Film & Media Culture

Halla is a fifty-year-old independent woman. But behind the scenes of a quiet routine, she leads a double life as a passionate environmental activist. Known to others only by her alias “The Woman of the Mountain,” Halla secretly wages a one-woman-war on the local aluminium industry. As Halla’s actions grow bolder, from petty vandalism to outright industrial sabotage, she succeeds in pausing the negotiations between the Icelandic government and the corporation building a new aluminium smelter in the mountains.

Customs officer Tina is known for her extraordinary sense of smell. It’s almost as if she can sniff out the guilt on anyone hiding something. But when Vore, a suspicious-looking man, walks past her, her abilities are challenged for the first time ever. Tina can sense Vore is hiding something she can’t identify. Even worse, she feels a strange attraction to him. As Tina develops a special bond with Vore and discovers his true identity, she also realizes the truth about herself.

DIRECTOR’S STATEMENT [excerpt]: “I Am Not A Witch came about because of a huge spate of witch accusations that took place over a particularly dry summer in Zambia. What drew me in particular was that these accusations of witchcraft were almost always aimed at Women… Eventually my research took me to Ghana. For over a month I stayed in one of the oldest Witch Camps in the world (over 200 years old) – the first foreigner to sleep there apparently. It’s my stay at the ‘witch camp’ that informed the script…”

In Won’t You Be My Neighbor?, Academy Award-winning filmmaker Morgan Neville looks back on the legacy of Fred Rogers, focusing on his radically kind ideas. (94 minutes).

While working in the US on a temporary visa as a caretaker, Mara, a 30 year-old single mother from Romania, marries Daniel, an American. After the arrival of her son Dragos, everything seems to have fallen perfectly into place. When the process of getting a green card veers unexpectedly off course, however, Mara is faced with abuses of power on every level and forced to answer a dark question about herself – how far would you go to get what you want? (88 minutes). A Hirschfield International Film Series event. Free.

In Paris in the early 1990s, a group of activists goes to battle for those stricken with HIV/AIDS, taking on sluggish government agencies and major pharmaceutical companies in bold, invasive actions. Sponsored by the Department of French. (143 minutes). A Hirschfield International Film Series event. Free.

Marina, a transgender woman who works as a waitress and moonlights as a nightclub singer, is bowled over by the death of her older boyfriend. The 2018 Academy Award Winner for Best Foreign Language Film of the Year. (104 minutes). A Hirschfield International Film Series event. Free.

During the summer of 1990 in Chile, a small group of families lives in an isolated community below the Andes, building a new world away from urban excesses, with the emerging freedom that followed the recent end of the dictatorship. In this time of change and reckoning, 16-year-old Sofía and Lucas, and 10-year-old Clara, neighbours in this dry land, struggle with parents, first loves, and fears, as they prepare a big party for New Year’s Eve. They may live far from the dangers of the city, but not from those of nature. In Spanish with English subtitles. (1h 50min). Free.

In a seaside village on the outskirts of an Italian city, where the only law seems to be survival of the fittest, Marcello is a slight, mild-mannered man who divides his days between working at his modest dog grooming salon, caring for his daughter Alida, and being coerced into the petty criminal schemes of the local bully Simoncino, an ex-boxer who terrorizes the neighborhood. When Simoncino’s abuse finally brings Marcello to a breaking point, he decides to stand up for his own dignity through an act of vengeance, with unintended consequences. In Italian with English subtitles.

Qiao is in love with Bin, a local mobster. During a fight between rival gangs, she fires a gun to protect him. Qiao gets five years in prison for this act of loyalty. Upon her release, she goes looking for Bin to pick up where they left off. In Chinese and Mandarin with English subtitles. (2h 17min). Free.