Terrestrial Verses      


Description:A satirical take on the mundane absurdities of life in modern-day Iran, these nine vignettes illuminate the lighter side of enduring under authoritarian rule. Whether choosing a name for a newborn, graduating from grade school, getting a driver’s license, applying for a job, or seeking approval for a film script, if you live in Iran, you best come fluent in Orwellian discourse. Progressing along a rough timeline from birth to death, each story is shot in a static camera angle as a single petitioner negotiates with an authority figure hovering just outside of frame, who is practiced in the language of doublespeak.

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    Miss Novak joins the staff of an international boarding school to teach a conscious eating class and forms a strong bond

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    The American

    American ballet dancer Joy Womack is accepted into Moscow's infamously tough Bolshoi Ballet Academy, with the dream of b

  • The Last Queen

    The Last Queen

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    All That Breathes

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    If Only I Could Hibernate

    Ulzii, a teenager from a poor neighborhood in Ulaanbaatar, is determined to win a sciences-physics competition to get a

  • In the Mirror

    In the Mirror

    The film is freely inspired by the great actress Monica Vitti, but it is in no way a biopic. It is the story of a woman

  • Home Stories

    Home Stories

    This one is a collage of Hollywood melodramas of the 1950s and 1960s, filmed directly from the television set. The const

  • Omar Killed Me

    Omar Killed Me

    In the summer of 1991 an elderly woman Ghislaine Marchal is found murdered in the basement of her home with the message

  • Green Tide

    Green Tide

    Not less than 3 men and 40 animals were found dead on the Breton beaches. The identity of the killer is an open secret:

  • Stop Making Sense

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    A concert film documenting Talking Heads at the height of their popularity, on tour for their 1983 album "Speaking in To

  • Quo Vadis, Aida?

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    Bosnia, July 1995. Aida is a translator for the UN in the small town of Srebrenica. When the Serbian army takes over the

  • Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within

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    Led by a strange dream, scientist Aki Ross struggles to collect the eight spirits in the hope of creating a force powerf

  • The Taste of Things

    The Taste of Things

    Set in 1889 France, Dodin Bouffant is a chef living with his personal cook and lover Eugénie. They share a long history

  • The Promised Land

    The Promised Land

    Denmark, 1755. Captain Ludvig Kahlen sets out to conquer a Danish heath reputed to be uncultivable, with an impossible g

  • The Teachers' Lounge

    The Teachers' Lounge

    When one of her students is suspected of theft, teacher Carla Nowak decides to get to the bottom of the matter. Caught b

  • Io Capitano

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    Longing for a brighter future, two Senegalese teenagers embark on a journey from West Africa to Italy. However, between

  • Aftersun

    Aftersun

    Sophie reflects on the shared joy and private melancholy of a holiday she took with her father twenty years earlier. Mem

  • Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines

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    It's been 10 years since John Connor saved Earth from Judgment Day, and he's now living under the radar, steering clear