25.11.26, 20:30, Jay and Silent Rob Strike Back (2001), Weird Wednesday

Dust in the eyes, mud on the face and bone-crushing cobbles that cause pain with every metre. That’s the 270 km from Paris to Roubaix. The documentary A Sunday in Hell by Danish director Jørgen Leth follows the infamous gruelling race of 1976, in which our undisputed golden generation of Flandriens (Merckx, De Vlaeminck and Maertens) displayed their fighting spirit and stamina.

It all begins even before the start, when mechanics meticulously prepare the bikes and riders shave their legs. The rival teams discuss their tactics whilst dressed in stylish seventies outfits. Motorcycle-mounted cameras, aerial shots and close-ups bring the chaos of the race impressively close to the viewer. All these elements mean that, 50 years on, A Sunday in Hell is perhaps still the finest cycling documentary – and tribute to the victor – ever made.

This screening will be introduced by media scholar Ben De Smet.

A charming lieutenant is kidnapped by a gang of mountain bandits whilst on his way to a remote fort. When the gang leader’s daughter falls for this young officer, his captivity turns into an absurd romantic adventure. What in anyone else’s hands would be a simple melodrama completely derails in Lubitsch’s hands into a madcap comedy full of militaristic nonsense, wild moustaches and amorous pranks.

With his exuberant scenery, expressionist sets and anarchic humour, Ernst Lubitsch turns the army into a playground where logic is, above all, a hindrance. Victory celebrations without a victory, soldiers who’d rather dance than fight, and military manoeuvres that resemble a slapstick ballet. Die Bergkatze (‘The Puma’) is a delightfully unrestrained early Lubitsch film, in which the director clearly had no intention of sticking to a single genre or a coherent plot.

With live musical accompaniment by Bart Maris and classical music students.

When an Iranian boy accidentally breaks the window in his classroom, his teacher gives him one day to replace it. This sets in motion a seemingly simple, yet deceptively complex quest in which he must raise the money himself, find a glazier and, ultimately, make his way back to school through a stormy landscape carrying a life-sized pane of glass.

Written by Abbas Kiarostami and directed by Mohammad-Ali Talebi, the film fits perfectly within the tradition of child-oriented Iranian cinema, in which simple stories provide a space for larger themes. Talebi transforms the vast, green landscape into a character in its own right, in which nature is both beautiful and unforgiving. With its slow pace, understated style and almost fairy-tale-like atmosphere, Willow and Wind turns a childish task into an exciting parable about responsibility, powerlessness and growing up. A small, poetic film that finds excitement in the simplest of things.

The screening will be followed by a Q&A with director Mohammad-Ali Talebi.

With the wind in your hair, this classic action film takes you on The Ultimate Ride. Police recruit Johnny Utah (Keanu Reeves) is tasked with infiltrating a criminal gang of surfers. Led by the charismatic Bodhi (Patrick Swayze), these daredevils rob banks dressed as former presidents. The deeper Utah delves into his mission, the more he becomes immersed in the adrenaline-fuelled philosophy of his target.

With this film, Kathryn Bigelow takes on a genre (usually) favoured by men and cleverly turns the lens around to offer a nuanced deconstruction of the action film. The world of extreme sports in which the film is set may well provide spectacle, but the real fireworks take place between Utah and Bodhi as they chase, are carried away and yearn.

This screening will be introduced by film scholar Eduard Cuelenaere.

The illustrious Al Moon spends his days on Yurok territory in California. Like many Native Americans, he watches with sorrow as the land becomes uninhabitable. Ecological disasters are contaminating the fish stocks, whilst violence and alcoholism are taking their toll on his community. The changes to the landscape run parallel to Moon’s personal reckoning with the past. Haunted by his memories as a soldier in the Vietnam War, he embarks on a road trip to come to terms with himself.

Following their dreamlike desktop documentary Elsewhere, Everywhere (2020), Vivianne Perelmuter and Isabelle Ingold return with an intimate observational portrait in which geopolitical forces play out on a small scale. Hovering between anthropological rigour and poetic freedom, they find in Moon a canvas for the demons that plague the American soul.

This screening will be followed by a Q&A with directors Vivianne Perelmuter and Isabelle Ingold.

Desire Lines (or elephant tracks) are the informal paths that emerge when people ignore existing routes to forge their own way. Drawing on Sara Ahmed’s Queer Phenomenology (2006), this playful short film programme explores how landscape architecture can be a manifestation of power inequalities and how ‘queering’ public space can lead to freedom.

Morgenkreis (2025, Basma al-Sharif) and Parish (2025, Eóin Heaney) guide us through the rituals of mourning in a changing environment. Through Verdigris (2025, Chloe Brenan) and Limits and Demonstrations (2025, Olivia Normile), we learn to recognise the infrastructural violence inherent in, amongst other things, Parisian urban planning, whilst Collectif Faire-Part’s Speech for a Melting Statue (2023) intervenes in the colonial remnants within Brussels. In doing so, the city becomes a political arena that can be shaped by its residents.

The screening will be followed by a Q&A with filmmakers Chloe Brenan, Olivia Normile and Collectif Faire-Part.

Every year, Kinoautomat’s Kinokwartet draws you away from the glaring sunlight and into the comforting darkness of the cinema. This time, we’re formally inviting you to a film day to sink your teeth into, with our tribute to an immortal film icon. During Vampire Empire, we celebrate the bat-like neck-biter in all his versatility during a four-part series of screenings that flits through film history.

We kick off with the ice-cool The Hunger (1983). This debut film by Tony Scott features David Bowie and Catherine Deneuve as stylishly dressed night owls who farm auras across the centuries. Next, we feast on Louis Ospina’s political parable Pura Sangre (1982). In a Colombia ravaged by poverty, the fabulously wealthy Roberto Hurtado seeks an unending supply of blood transfusions. His chauffeur, Perfecto, stalks the streets in search of impressionable young men.

As night falls, we pay tribute to The Queen of the Damned with Dracula’s Daughter (1936). Here, Joke Dheer eagerly extracts sexual allegories from this Universal horror hit with a queer reading that pulls the Prince of Darkness out of his coffin. Beforehand, we’ll watch the short film You Are a Lesbian Vampire (2008), which drives a stake through the patriarchal influences of the genre. Finally, we bathe in the moonlight with Ganja & Hess (1973). Drawing on Afro-surrealism and biting reflections on America’s postcolonial condition, this contrarian horror drama brought a fresh blood transfusion to the vampire genre. Then we’ll head off into the (eternal) night together.

In Goshogaoka, Sharon Lockhart turns her camera on the girls’ basketball team at a Japanese sports school. In six uninterrupted ten-minute takes, we follow a group training session, punctuated by the squeaking of trainers on the parquet floor. The hypnotic focus on collective movement patterns transforms physical action into mental gymnastics. The red curtains and the school stage in the gym are reminiscent of a cinema auditorium. Are we watching a performance or a production?

Prior to Goshogaoka, we will be screening A Poster Fantasy by Melissa Mabesoone, followed by Western History by Stan Brakhage, in which a basketball match collides with images from Western art history.

When Dylan ends up on a ranch in the American Southwest, his path crosses that of the intriguing Sky. This chance encounter gradually draws him into life on the ranch and the unique world that unfolds there. Dylan finds himself tumbling from his simple summer job ever deeper into a world where cowboy hats, rodeos and queer love coexist effortlessly.

With National Anthem, photographer and director Luke Gilford has created a tender ode to the queer rodeo community, inspired by his eponymous photo book. The ranch becomes a place where outsiders have formed their own family and everyone is welcome. Gilford captures this world in warm colours, sweeping landscapes and intimate close-ups, whilst real rodeo riders lend the film a documentary-like energy.

Before the screening (at 19:30), we’ll be holding a queer line-dancing workshop in the foyer.

Shivering and trembling – there’s plenty to get up to at the North Pole.

Cinema for the very youngest cinema-goers! Parents and children aged 4 and over are welcome to this screening, where we’ll be presenting a varied and original selection of short films.

Garrett Bradley once said: “The tendency to forget is humanity’s Achilles’ heel. But trying to remember is the driving force and the seed of constant revolution.”

Some films cannot be summarised easily. They demand attention, time and a different way of looking at things. ‘Time’ is one such film. Without passing explicit judgement, ‘Time’ raises fundamental questions about how we view justice.

The past plays a central role in Bradley’s films, and the concept of time lies at their heart. Her use of the camera reflects an abstraction of reality. In ‘Time’, the wives of men in detention – and the detained men themselves – are constantly drawn back to that one moment in the past for which they have been condemned, whilst at the same time being swept towards the future.

What unfolds in ‘Time’ is not a classic tale of guilt and punishment, but an intimate and multi-layered exploration of what it means to live with the consequences of a single moment. The film moves between the past and the present, revealing how time itself plays a central role in the prison system. During this evening, Garrett Bradley’s film ‘Time’ serves as the starting point for a broader reflection on prisons and perceptions, not only in the United States, but also closer to home in Belgium and Europe. What does it mean to lock someone up in prison? And what are the alternatives?

Veronique Aicha will give an introduction to Garrett Bradley’s documentary ‘Time’, followed by a screening of ‘Time’.

• Veronique Aicha works at the intersection of art, justice and philosophy. In her work, she explores and develops new perspectives on criminal law. She has worked on criminal law projects across Europe, visited prisons and detention centres throughout the continent, and taught philosophy to people in detention for many years. She is also active as a writer, presenter and programme maker, and develops cultural and social programmes centred on justice, imagination and systemic change.

• Garrett Bradley uses narrative, documentary and experimental film forms to address themes such as race, class, family relationships, social justice, the culture of the American South and the film history of the United States. Bradley has won numerous awards, including the 2019 Prix de Rome and the 2017 Sundance Jury Prize for the short film ‘Alone’, which was released by The New York Times OpDocs and was nominated for an Oscar in the short non-fiction film category, having been shortlisted by the Academy.
  
  Bradley’s work has been featured in various venues, including her role as second unit director on Ava DuVernay’s ‘When They See Us’ and the 2019 Whitney Biennial. In December 2019, Bradley’s first solo exhibition opened at the Contemporary Arts Museum Houston (CAMH), curated by Rebecca Matalon. In January 2020, Bradley became the first African-American woman to win the Best Director award at the 2020 Sundance Film Festival for her debut feature-length documentary, ‘Time’.

This talk and film screening will take place at KASKcinema. The auditorium is wheelchair accessible and a limited number of spaces are provided within the auditorium. The wheelchair-accessible toilet is located on the first floor and is accessible via a lift (90 cm wide, 1.35 m deep). There is another toilet available further down the corridor, past the KASKcafe, for those using a wider wheelchair. Anyone with further questions about accessibility facilities can contact the organisers: helena.verheye@hogent.be.