CFFS 2020 – Borders, Boundaries and Home (Ages 13+)
** NOTE: All CFFS Closing Weekend events have been postponed until further notice. Please see here for updates around our response to COVID-19, and thank you for your patience and understanding! **
Visiting Artist
** Melissa Gregory Rue, director of “Esperanza’s Turn,” in attendance on March 7th! **
About
Ages 13+
In these powerful narrative and documentary films, we meet young people who must navigate the occupation of their countries or immigration, migration and separation from loved ones. These unstoppable kids show us the resilience and belief on dreams that it takes to grow up in an uncertain world.
Content advisory: “Adnan” shows a boy tending to his mother when she is in serious psychological distress. “Maradona’s Legs,” an uplifting film about brotherly love and adventure, includes a scene where the film’s hero must confront and correct another boy who is repeatedly screaming a curse word. The film also includes an obscene gesture made in a humorous way, smoking by an adult and political content that is woven into the fabric of the storytelling. “Dumpling” contains instances of bullying. “Cleats” has an ending which leaves audiences wondering whether or not a character is alive.
72 min.
Short Films in this Program:
199 Little Heroes: Rania from Syria
(Gessie George, Germany, live-action documentary, 2018, 8 min, Arabic with English subtitles)
Rania lives in one of the biggest refugee camps in the world, in Jordan. Not all the children in the camp go to school, but Rania does. She wants to become a civil engineer and be the one who gives instructions.
Dumpling
(Xiaolu Wang, USA, live-action, 2018, 5:28 min, English & Chinese with English subtitles)
Based on the director’s lived experience of moving from China to a predominantly white, rural American town when she was 14, this film tells the story of how a girl preserves her identity and overcomes bullying by eating her mother’s cooking.
Esperanza’s Turn
(Melissa Gregory Rue, USA, live-action, 2019, 12 min, in English & Spanish, with English subtitles)
A 12-year-old immigrant farm worker taps into her imagination to confront a bully at school.
Cleats
(Abdullah Şahin, Turkey, live-action, 2019, 10 min, Turkish with English subtitles)
Ilyas and Ahmet are two close friends. Emir, a Syrian refugee boy, completes the gang. The Turkish boys show empathy and compassion for their friend, perhaps not realizing how deeply he cares for them.
Adnan
(Steven Chatterton & Mark Arrigo, UK, live-action, 2019, 15 min, Arabic with English subtitles) North American premiere!
Ten-year-old Adnan has fled Syria with his mother after their other family members were killed and their neighborhood destroyed. Now settled in the UK, he must use all his creativity to help her recover from trauma.
Maradona’s Legs
(Firas Khoury, Germany & Palestine, live-action, 2019, 20 min, Arabic with English subtitles)
During the 1990 World Cup, two young Palestinian boys are looking for “Maradona’s legs” — the last missing sticker that they need in order to complete their world cup album and win a free Atari.
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