This film was shot between 2014 and 2019 in the town of Zhili, a district of Huzhou City in Zhejiang province, China. Zhili is home to over 18,000 privately-run workshops producing children's clothes, mostly for the domestic market, but some also for export. The workshops employ around 300,000 migrant workers, chiefly from the rural provinces of Yunnan, Guizhou, Anhui, Jiangxi, Henan and Jiangsu.
A cop in Singapore investigates the disappearance of a Chinese migrant construction worker who spent sleepless nights playing a mysterious video game.
When a daughter becomes concerned about her mother's well-being in a retirement home, private investigator Romulo hires Sergio, an 83-year-old man who becomes a new resident—and a mole inside the home, who struggles to balance his assignment with becoming increasingly involved in the lives of several residents.
It follows Marija an ice skater who lives with her father. When her father's girlfriend moves in, Marija realizes that she cannot trust her. The love of a young businessman will give her the strength to accept herself and her sexuality.
In this enveloping second part of the Youth trilogy, shot between 2015 and 2019, Wang Bing deepens his vérité portrait of a generation struggling to survive on meager wages amidst a nation’s economic expansion, emphasizing the distrustful, increasingly combative relationship between workers and management.
Luka, a young and ambitious soldier, embeds himself in the legendary Fort Kairos where heroic warriors defend the remains of civilization. His hopes to serve as an elite sniper are crushed when he is assigned to maintenance and must submit to the code of Kairos: obedience-endurance-sacrifice.
After his wife's death, a vallenato singer from Majagual, Sucre, decides to quit music and return his allegedly cursed accordion to his master. He is joined by Fermín Morales, a teenage boy who admires him and wishes to follow his footsteps. Together, they start a journey throughout several towns in Northern Colombia to Taroa, in La Guajira desert, where the singer's master supposedly lives.
Nine year old Sara befriends a newborn dragon, together they will turn Christmas upside down and literary put it on fire.
An amnesiac old man Zarlyk who after twenty-three years of ordeal in a foreign land, returns to his homeland. Events take place in a village in Kyrgyzstan, where he is brought by his matured son Kubat. Much has changed during his absence: the morals of the villagers, mired in the realities of a changing world, radicalization of Islam, growing crime, and moral corrosive corruption began to consume... Zarlyk’s wife Umsunai, having lost hope of his return, went into religion, married the local authority Jaichy. The bright past invades the already accustomed Umsunai’s life. But nothing touches Zarlyk. An inexplicable passion for collecting garbage replaced him everything. Will the memory return to him and will Umsunai gain lost happiness when they are pressed by tight attitudes and immorality of the clergy, when love has eclipsed recklessness?
Centaur lives a modest life with his family in rural Kyrgyzstan until he abruptly becomes the center of attention when he is caught stealing a racehorse at night. A story inspired by the myth when horses became the wings of men.
This snackbar, owned by Ali, in a suburb of Rotterdam is a refuge for the local Moroccan youth. They are wild, violent and criminal. To them Ali is like an old, trustworthy Turkish uncle, understanding, funny but also strict. But what if Ali, with his addiction to gambling jeopardizes their habitat?
Ze, a 17-year-old, studies hard at school to succeed in the cold, callous society of modern Mongolia. When Ze encounters Maralaa, his senses are awakened and another reality seems possible.
A group of friends with Down Syndrome have been attending the same school for 40 years, and they are tired of being treated like children, they are grown-ups and want to live as such.
In the heart of the Middle East, a metropolis is mushrooming. In Dubai, the city where anything seems possible, one after the other skyscraper shoots up. To realise the property developers' plans, workers are called in from India, Pakistan and Nepal, who earn a mere pittance. Just like the nannies and cleaning women of well-to-do expats. Eighty percent of the inhabitants of Dubai come from other parts of the world, so who calls this city home? The original inhabitants saw the city change and now contend with religious and social taboos, something that completely passes by the average expat. In a photography class, students of various origins show how they experience the city. Apparently, original residents, expats and workers live mostly separate lives in a class society where the labourer is driven into the ground and the rich housewife thinks everyone in the city is happy.
The cross-frontier migrant's life 'within the system' - an endless, featureless, futureless round of queues - becomes even bleaker in December. Bipul doesn't want to admit it, but the arrival of Lidia, a Russian girl makes a difference. Hope? Surely not! A future? Get real! December is also the ninth month of Martina's pregnancy. But, just when the situation seems hopeless, help is at hand. A Christmas story.
The main hero of the film is an electrician with a far greater effect on the people around him than his job defines. He is the last link in a huge energetic system and he becomes the binding bridge between the geopolitical problems of post-soviet space and the common people. The economic devastation of the country had an enormous impact on the industrial workers and yet despite the upheaval, these people did not seize to love and suffer, to have and be friends and to enjoy their lives. In particular our resilient electrician, who possesses a wonderful and open heart. He not only brings electric light (which is often out) to the lives of the inhabitants of this small city, but he also spreads the light of love, loyalty, life and mainly laughter.
Vitaly, a nuclear physicist and record holder in extreme cold-exposure training, makes his living as a bricklayer and lives below the poverty line. While his parents, prominent scientists, reminisce about the glory of the regime they willingly built, the avowed patriot from Novosibirsk is gradually changing his mind about Putin's Russia. He rejects its capitalist nature and continues, as a radicalised blogger, to advocate the establishment of a juster regime. This intergenerational clash is typical of the countries of the former Soviet Bloc. While the older generation remembers the certainties and advantages of the past regime, the younger one is hopelessly mired in a crisis of authority, rejecting past and present political representation and resorting to extreme views. Like everything else in his life, Vitaly is experiencing his political awakening in an extreme way as the son of elites relegated to the social periphery after the collapse of the empire
Arnold is a clever student who has won many academic awards. One day, he meets Bee who has an underground business of helping students to cheat their exams. Bee asks Arnold to join his cheating ring and offers him a lot of money. While Arnold is considering working with Bee, at his school, many students are not happy with the school’s disrespect of their freedom and they organize a big protest.
Headbutt portrays the desire of Tobias (15) to restore the old relationship he had with his brother Lucas (18). While they used to do everything together, Lucas now has no interest in his younger brother anymore. When Tobias fantasizes that Lucas will commit suicide, Tobias has no other option than to restore the relationship with his isolated brother.
On a bridge, one night, a stabbing. There is Pouga. And there is Julien. The film shows the parallel destiny of these two young men who look alike without knowing each other.
