Synopsis: An unflinching portrait of the one-of-a-kind politician Sam Sullivan who has become the face of Vancouver on the international stage. Citizen Sam, the quadriplegic city councillor in a pinstripe suit, was elected Mayor of Vancouver, Canada. With unprecedented insight, director Joe Moulins blends the rough and tumble of the campaign with intimate moments from Sullivan's daily life. A brutally frank and funny video diary counts down the days to the election.

Awards - Recognition : Canada, Victoria, Independent Film & Video Festival 2006-7. 

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Synopis: Mat Fraser, successful musician, actor, performer and television presenter, has birth defects caused by thalidomide-containing drugs administered to his pregnant mother. Fraser sets out on the fiftieth anniversary of its discovery to track down this notorious drug. His search takes him to Brazil, where it is still prescribed, and where a new generation of "thalidomide kids" is growing up. And thalidomide is enjoying an astonishing comeback even in Europe. Kim Flitcroft has for many years worked as a documentary filmmaker and director for TV plays in Great Britain.

 

 

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Synopsis: The film Phoenix Dance shows us the beauty and strength of one individual who defies our expectations of what it means to be “disabled.”  Dancer Homer Avila had – who had been dancing with Twyla Tharp, Bill T. Jones and Mark Morris – his right leg and most of his hip amputated. The film is an intimate poem, revealing that when heart and will are joined, the impossible happens. Through interviews, studio rehearsals, and theatre performances, we witness a deeply-moving collaboration. Interdependence, trust, and the process of “strength-building” by overcoming challenges in life, come visually alive. Three years after his amputation, Homer dies. He had disclosed his decision to keep dancing and not go into treatment to only a few people. While Homer’s death did not affect the making of the film, it only made it more essential that his legacy live on. 

 

 

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Synopsis: Katja, aged 16, and Catherine, aged 8, both have a unique relationship to music, to nature and to sensation in general. Katja and Catherine are blind, but have developed their other senses and use them more keenly than most people. The director, Erlend E. Mo, depicts the girls; interpreting their sense-based, subjective experience of the world, which is as rich as a world observed by a seeing person, just different. The film represents the intimacy and intensity of the girls’ environment in few words, thus allowing the viewer to partake in a poetic experience and perceive an old world afresh. 

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Synopsis:The 39-year old dancer and choreographer from Cologne Gerda König suffers from muscular atrophy. Since her body doesn’t produce any muscular tissue she lives a life without power in her arms and legs. She depends on the electric wheelchair. But on stage a fascinating personality is unfolded.
The movie not only shows the artistic genesis of the dance piece “Countercircles” in Nairobi, but also offers an unusual insight into eastern African culture and way of living. Five disabled and non-disabled dancers were chosen for the performance, most of them coming from the slums of Nairobi. In addition there were two dancers of the permanent German ensemble.

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Synopsis: We see Elena Wiele at her martial arts training. She has cerebral paresis. The body learns to store motion patterns by repeating sequences of movements until they are indelibly written into the muscular memory. But what if there are gaps in this memory? What if every action, every step, every movement has constantly to be called up afresh via the thinking brain? The film shows her daily battle with a "damaged" body and her battle with a non-disabled world. 

 

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Synopsis: Domenique has Tourette Syndrome. As he says himself, it’s a bit like having hiccups in your brain. What is it like when other children make fun of him because of the faces he pulls? How does he feel when his involuntary head movements make people stare at him as though he “had a screw loose”? Inside himself Domenique feels just the same as all the other boys of his age – if it weren’t for these tics. Domenique doesn’t hide himself away. He likes company. Most important of all, he has found friends that accept him and understand him. This film was made for the children’s television  series “Stark! (Strong) – children talk about themselves”.

 

 
Awards - Recognition: Short Film Festival Muenchen "Wie wir leben" 2005, Filmfestival in India 2005 (Chennai) First Price Koelner Medienpreis 2006.

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Synopsis: Since she was very young, Arielle has always dreamed of going on stage. Although she was born deaf, she started dancing at three, then studied acting and mime. Thanks to her determination, Arielle has learned to fulfil her dreams despite her handicap. At seventeen, she decides to take an audition for a famous dance school in New York and hopes to become a professional dancer. 

Bio: Jan-Marc Descamps has studied cinematography techniques (montage, managing actors, operating multicamera, screen-play writing). He has been making short films and documentaries sing the age of eighteen. Since 1994 he has been involved with the theme of "disability and art".  

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Synopsis: Ten years ago, Montrealer Paul Nadler was a go-getter person. Then he was found alone on a road in Egypt, without clothes, comatose after a car accident that caused him Traumatic Brain Injury. He had been left for dead. He was only 30. Braindamadj'd…Take II documents Nadler's gutsy, manic determination to regain his previous life. It features Nadler's often sardonic comments on his progress, and the observations of key people involved in his recovery. An intensely personal account, the film traces the excruciating process of recovery, both physical and psychological, containing a startling surprise in the end.

 

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Synopsis: An experimental, humanistic and informal examination of living with blindness. Conversations with three South Australian women are illustrated on film. Animation, time-lapse photography and many other methods of abstraction invite the viewer to celebrate the beauty of the women's unique perspectives. Described by Realtime OnScreen magazine as “a visual treat”.  

 

 

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Synopsis: Dreaming Sideways is an experimental short documentary about three unordinary ways of “seeing”. Shot entirely on super 8 and 16 mm, the film explores a world and dreams of three blind artists, by unique and evocative use of sound, images and animation. Dreaming Sideways explores the dreams and experiences of three individuals, whose primary experiences of the world are other than visual. 

 

 

 

Awards - Recognition: B09/05 291 Gallery,Film artist event, Hackney, London.
11/05 Brief Encounters International Short Film Festival, Bristol 2005,Best of British category / Nov 05. 12/05 The Horse Hospital, London,Masters Graduation Program from Goldsmiths College, London. 02/06 Broadcast on Sky YouTV ‘Shortcutters’ program with director’s interview. 02/06 Screened at Shortcutters Film Festival, London.03/06 Ofensiva Film Festival, Wrocaw, Poland
05/06 Royal Television Society Student Awards, UK -nomination in the national, postgraduate, non-factual category. 09/06 Vilnius Film Shorts – European Film School Festival . 

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Synopsis: Jolieke hasn’t had it easy so far. Not only did her father die 8 years ago, she also has a chronic immune system disease. This means she has to go to the hospital every two weeks for a drip which often makes her tired. Her little sister has the same illness and together they also share their pains and frustrations. Jolieke and her sister show us that sometimes sadness and bad luck are just part of life.

 

 

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Synopsis: Self Preservation brings to life Lehrer’s paintings of influential thinkers, artists, and activists from within the Chicago disability rights movement. As a result, viewers learn about disability as a political, social, and revolutionary identity of our times, and how a new mode of being disabled is taking shape at the beginning of the 21st century. 

 

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Synopsis: “I was angry when I lost my sight. Painting seemed a way of shoving my disability right back in the face of God, or nature, or whatever. Funny how things seem to right themselves though. Through painting I found a calmness that I had not known since before my vision had gone”. Bramblitt profiles artist John Bramblitt’s refusal to let the loss of his vision restrict his ability to paint, and documents the profound emotional and physical process he goes through with each new painting. 

 

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Synopsis: Robert Jurczyga is 23 and has been in prison since he was 15. He participates in a rehabilitation programme initiated by the prison and an institution for the mentally handicapped in Krakow. Every day, Robert works at the institution, mainly with children and adolescents. Though nervous and awkward at first, Robert soon discovers a different life from the chilly, gray-blue silence in prison. He is strict when necessary, but also sings and dances with the children, holds their hands in the game. He  discovers the world of feelings and foremost the emotional thrill of human contact and communication.

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Synopsis: Τwo women who were born without their left arms meet over the internet and develop a kinship based on their mutual feelings of self-consciousness about their residual limbs. Both women are only comfortable when concealing their stumps. But what happens when the two women meet for the first time in New York City to challenge themselves to reveal their stumps? What ensues is a battle of body-image righteousness instead of the understanding and connection that was hoped for. In spite of these “growing pains”, a new sense of body image is established.

Bio: Diana Naftal is a founding member of ConnecTV – the only Television production program for people with disabilities in the United States. As a Licensed Clinical Social Worker, she has worked with abused children, women exposed to HIV, the homeless. As a professional actress, she has performed in many Off- Broadway productions.

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Synopsis: Przemek, a quadriplegic since birth, was unable to control the movements of his arms and legs and was also unable to speak. Until he was six he believed that he was the same as everyone else and that his mother understood the screeches which he considered to be his speech. The boy grew and matured, but everybody considered him stupid. To make matters worse, when he was eight years old, his mother – afflicted with a serious back problem – put him in a clinic. Przemek stayed there for another eight years, presumed to be a "vegetable". Gradually Przemek realized that nobody had any idea that mentally he was completely healthy. He tried to make contact by batting his eyelids, but it was no use. Finally, a miracle happened. Accidentally, a therapist discovered Przemek’s signaling and the boy’s life took a new turn. At the age of sixteen he began to learn Bliss, a system of pictorial symbols which enabled him to communicate with those around him for the first time. Although Przemek cannot speak, he now writes poems and songs and "shows how beautiful it is to live, despite or because of his handicap."

 

 

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Synopsis: Poet and novelist Claude Messier enjoyed a full life and a successful career despite a serious degenerative illness which deprived him from childhood of the use of all his limbs. The film presents the final days of this remarkable man. His battles for recognition of the right to work, to a decent life, to sexuality and to dignity in all forms. Claude Messier was one of the first Canadians to be permitted to smoke marijuana for therapeutic reasons. 

 

 

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Synopsis: What does “normal” mean? Yoshi (16) has Asperger Syndrome, a disorder related to autism. Recently he was transferred from a regular to a special school for the severely handicapped. Yoshi feels lost between two worlds. He dreams of a solution to become normal.

 

 

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Synopsis: Hannes Tiira is blind. On summer evenings he takes a solitary walk into a bird grove. He wants to hear their song every night, impatient for the unique “magic night”. “Each summer is blessed with one or two magic nights. These are the twilight hours between two very hot days, when the sound world of the grove intoxicates the mind: birds, birds, birds!”

 

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Synopsis: Anyone can be affected by mental illness. What if it were a workmate, a close friend or a member of your family? What if it were you? Six people living in Melbourne speak frankly and openly of their personal experience of mental illness, of the stigma of fear that people hold regarding mental illness, of the impact on the recovery when returning to work place, of bringing joy back into life.

 

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Synopsis: An epileptic seizure is a transient sign and/or symptom due to abnormal, excessive or synchronous neuronal activity, a “thunderstorm” in the brain. A seizure has various different causes. But an epileptic seizure alone is not what we call epilepsy – not until there occurred several seizures without obvious reason.
Three young reporters spent four weeks into a children’s clinic in Bielefeld to get to know their disease and to maybe overcome it. They are reporting on their problem in their little film. Kids Reporting is a weekly series in WDR. One of the main ideas is to give children a platform to present their topics from their own point of view. While making a film for TV the kids learn to use the medium television.

Bio: Anke Lehmann-Echternatcht kives and works in Köln, Germany. Journalist, director, producer and film-author for TV and youth welfare services: she teaches children how to make films and use the media.

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Synopsis: Kyra is 6 years old. From her birth on she’s paralysed. She’s drawing a penguin. She likes Penguins and visits them often in the zoo. She loves their waddling and their swimming and says: "I can do that too!".
Moreover she likes swinging, hopping on the springboard, stepping in puddles, riding the merry-go-round, playing handball and much more. And sometimes she’s dreaming of two Kyras. One of them is a fairy...

Awards - Recognition: Filmfest Weiterstadt 2002 (Germany).

 

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Parallel Section - Foreign Participations

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Synopsis: We follow a group of patients in the Attica Psychiatric Hospital, better known as “Daphni”. We visit them in two periods, seven years apart. Principal characteristic of these people is their struggle to survive in the psychiatric facility, through “personal expression”. The relationship between mental disorder and creativity is still an open question. Inside asylums the products of the more or the less creative moments of madness, made in secret, are destroyed immediately, either by the patients themselves or by the personnel. Those that survive remain forgotten in the deep institutional silence. Just as the inmates themselves remain forgotten, immobilized, neutralized, hermetically imprisoned, not only in the asylum but also in the enigma of their insanity.

 

 

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Synopsis: This is a film of a play entitled "Making a Film",  written by pupils of the High School for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing, in Aghia Paraskevi. The play was successfully performed by them  and their teachers at the Panhellenic Art Festival for Schoolchildren. A director is waiting for his actors on set, and when they finally arrive shooting begins. Nervous, slow, fast, sad, happy shots, until the best result is achieved. Making a film is tiring and never-ending. In the end, the cameraman was bored and fell asleep. The best shot was lost ... but  the joy of participating in the creative process is the true gain.

 

 

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Synopsis: Once upon a time, near a big city called Athens, there was a suburb called Nea Penteli. At Christmastime it would always snow there, near a beautiful house called Margarita (daisy). And then, suddenly, the sun came out and melted the snow, and Margarita blossomed and produced little buds. Lots of children gathered there, and they talked and ate and drank and played and worked and laughed and fell in love, and every day there was endless joy. And then, one morning, they decided together with their teacher to put on a show. They chose the traditional Japanese fairytale “The Girl with the Basket on her Head”.

Bio: He studied at the Lycourgos Stavrakos Film Schoοl. He had an important role in Theo Angelopoulos’ first feature Reconstruction. In 1975 he started producing for Greek television. In 1977 the public prosecutors banned his film A Hail of Bullets. Nikos Alevras is a pseudonym for a man who chose to live a bucolic life, and distanced himself  from the field of contemporary arts, where the only purpose is profit.

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Bio: Iris Zahmanidi studied Film-directing in Greece and Political Sciences and Marketing in the US. Her working experience includes the fields of cinema, television and culture. Besides being a director she works for the Hellenic Culture Organization. 

 

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Synopsis: Chip & Ovi met in an orphanage near the city of Kluj-Napoca in Romania, during their teenage years. They are disabled, Ovi was born with disabilities in his arms and Chip has a severely damaged leg from polio. Their mothers abandoned them shortly after they were born, and they have lived their formative years in state orphanages. They have been a couple for the past year and a half, and they are trying to cope with life, overcome their disabilities and poverty, as well as the problems in their relationship. They dream of having a good life, Chip wants to be an oilman in Texas and Ovi a professional cameraman. I shot the film on my own during ten days on location in Kluj-Napoca, without a professional production team or any financial or technical assistance, with only the help of Chip and Ovi.

 

 

World Premier 

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Synopsis: Stelios Payas is the “Masterpiece”, not only because of the interest he attracts through his zest for life, although he is quadriplegic, but also for the opportunity he offers us to re-examine the commonly accepted canons of aesthetics. Given that disability does not seem, by definition, to conform to these, Stelios challenges us to discover new aesthetic concepts, so that disability and beauty are not mutually exclusive.

 

 

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Parallel Section - Greek Participations