind of love. For their family, Kiki and her brother Sandu are sister and brother who sometimes fight. They happen to be lovers too. Love Sick is about their stories.
17/12/09
Genetics / eugenics
20:30 - Gattaca
1997, by Andrew Niccol, English (Dutch subtitles), Sci-Fi/Drama/Romance/Thriller, 106 min., color, 6 wins & 8 nominations
Vincent is one of the last "natural" babies born into a genetically-enhanced world, where life expectancy and disease likelihood are ascertained at birth. Myopic and due to die at 30, he has no chance of a career in a society that now discriminates against your genes, instead of your gender, race or religion. Going underground, he assumes the identity of Jerome, crippled in an accident, and achieves prominence in the Gattaca Corporation, where he is selected for his lifelong desire: a manned mission to Saturn. But things do not quite go as he hoped for and the tension builds up every step he takes.
22:30 X-men (part 1)
1997, by Bryan Singer, English (Dutch subtitles),Action/Sci-Fi/Thriller, 104 min., color, 11 wins & 23 nominations
In the near future, when children are being born with a special X-factor in their genes, giving them special powers and making them mutants, the seeds of a new Holocaust are being sown by Senator Robert Kelly. The situation brings into opposition the fellow mutants and former friends, Erik Lehnsherr, a.k.a. Magneto, and Professor Charles Xavier. While Xavier wants a peaceful means of stopping the hatred toward mutants, Magneto looks for other means to do the same. In the meantime, two mysterious mutants emerge: Logan, a powerful and aggressive mutant with no past, no memories, and a young girl named Rogue. Their quests for identities eventually land them in the sights of Xavier and Magneto, but for what purpose?
18/12/09
Immigrants
20:30 - La haine
1995, by Mathieu Kassovitz, French (English subtitles), Drama/Crime, 96 min., black and white/color, 8 wins & 11 nominations
The film follows three young men and their time spent in the French suburban ‘ghetto’, over a span of 24 hours. Vinz, a Jew, Saïd, an Arab, and Hubert, a black boxer, have grown up in these French suburbs where high levels of diversity coupled with the racist and oppressive police force have raised tensions to a critical breaking point. During the riots that took place a night before, a police officer lost his handgun in the ensuing madness, only to leave it for Vinz to find. While his friend Abdel lies injured in the hospital after being beaten up by police, Vinz takes matters into his own hands…
22:30 - Apo tin akri tis polis (From the edge of the city)
1998, by Constantine Giannaris, Greek/Russian (English subtitles), Drama, 94 minutes, color, 3 wins & 3 nominations
Menidi is a poor suburb on the edge of Athens, where many Cosssack Greeks live. They are also called "pontios", ethnic Greeks from the Black Sea dispersed by the ex-Southern Soviet Union in the Stalin era. Lots of "pontios" have returned to Greece after the demise of the USSR. The parents speak mostly Greek, but the teenage children speak a hybrid Russian-Greek language which reflects their lack of identity and marginalization in Greece's highly xenophobic society (the only EU country where no minorities exist! Officially…). Their lives exist from petty crime and prostitution. Their friendships, the way they mock each others' dealing in homosexuality, their sexual and criminal exploitation by rich Greeks, their own exploitation of prostitutes, sexual and moral ambiguity all lead to the film's defining!
23/12/09
Less-worthy
20:30 - The constant gardener
2005, by Fernando Meirelles, English/Italian/Swahili/German (Dutch subtitles), Drama/Romance/Thriller, 129 min., color, 21 wins & 42 nominations
Justin Quayle is an English gentle diplomat who is sent to the Kenyan Embassy to work. He takes his unpredictable wife Tessa with him, who insists to come along. Tessa -unlike her diplomatic husband who is more into gardening then saving the world- is an activist and an idealist. Tessa finds out accidentally that a powerful pharmacist firm (3 Bees) is testing a new drug amongst the Africans. Tessa gets more and more involved in this matter and also gets involved with all sorts of people, inhabitants like Arnold and white diplomats such as Sandy. Tessa is being confronted with the power of the ‘first world’ in the hardest way possible and Justin cannot longer turn his head the other way.
22:45 - Salt of the earth
1954, by Herbert J. Biberman, English/Spanish (Dutch subtitles), Drama/History, 94 minutes, black and white, 3 wins.
Based on an actual strike against the Empire Zinc Mine in New Mexico, the film deals with the prejudice against the Mexican-American workers, who struck to attain wage parity with Anglo workers in other mines and to be treated with dignity by the bosses. The film is an early treatment of feminism, because the wives of the miners play a crucial role in the strike, against their husbands wishes. In the end, the greatest victory for the workers and their families is the realization that prejudice and poor treatment are conditions that are not always imposed by outside forces. This film was written, directed and produced by members of the original "Hollywood Ten," who were blacklisted for refusing to answer Congressional inquiries on First Amendment grounds.
24/12/09
Women at the front line
20:30 – Trust
1990, by Hal Hartley, English (Dutch subtitles), Drama/Comedy, 107 min., color, 3 wins & 2 nominations
When high school dropout Maria Coughlin announces her pregnancy to her parents, her father drops dead on the floor. Her mother kicks her out of the house and her boyfriend dumps her, so Maria is left alone and homeless. This is when she meets Matthew Slaughter. Matthew is an educated high school graduate with a great talent for fixing electronic devices, but he can't hang on to a job because of his principled attitude towards quality. When Maria accepts Matthew's offer to help her, they begin to form a relationship with each other in which both of them begin to change.
22:30 - Nine to five
1980, by Colin Higgins, English/French (Dutch subtitles), Comedy, 110 min., color, 1 win & 6 nominations
Frank Hart is a pig. He takes advantage in the grossest manner of the women who work with him. When his three assistants manage to trap him in his own house they assume control of his department and productivity leaps, but just how long can they keep Hart tied up?
30/12/09
Looking back now
20:30 - Die welle (The wave)
2008, by Dennis Gansel, German (English subtitles), Drama/Thriller, 107 min., color, 3 wins & 6 nominations
A high-school teacher assigned the thankless task of teaching autocracy as part of the school's project week. Being an ex-punk he would rather teach them ‘anarchy’. He decides to spice up his lessons by conducting an experiment. Though his students are initially apathetic about the prospect of being schooled in the evils of fascism yet again, the lesson soon takes an unexpected turn of events that no one in the classroom could have seen coming. The movie is loosely based on a real event that took place in Palo Alto, California, US in 1967.
22:30 - Everything is illuminated
2005, Liev Schreiber, English/Russian/Ukrainian (Dutch subtitles), Comedy/Drama, 106 min., color, 7 wins & 4 nominations
A young Jewish American, Jonathan, flies to Ukraine in search of his grandfather's past. He has only a few maps and a photograph of a woman named Augustine, who is said to have saved his grandfather from the Nazis. Jonathan's guide on his trip is Alex, a young archetypal Ukrainian man. They are both 22. Their driver is Alex's grandfather, who claims to be blind. Accompanying the men is grandfather's seeing-eye dog. Jonathan is a collector, putting things he finds into small plastic bags. Alex asks the old man, "Was there anti-Semitism in the Ukraine before the war?" Will they find the village? The past illuminates everything.
 Website: http://www.eurodusnie.nl
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