07.05.26, 20:30, So Is This? (1982), Text II (1964)

Mona, a retired singer from Northern Sudan, harbours a heavy secret concerning a covered-up murder. Driven by guilt, she takes in Julia, the victim’s South Sudanese widow, and her son.

As the political conflict in Sudan escalates, social divisions deepen. This political unrest seeps into the daily lives of the two women and forces Mona to confront her sins. Through a provocative and allegorical exploration of the complex Sudanese situation, Goodbye Julia invites the viewer to reflect on urgent issues. Rather than answers, this melodrama with thriller elements offers the viewer only questions. Is coexistence without justice even possible?

Director Mohamed Kordofani made his film debut with Goodbye Julia. Sudanese cinema has a long history, but the colonial political situation brought the country’s film production to a virtual standstill. With this film, Kordofani has reignited the spark.

This screening will be introduced by PhD researcher Sarra Khlifi.

In today’s Istanbul, where the shadow of censorship and oppression is growing ever longer, eight filmmakers have joined forces under the banner of Altyazı Fasikül: Free Cinema. Together, they paint a portrait of a country where critical voices are systematically silenced.

This anthology film brings together six short works, each of which exposes the mechanisms of censorship in its own way. As legal cases against critical artists pile up, self-censorship often proves to be the most effective form of oppression. The short documentaries range from deadly serious to ironic and incisive, linked by a common thread: how do we keep the hope of protest alive in an age where every critical gaze carries risks?

Through Zoom calls, cryptic security footage and dreamlike night-time shots of forbidden places, the filmmakers demonstrate how self-censorship works. They show how ideas and stories, even before they take shape, disappear into a folder labelled ‘forgotten projects’. See Unseen is not only an indictment of repression, but also a testament to the will to continue speaking out and taking action despite everything.

The screening will be followed by a Q&A with filmmakers Firat Yücel and Sibil Çekmen.

In a parched village in Gujarat, somewhere in the early 1940s in British colonial India, the landscape is tinged red with dust and ground chillies. Here works the fearless Sonbai, whose refusal to submit sparks a rebellion. When a corrupt tax collector sets his sights on her, Sonbai refuses to be treated as property. Her slap in his face is not only an act of personal defiance, but also the beginning of a collective struggle.

What follows is an escalating power struggle that divides the village. Whilst male village leaders vacillate between fear and opportunism, Sonbai and the other women seek refuge in the factory. Behind its thick walls, they engage in conversations about sex, love and freedom that contrast with the hypocrisy of the men, who place honour and property above all else.

Director Ketan Mehta weaves a gripping village drama with sharp criticism of patriarchal power, caste hierarchy and colonial oppression. Carried by actress Smita Patil, the film unfolds as a passionate parable of resistance in which women, armed with chilli peppers and stubbornness, decide to fight back.

Crawling and burrowing creatures – discover the world beneath your feet.

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

Join us on a journey through one of the most heart-wrenching adventures in film history: the official account of the gruelling 1924 Everest expedition. John Noel, a 23-year-old mountaineering veteran armed with a camera, filmed George Mallory and Sandy Irvine as they ventured towards the summit. Whilst the two climbers pressed on, Noel remained behind at Camp 3, helplessly following their progress through his telephoto lens. He would, however, prove to be the sole survivor of the mission.

Noel, himself a passionate climber, set new standards for documentary filmmaking with this film. As a 23-year-old veteran, he had secretly come closer to the mountain than any other foreigner, until Tibetan soldiers sent him back. The result is a haunting portrait of human ambition, layered through stages of pain and triumph. The question with which he concludes The Epic of Everest: “If you had lived as they did, and died in the heart of nature, could you wish for a more beautiful grave?”

This screening takes place to mark the publication of the book Schijnwereld: filmkritieken 1919-1935 by Joseph Roth. Editor Steven Jacobs will introduce the film with a short talk on Roth’s film criticism and his views on the film.

With live piano accompaniment by Tom Van der Schueren.

Feel the wind in your hair and the sun on your face; Kinoautomat sweeps you into summer with this visually stunning cinematic dream.

Voci Nel Tempo (Voices Through Time) is one of the unsung masterpieces by Italian filmmaker Franco Piavoli. Virtually devoid of dialogue, the film explores the human condition through a series of actions, glances and landscapes. As the seasons pass in a sleepy Lombard village, life unfolds. Farmers plough the land, young couples chat, and preparations are made for the annual village festival. By focusing on small moments of everyday beauty and struggle, Piavoli succeeds in finding a timeless quality within the village’s microcosm.

Our guest speaker will present an anthology on wordless cinema. Whilst in early cinema characters were silenced by technical limitations, contemporary filmmakers continue to draw on the haunting beauty of silence. Piavoli’s observational films thus build upon a lost visual language to rediscover a form of resignation.

This screening will be introduced by Kleo Van Ostade.

Film-Plateau transports you to the bustling, hallucinatory Shinjuku of the 1960s, where Toshio Matsumoto ignited the Japanese New Wave with Funeral Parade of Roses. In one of the earliest, most radical queer films from East Asia, Toshio Matsumoto blends documentary, avant-garde montage and playful metafiction into a thrilling portrait of the ‘gay boy’ subculture, where labels such as ‘drag’, ‘gay’ or ‘trans’ were still fluid. With his keen eye for the fringes of society, Matsumoto reveals not only the glamour but also the grim reality behind the glittering facades of Shinjuku’s nightlife.

This loose adaptation of the Greek tragedy Oedipus Rex follows Eddie, a gender-nonconforming hostess trying to navigate a city that both celebrates and rejects her. This leads to a psychosexual awakening and numerous romantic rivalries. No exoticising gaze, but an invitation to step inside Eddie’s mind. There we are introduced to her desires, traumas and gender euphoria. With echoes of Derek Jarman, yet entirely unique in its queer rebellion, Funeral Parade of Roses is a poetic sledgehammer blow that still tingles and provokes.

This screening will be introduced by Japan-Square organiser Floor Meesen

Weird Wednesday packs her suitcase for an unparalleled campy crime caper. Forget James Bond and open your heart to Diabolik: a master thief who conquers the underworld in tight latex. Accompanied by his girlfriend Eva Kant and armed with an arsenal of high-tech gadgets, this suave super-criminal plans a series of stunning heists that leave many a law enforcement officer eating their hat. When his eye falls on a substantial hoard of gold, however, our anti-hero faces a challenge that pushes his cunning to the limit.

It comes as no surprise that Danger: Diabolik sprang from the mind of giallo master Mario Bava. Based on Italian comic books and silent-era villains such as Fantomas and Irma Vep, the film is Bava’s ode to the poetry of pulp. Danger: Diabolik strings together a series of stylistic sensations that will make your eyes pop with visual fireworks. Like a pop art explosion, the film blazes with psychedelic visuals and absurdist daring, all set to a roaring pop soundtrack by Ennio Morricone. A devilish treat to round off the season.

This screening is preceded by the short film CHLORINE by Zayd Hamzane.

In the Montréal metro, Raoul and Béatrice’s eyes meet, and suddenly the city seems to shift ever so slightly. He is a rock star activist with grand plans; she is a nocturnal flâneuse who hands out books to the homeless. Every Thursday evening, Béatrice meets up with her friends Constance and Eugène to dream aloud of a poetic uprising. Constance broadcasts politically charged sound art via an independent radio station, and Eugène has been writing a novel for years that never seems to be finished. When Raoul appears in their world, their small circle suddenly begins to resonate with grander revolutionary fantasies.

This hypnotic, fragmentary ode to resistance hovers between essay, fiction and daydream, imbued with the spirit of Godard and Debord. Film, video, archive footage and glitching phone screens intertwine. Playing with the boundaries between fiction and autobiography, between activism and performance, the characters and the city itself slowly begin to awaken from their apathy, ready for a revolution that might spring from books, sound waves and a handful of friends in a dark room.

This screening will be introduced by filmmaker Émilien Dubuc and preceded by the 16mm short film La Plage (1991).

Join us in discovering this enchanting gem from the Japanese underground cinema scene. A former star from the silent film era enlists the help of a private detective and his assistant to track down her kidnapped daughter. Soon, the trio finds itself in a labyrinth of obscure clues and archetypal villains. What follows is a game of cat and mouse in which the boundaries between the harsh underworld of the 1950s and the silent film world of the 1920s blur. Reality and illusion merge in a haze of waking dreams, where magic, metafiction and mystery set the tone.

With no formal film training but a deep reverence for film history, the independent Japanese director Kaizô Hayashi made his debut in 1986 with this utterly unique ode to hard-boiled detective stories, old Tokyo and the mythical past of cinema. It was only years later, thanks to crowdfunding, that this film was rediscovered as a long-forgotten dream. To Sleep So as to Dream feels as though a lost romantic, a kindred spirit of Guy Maddin and Bi Gan, has conjured his vision directly onto celluloid.

This screening will be introduced by Kuleshov dreamer Tim Maerschand.