Thao’s Library

Elizabeth Van Meter / Vietnam / 2015 / Documentary Feature Film, Drama, Family / 88 mins

Forty years after the Fall of Saigon, a young Vietnamese woman is among the Vietnam War's uncounted casualties. Born near fields where American planes sprayed Agent Orange, Thao lives with severe physical deformities. Halfway around the world, a woman in New York is struggling to cope after the sudden death of her famed younger sister. In the midst of her crippling depression, a friend shows Elizabeth a black-and-white photograph from a recent trip abroad. The image haunts Elizabeth. It shows Thao sitting in a wheelchair outside a shed that houses pig feed, fertilizer -- and books. Despite her disabilities, Thao had set up a makeshift library for children in her village. Thao and Elizabeth are brought together, forging an unlikely sisterhood, transcending language and culture. Together the women reflect on the past. They confront the present. And they begin to heal.

Drama with Director Q&A

Sophie Mathisen / Autrailia (filmed in France) / 2014 / Romantic Comedy / 1 hour 45 mins

For struggling young actress Anna, living in London is getting intolerable. She has split with her boyfriend, isn’t getting auditions, and faces mounting pressure from her family. Obviously, the only thing to do is to go to Paris and visit gay best friend Jean. Funny, tragic, and everything in between (like life itself), Drama is, in Mathisen’s own words, “about people at their worst trying to do their best." The film blends an exciting mix of Australian and French talent and was shot over a Parisian summer.

Chemo

Bartosz Prokopowicz / Poland / Drama / 95 mins

Thirty-year old fashion photographer Benek, disgusted with his life, has chosen a date for his suicide. Beautiful, quirky Lena refuses to seek treatment for her cancer. But when they begin a delirious romance, their mutual obsession with death is transformed into a fight for life against a seemingly all-powerful enemy.

Happy 40th – Opening Night Film with Director Q&A

Madoka Raine / USA / 2015 / Drama / 1 hour 40 mins

Quietly courageous, this beautifully acted ensemble film features four women coming together to celebrate the birthday of a friend, who is grappling with a dramatic shift in her life due to an accident that has left her wheelchair dependent. Director Madoka Raine co-stars as the "loose cannon" — an ironic role considering her delicate navigation between drama and dialogue in scenes that should be painfully intimate between husband and wife. Instead, a profound elegance is revealed in this marital dance as we witness a relationship that relies on caretaking vs. communication.

Honor Diaries – with Audience Q&A

Micah Smith / USA / 2014 / Documentary Feature Film / 1 hour 1 mins

We’ve all heard the horror stories from male-dominated cultures, like Saudi Arabia: forced marriages for young girls, female genital mutilation, “honor” killings. Now, for the first time on film, an international group of women’s-rights champions break the silence and reveal their efforts to fight against these injustices and for women’s rights everywhere.

Happygram – with Director Q&A

Julie Marron / USA / Documentary Feature Film / 1 hour 40 mins

Forty percent of the women in this country are given the illusion of knowledge when they receive their yearly letter announcing the results of their mammogram. This riveting documentary tells the story of the fight to accurately inform women about their cancer screening.

Funny Bunny – Closing Night Film

Alison Bagnall / USA / 2015 / Drama/Comedy / 1 hour 25 mins

What do you get when you mix an unsuccessful do-gooder divorcee with a dysfunctional trust-fund baby who is on the outs with his rich parents? And then add a likeable femme fatal, who is sadly odd, with an ancient secret...

Small Gestures Short Films Program II

1 hour 30 mins

Films are called moving pictures for a reason. A well-made short film can be like a small gesture that touches an audience in a profound way or delights with its lightness. Be prepared to be moved by these nine cinematic gems. Programmed by Johannes Bockwoldt

Yemeniettes

Shawn Thompson / USA / 2013 / Documentary Feature Film / 1 hour 1 mins

This uplifting documentary helps give us hope that young Muslim girls might just have a chance for a better future. Three Yemeni teenage girls enter a youth Middle Eastern entrepreneurial competition, with their innovative solar-panel powered devices, designed to compensate for the frequent electrical grid outages in their country.

Luckily, their unusually open-minded parents “support” the girls’ ambitions, despite community pressure not to allow their daughters to pursue non-traditional female vocations. Along the way, the girls encounter the hardships of a country scarred by a broken educational system, joblessness, and a threatening Al-Qaeda presence.

Jack of the Red Hearts

Janet Grillo / USA / 2015 / Drama, Family / 100 mins

A streetwise teen, and casualty of the flawed foster care system, cons her way into a job by posing as an experienced caregiver for a family with an autistic child. At first in over her head, she ends up connecting with her new life in a way she never expected. Just as she’s found redemption, her deceitful past catches up with her and she’s forced to come to terms with who she really is.

Paradise (Paraíso)

Mariana Chenillo / Mexico / 2013 / Drama / 1 hour 45 mins

In this charming Mexican love story, a young couple moves to the big city for his job and discovers a blatant bias against them because of their weight. When he begrudgingly follows her lead in losing weight, then exceeds her success, comedy and pathos ensue as their relationship unravels. This film poignantly explores the issues of self-esteem, physical appearances, and the nature of love.

Children’s Short Films Program – FREE Admission

60 minutes mins

This year’s Festival collection includes ten films that creatively illustrate life andimagination for children. Notably, two of the films have been made with children involved in the creative process. There are films from eight different countries — Croatia, South Africa, Northern Ireland to name a few — as well as one made right here in Rochester by local schoolchildren! Many of the films have received significant awards.

Odd Brodsky – with Director Q&A

Cindy Baer / USA / 2013 / Comedy, Drama / 1 hour 33 mins

After 11 years at a job she hates, Audrey Brodsky quits to pursue her childhood dream of acting. There’s just one problem: she’s not very good at it. But when she meets an aspiring cameraman on the Internet, she begins an unexpected, life-changing series of adventures. Director Cindy Baer’s first feature, Purgatory House, won awards at a dozen festivals. The delightfully quirky comedy Odd Brodsky is her second feature and is having similar success. Unusually ambitious for a low-budget indie, it includes more than 50 speaking parts, more than 80 music cues, and lots of sharp swipes at our media-saturated, celebrity-obsessed society.

Hardy

Natasha Verma / USA / 2013 / Documentary Feature Film / 1 hour 45 mins

With nothing but two hands and an unbreakable will, Heather Hardy rose from being a homeless single mother to a world champion, in a sport that traditionally ignores women — boxing.

Ritorni (Homecoming) – with Director Q&A

Giovanna Taviani / Italy / 2006 / Drama / 53 minutes mins

Documentary film that traces the experiences of Maghred people living in Europe as the return home.. The return of people from Maghreb living in Europe to their lands of origin during the summer holidays and the study of the different points of view and meanings of these ‘homecomings’: an exodus to the opposite direction, an upside down trip in comparison with the desperate route that thousands of refugees make each year from the African coasts to our lands.

Saturday Night Spotlight Party

Party

Join us for rockin' live music, drink & hors-d'oeuvres as we mingle with our filmmakers on the rooftop of the Strath! $20 admission in advance, $25 at the door Many more party details to be announced soon!

The Lennon Report – Saturday Night Spotlight Film – with Audience Q&A

Jeremy Profe / USA / 2015 / Drama / 1 hour 27 mins

This much-anticipated feature film makes its U.S. Premiere at High Falls Film Festival — showing audiences what they don't know about the night John Lennon was killed. The events unfold as seen through the eyes of those who lived it — the good men and women of NYC who did all they could to save a life, some not even knowing it was John Lennon himself. For the first time in decades, the doctor and nurses break their silence about what really happened in the operating room. Based on a true story. In attendance for the post-film Q&A (and the Saturday Spotlight Party) will be the film's producers, directors, actors, and the doctor and nurses.

Connie Cook: A Documentary – with Director Q&A

Sue Perlgut / USA / 2015 / Documentary Feature Film / 56 minutes mins

Connie Cook — pilot, legislator, advocate and attorney — was indeed a woman ahead of her time. This interview-driven documentary, with archival footage, chronicles her life, her contributions to politics, and her fight for women’s rights. Many changes in American life came about because of Connie’s drive, determination, and humanitarianism. Her work inspired many, and her story inspires us all.

Short Films by the Women of RIT’s School of Film and Animation

1 hour 30 mins

Short films by students in the School of Film and Animation at RIT

Wildflower – with Director Q&A

Nicholas DiBella / USA / 2015 / Drama, Thriller / 1 hour 32 mins

When a college student starts having a reoccurring nightmare, she begins to believe that it might be a suppressed memory and that she may be connected to the strange disappearance of a teenage girl twelve years earlier.

Tea + Cake

Kirsty Robinson / UK / 2015 / Narrative Feature Film / 1 hour 32 mins

A coming of age story of four generations of women whose lives are intertwined in a small town in England and the strength they gain from their friendships and family.

Cart

Boo Ji-Young / South Korea / 2014 / Drama / 110 mins

Based on a true story, Cart is about big corporations that screw-over their workers. This empowering drama from South Korea tells the “David vs. Goliath” tale of Sun-hee, mother of two and a part-time cashier at a Walmart-like, big-box retail store, who is abruptly fired — via text message, no less — just before receiving the promotion she was promised. Her job and the jobs of hundreds more have been outsourced! Transforming herself from shy worker-bee to passionate protest leader, Sun-hee rallies her colleagues to fight the company’s callousness and expose the injustice.

“Connections” – Short Films Program 1

1 hour 30 mins

A lost child, a long–over-due coming out, a dead cat, small and large dramas in nine short films from Britain, Sweden, Australia and the US. This program is a poignant mix of tragedy and comedy that affirms the need for human connection in as concentrated a form as only short films can. Programmed by Johannes Bockwoldt