Seven films from seven countries. Take a trip around the globe without ever leaving the comfort of your theater seat! See a diverse assortment of the best new works from the far ends of the earth.

Buy a Foreign Film Festival Passport and see all the films at a reduced rate - only $45. That's only $6.42 per film. Get your Festival Passport or purchase tickets to individual shows.	All films will be presented at: Mill Hill Playhouse Front and Montgomery Trenton, NJ  08608 (609) 989-3038
Questions? Call our Festival Hotline. Hours: 9am-9pm. Phone: 215-370-2200

Three Monkeys

[Turkey/France/Italy 2008, 108 min.] Turkish w/ English subtitles.

After his critically acclaimed mood pieces Distant and Climates, Turkey’s leading filmmaker moves in a more plot-driven direction while retaining his mastery of ambience, nuance and astonishing cinematography.

Winner of the Best Director prize at Cannes, Three Monkeys tells a twisty, noirish tale that opens with an ambitious politician fleeing a hit-and-run accident. Afraid of hurting his election chances, he pays off his chauffeur Eyüp to take the rap. The film concerns the effects of this devil’s bargain on Eyüp’s family as simmering tensions and sexual intrigue wreak havoc in a household already haunted by hidden ghosts.

In the spirit of Buñuel’s The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie and Haneke’s Caché, Three Monkeys mounts a caustic critique of the bourgeois family, riddled with hypocrisy yet stubbornly resilient in its seemingly boundless capacity to sidestep guilt and accountability. Cannes Film Fest Winner-Best Director. Directed by Nuri Bilge Ceylan.

South Desert

[Chile 2007, 100 min.] Spanish w/ English subtitles.

A woman in mourning takes a journey to rediscover a missing piece of her past in this drama from Chilean filmmaker Shawn Garry. Sofia (Marta Etura) is a top-ranked swimmer who is taking part in a major competition when she gets word that her mother has died. Sofia is devastated by the news, and while going through her late mother's effects she discovers that for many years her mother was having an affair with a man living in the desert community of Desierto Sur. Sofia wants to meet the man who meant so much to her mom, and sets out to find him with no idea of his current address or even if he's still alive. While making her way to Desierto Sur, Sofia picks up a traveling companion, a hitch-hiking punk rocker named Nadia (Carolina Varleta), but when the two catch a ride with Gustavo (Alejandro Botto), their luck takes a turn for the worse as they discover he's a drug runner wanted by the law. Desierto Sur received its North American premiere at the 2008 Guadalajara Film Festival. Directed by Shawn Garry.

$9.99

[Australia/Israel 2008, 78 min.]

The title of this inventive, enchanting stop-motion animated fable, $9.99, reflects the price of a mail-order book that promises to reveal the meaning of life to an unemployed slacker who lives at home with his blustery father. The investment is worth it for a movie ticket to an original universe of characters in search of contentment, including a boy in love with his piggy bank and a down-and-out suicide who returns to earth as a disgruntled angel. Using the droll, wise stories of Etgar Keret as her guide, Israeli filmmaker Tatia Rosenthal concocts an artful film that expresses deep thoughts, lightly. Directed by Tatia Rosenthal.

Big Man Japan

[Japan 2007, 113 min.] Japanese w/ English subtitles.

A middle-aged slacker living in a rundown, graffiti-ridden slum, Daisato’s (Matsumoto) job involves being shocked by bolts of electricity that transform him into a stocky, stick-wielding giant several stories high who is entrusted with defending Japan from a host of bizarre monsters. But while his predecessors were national heroes, he is a pariah among the citizens he protects, who bitterly complain about the noise and destruction of property he causes. And Daisato has his own problems—an agent insistent on branding him with sponsor advertisements, an Alzheimer-afflicted grandfather who transforms into a giant in dirty underwear, and a family who is embarrassed by his often cowardly exploits. A wickedly deadpan spin on the giant Japanese superhero, Big Man Japan is an outrageous portrait of a pathetic but truly unique hero. Directed by Hitoshi Matsumoto.

Laila's Birthday

[Palestine/Lebanon/Netherlands 2008, 71 min.] Arabic w/ English subtitles.

Judge Abu Laila (Mohamed Bakri) is forced to become a taxi driver when the government runs out of money to pay his wages. On the day of his daughter Laila's seventh birthday, his wife insists that he needs to be home early with a gift and a cake. Abu Laila has nothing on his mind other than completing this mission. However, the daily life in Palestine is a bit chaotic and takes him in many other directions before he gets home.

Drawing from the everyday tales of contemporary Palestine, director Rashid Masharawi concentrates his focus on a single day, crafting a wry comedy about a father, his daughter and the incongruities around them. Directed by Rashid Masharawi

“A fleet, dark urban comedy that registers outrage in glancing jabs of absurdist observation.” (Stephen Holden, New York Times)

“A vivid passenger seat tour of a society perpetually crashing into madness.” (Kevin Lee, Time Out New York)

No Time to Die

[Ghana/Germany 2006, 95 min.] In English.

Pioneering Ghanaian filmmaker King Ampaw's film is a charming comedy about the romantic travails of a lovestruck hearse driver. Asante, the hearse driver, meets and falls in love with a young, beautiful dancer who is planning an elaborate home-going celebration for her mother. The film follows Asante as he does everything to win the affections of the woman of his dreams. Death and funeral traditions play a significant role in African culture; No Time to Die is Ampaw’s contribution to passing the tradition onto the next generation. Ampaw, in only his third feature in a quarter-century, fully explores the color, absurdity and acceptance of social ritual in this delightful farce. Directed by King Ampaw.

Apron Strings

[New Zealand 2008, 90 min.] In English and Punjabi with English subtitles.

Food and love are intertwined in this tale of two mothers who must find the courage to confront the secrets and misunderstandings of the past, in order to set their sons free. Apron Strings is a parallel story of two families and two cultures set in suburban Otahuhu in South Auckland, New Zealand. It explores the boundaries of nurture and control, mothering and smothering, and how we sometimes have to let go of our individual sense of what is ‘right’, to do what is ‘good’ for all. As the Pakeha family struggles to move out of a co-dependent stalemate that stops them moving forward, our Indian family have to confront misunderstandings and secrets from the past that tore their family apart. At the heart of our stories are three women whose lives and livelihoods revolve around food. LORNA, in her old fashioned cake-shop; TARA, in her no-frills curry-house and ANITA on her stylish Indian cooking show on TV. Hard working Lorna must not only deal with her unemployed stay-at-home son BARRY and his chronic gambling addiction, but also reckon with a tragic past that haunts them both. Their co-dependant relationship is as habitual as any addiction. For the stylish and beautiful Anita, the host of her own TV cooking show, everything comes to a head when her son MICHAEL decides to meet her estranged sister Tara, and delve into a past that she cannot bear to face. And for the more traditional Tara, Michael’s arrival in her life opens up old wounds that challenge her seemingly peaceful life as a spinster.

A character driven story, Apron Strings delves into the tender yet complicated relationship between mother and child. Sometimes, in order to grow and forge new connections, old apron strings have to be cut loose.

Letting go, is the best embrace. Directed by Vaele Sima Urale.