Eye For Film >> Festivals >> NDNF >> 2017 >> Feature Films

New Directors/New Films 2017
Beach Rats Beach Rats
Beach Rats and Quest
4 Days In France (Country: France; Year: 2016; Director: Jérôme Reybaud; Writer: Jérôme Reybaud; Stars: Pascal Cervo, Arthur Igual, Fabienne Babe, Nathalie Richard, Laetitia Dosch, Liliane Montevecchi, Jean-Christophe Bouvet, Marie-France, Bertrand Nadler, Dorothée Blanck, Florence Giorgetti, Mathieu Chevé, Olivier Galinou, Corinne Courèges, Emilien Tessier)
A mysterious, humorous, and erotic road movie in which a man sets out without any clear destination, guided only by the connections he forges with strangers on a hookup app, with his lover in hot pursuit.
Araby (Arábia) (Country: Brazil; Year: 2017; Director: João Dumans, Affonso Uchoa; Writer: João Dumans, Affonso Uchoa; Stars: Aristides de Sousa, Murilo Caliari, Gláucia Vandeveld, Renata Cabral, Renan Rovida)
The story of ex-con and eternal optimist Cristiano, as he journeys across Brazil in search of work and self-knowledge.
North American premiere
Album (Albüm) (Country: Turkey, France, Romania; Year: 2016; Director: Mehmet Can Mertoglu; Writer: Mehmet Can Mertoglu; Stars: Sebnem Bozoklu, Murat Kiliç)
A couple preparing to adopt create a false pregnancy album... which leads to trouble.
Autumn Autumn (Country: Republic of Korea; Year: 2016; Director: Jang Woo-jin; Stars: Yang Heung-ju, Lee Se-rang, Woo Ji-hyeon)
A young man and an older couple take a train from Seoul to the small town of Chuncheon. Across two separate threads, the film follows these protagonists to the temple of Cheongpyeong, a place full of memories for them all.
North American premiere
Beach Rats (Country: US; Year: 2017; Director: Eliza Hittman; Writer: Eliza Hittman; Stars: Harris Dickinson, Madeline Weinstein, Kate Hodge, Neal Huff)
A Brooklyn teen struggles with his sexuality.
Full Review
Centrepiece gala
Patti Cake$ Patti Cake$
Patti Cake$ and Strong Island
Boundaries (Pays) (Country: Canada; Year: 2016; Director: Chloé Robichaud; Writer: Chloé Robichaud; Stars: Emily VanCamp, Serge Houde, Macha Grenon, Rémy Girard, Max Laferriere, Alexandre Landry, Carlo Mestroni, Yves Jacques, Micheline Lanctôt, Michael Rudder, Nathalie Doummar, Sophie Faucher, Karl Werleman, Jean-Guy Bouchard, Jules Philip)
The lives of three women intersect on a small island.
By The Time It Gets Dark (Dao Khanong) (Country: Thailand, Netherlands, France, Qatar; Year: 2016; Director: Anocha Suwichakornpong)
A film director and her muse who was a student activist in the 1970s, a waitress who keeps changing jobs, an actor and an actress are all connected to each other in hidden ways.
US premiere
The Challenge (Country: Italy, France; Year: 2016; Director: Yuri Ancarani)
Documentary follows wealthy Qatari sheikhs who moonlight as amateur falconers, with no expenses spared along the way.
Full Review
Diamond Island (Country: Cambodia; Year: 2016; Director: Davy Chou)
A young man leaves his village to work in the construction industry and encounters his estranged older brother - who introduces him to the world of the middle class.
US premiere
The Dreamed Path (Der traumhafte Weg) (Country: Germany; Year: 2016; Director: Angela Schanelec; Writer: Angela Schanelec; Stars: Miriam Jakob, Thorbjörn Björnsson, Maren Eggert, Phil Hayes, Anaïa Zapp, Alan Williams, Petra Trenkel, Benjamin Hassmann, Michel Drobnik, Esther Buss, Stefan Butzmühlen, Ben Carter, Caroline Garnell, Helena Hentschel, Miriam Horwitz)
Two couples' lives become unexpectedly entwined.
Lady Macbeth Lady Macbeth
Lady Macbeth and The Challenge
The Future Perfect (Country: Argentina; Year: 2016; Director: Nele Wohlatz; Writer: Pío Longo, Nele Wohlatz; Stars: Xiaobin Zhang, Saroj Kumar Malik, Mian Jiang, Nahuel Pérez Biscayart)
A Chinese teenager who has recently moved to Argentina, embarks on Spanish classes and, as she learns the language, imagines a constellation of possible futures.
The Giant (Jätten) (Country: Sweden, Denmark; Year: 2016; Director: Johannes Nyholm; Writer: Johannes Nyholm; Stars: Christian Andrén, Johan Kylén, Anna Bjelkerud, Linda Faith, Moa Malan, Niclas Fransson, Gun Larsson, Bengt Carlsson, Stina Rangmar, Stina Elinderson, Pia Edlund, Leif Edlund, Bo Melin, Martin McFaul, Martin Högdahl)
Rikard is a 30-year-old man, severely deformed and suffering from autism, haunted by the loss of his mother. From time to time, he escapes from reality into an imaginary world where he is a 50m tall giant.
Full Review
Happiness Academy (Country: France; Year: 2016; Director: Alain Et Kaori della Negra Et Kinoshita, Alain Della Negra, Kaori Kinoshita)
Docufiction hybrid set at a retreat for the real-life Raelian Church.
US premiere
Happy Times Will Come Soon (I tempi felici verranno presto) (Country: Italy, France; Year: 2016; Director: Alessandro Comodin; Writer: Alessandro Comodin, Milena Magnani; Stars: Sabrina Seyvecou, Erikas Sizonovas, Luca Bernardi, Carlo Rigoni, Marco Giordana, Paolo Viano, Marinella Cichello)
Prisoners in the past are linked to the present when a woman finds a strange hole in the forest.
North American premiere
The Last Family (Ostatnia Rodzina) (Country: Poland; Year: 2016; Director: Jan P Matuszyński; Writer: Robert Bolesto; Stars: Andrzej Seweryn, Dawid Ogrodnik, Aleksandra Konieczna, Andrzej Chyra)
A surrealist painter famous for his S&M themes tries to keep his suicidal son from harm.
The Wound The Wound
The Wound and Menashe
The Last Of Us (Country: Tunisia, Qatar, UAE, Lebanon; Year: 2016; Director: Ala Eddine Slim)
Chronicle of an unnamed man's inadvertent journey into nature.
North American premiere
Lady Macbeth (Country: UK; Year: 2016; Director: William Oldroyd; Writer: Alice Birch, based on the novel by Nikolai Leskov; Stars: Florence Pugh, Christopher Fairbank, Cosmo Jarvis, Naomi Ackie, Paul Hilton, Golda Rosheuvel, Anton Palmer)
A woman sold into a loveless marriage develops a mind for murder after starting an affair.
Full Review See: William Oldroyd interview about austerity and colour-blind casting in Lady Macbeth
Menashe (Country: US; Year: 2017; Director: Joshua Z Weinstein; Writer: Joshua Z Weinstein, Alex Lipschultz, Musa Syeed; Stars: Menashe Lustig, Ruben Niborski, Yoel Weisshaus), Trailer
A man faces losing custody of his son after the death of his wife.
Full Review See: Menashe co-writer/producer Alex Lipschultz on the challenges of making the film
Patti Cake$ (Country: US; Year: 2017; Director: Geremy Jasper; Writer: Geremy Jasper; Stars: Danielle Macdonald, Bridget Everett, Siddharth Dhananjay, Mamoudou Athie, Cathy Moriarty, McCaul Lombardi, Wass Stevens)
A New Jersey kid dreams of making it as a rapper.
Full Review
Opening night
Pendular (Country: Brazil, Argentina, France; Year: 2017; Director: Júlia Murat; Writer: Júlia Murat, Matias Mariani)
The relationship between a dance artist and a sculptor.
North American premiere
The Giant The Giant
The Giant and Araby
Person To Person (Country: US; Year: 2017; Director: Dustin Guy Defa; Writer: Dustin Guy Defa; Stars: Michael Cera, Abbi Jacobson, Philip Baker Hall, Michaela Watkins, Tavi Gevinson, Olivia Luccardi, Craig Butta, Ben Rosenfield, Hunter Zimny, Bene Coopersmith, George Sample III, Buddy Duress, Isiah Whitlock Jr., Eleonore Hendricks, Frank Mosley)
A record collector hustles for a big score while his heartbroken roommate tries to erase a terrible mistake, a teenager bears witness to her best friend’s new relationship and a rookie reporter, alongside her demanding supervisor, chases the clues of a murder case involving a life-weary clock shop owner.
Closing night
Quest (Country: US; Year: 2016; Director: Jonathan Olshefski)
Intimate portrait of a North Philadelphia family.
Full Review
Sexy Durga (Country: India; Year: 2017; Director: Sanal Kumar Sasidharan, Sanal Kumar Sasidharan; Writer: Sanal Kumar Sasidharan; Stars: Rajshri Deshpande, Bilas Nair, Vedh, Arun Sol, Sujish)
Thriller, chronicling a long, bad trip taken by a young couple on the run.
Strong Island (Country: US, Denmark; Year: 2017; Director: Yance Ford)
The filmmaker investigates the shooting of his brother.
Full Review
The Summer Is Gone (Ba yue) (Country: China; Year: 2016; Director: Dalei Zhang; Writer: Dalei Zhang; Stars: Weiyi Kong)
A portrait of a family in Inner Mongolia in the early 1990s that doubles as a snapshot of a pivotal moment in recent Chinese history.
Person To Person Person To Person
Person To Person and The Dreamed Path
White Sun (Seto Surya) (Country: Nepal, US, Qatar, Netherlands; Year: 2016; Director: Deepak Rauniyar; Writer: Deepak Rauniyar, David Barker; Stars: Dayahang Rai, Asha Maya Magrati, Rabindra Singh Baniya, Sumi Malla, Amrit Pariyar)
On the occasion of his father’s funeral, Chandra returns to the village he left years earlier to join the Maoists, and finds himself united with the daughter he never met and revisiting uneasy relations with family members and neighbours.
Wùlu (Country: France; Year: 2016; Director: Daouda Coulibaly; Writer: Daouda Coulibaly; Stars: Quim Gutiérrez, Dembele Habib, Ndiaye Ismaël, Ibrahim Koma, Ndiaye Mariame, Inna Modja, Olivier Rabourdin, Jean-Marie Traoré)
A Malian bus driver faces a stark choice when he discovers crime pays more than honesty.
The Wound (Country: South Africa; Year: 2017; Director: John Trengove; Writer: John Trengove, Thando Mgqolozana, Malusi Bengu; Stars: Nakhane Touré, Bongile Mantsai, Niza Jay Ncoyini)
Sexual repression and coming of age prove a dangerous mix for a small community.
Full Review See: John Trengove interview about The Wound
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