Filmoption International

A fertilizer used in a rich gated community becomes the source of a genetic mutation that transforms its residents into zombies. Can a teenager and his baby sister break free from the quarantined island before turning into grass?

GAZA brings us into a unique place beyond the reach of television news reports to reveal a world rich with eloquent and resilient characters, offering us a cinematic and enriching portrait of a people attempting to lead meaningful lives against the rubble of perennial conflict. Throughout its entire history the Gaza Strip has been witness to conflict and upheaval. From ancient times this tiny coastal territory, located at a crossroads between continents, has been a pawn whose fate rested in the hands of powerful neighbours.

Why are we still able, today, to view images that were captured over 125 years ago? As we enter the digital age, audiovisual heritage seems to be a sure and obvious fact. However, much of cinema and our filmed history has been lost forever. Archivists, technicians and filmmakers from different parts of the world explain what audiovisual preservation is and why it is necessary. The documentary is a tribute to all these professionals and their important work.

From Gaza’s Jabaliya refugee camp, to the University of Toronto and the Supreme Court of Israel, I Shall Not Hate follows the uncharted path of Dr. Izzeldin Abuelaish, The first Palestinian doctor that worked in an Israeli hospital delivering babies, whose ethos of forgiveness and reconciliation is put to the ultimate test when an Israeli tank bombs his house, killing his three daughters. Against all odds, he turns his tragedy into a global campaign to eradicate hate.

The son of a wealthy Haitian presidential candidate has just been kidnapped. The kidnappers are demanding a hefty ransom. Doc and Zoe are two amateur gangsters - and soccer freaks - who must deliver the young man to their ruthless boss. Impulsive Zoe accidentally kills the candidate’s son. Faced with a terrible fate for killing their hostage, Doc and Zoe stumble upon Patrick and his nine-month-pregnant wife, Laura. The young couple must, at all costs, catch a flight out of Haiti to give birth in the US to get citizenship for their baby. Patrick’s great misfortune is that he looks ex- actly like the senator’s dead son. In the midst of a heated election and a Barça-Real classico match, Doc and Zoe find themselves at the center of a political conspiracy.

A woman finds herself isolated in her remote home with her brother who is seeking forgiveness for the darkest moment in their family history.

Lea Tsemel, a Jewish-Israeli lawyer, defends Palestinians: from feminists to fundamentalists, from nonviolent demonstrators to armed militants. As far as most Israelis are concerned, she defends the indefensible. As far as Palestinians are concerned, she’s more than an attorney, she’s an ally. «Advocate» follows Tsemel in real time, including the trial of a 13-year-old boy — her youngest client to date.

In the nearly 50 years since Israel's decisive victory in the 1967 Six-Day War, hundreds of thousands of Israeli citizens have established expanding communities in the occupied territories of the West Bank. Frequently coming into direct conflict with the region's Palestinian inhabitants, and facing the condemnation of the international community, the settlers have been viewed by some as the righteous vanguard of modern Zionism and by others as overzealous squatters who are the greatest impediment to the possibility of peace in the region.

Documentary and reflection about the effects of technology.

Social isolation affects millions of people, even Mars-bound astronauts. A savvy NASA psychologist is tasked with protecting these daring explorers.

Segregated, highly surveilled, heavily filmed and intensely guarded: H2 uncovers the ways in which a single neighborhood in Hebron fuels the entire Israeli-Palestinian conflict. 54 years of military occupation, told through the story of a one-kilometer long street.

Sharon-Rose Khumalo, a South African beauty queen, faces an identity crisis after discovering she's intersex. Her path crosses with Dimakatso Sebidi, a masculine-presenting intersex activist, as they both navigate a journey marked by society’s stigma and inner struggles. Intertwining raw reality with poetic beauty, Who I am Not captures the heart-wrenching fight for acceptance in a binary world.

On an idyllic country estate, three generations of women grapple with their family's involvement in the Holocaust. Wendi, the strong-willed matriarch, today lives on the farm of her uncle, Hitler's first foreign minister. While he was part of the regime, Wendi's mother, Irmgard, used her privileged position to help Jewish prisoners in the concentration camp built on their land.

Bedrock is a psychological journey across today’s Poland that weaves together stories of Poles living on Holocaust sites. Through a series of intimate encounters, this poetic film looks at the unsettling contradictions people learn to live with.

When a man living alone in the woods saves the life of a young woman, they are forced to coexist. Chaos ensues when the woman makes a terrifying discovery in the woods behind the man's home and unleashes something truly haunting.

A young would-be writer is forced to confront her past upon the return of her angry, wayward brother.

The mysterious and violent murder of a cashier in a remote small-town supermarket – sends her colleague, Orly Blaish, a conservative middle-aged family woman suffering from advanced muscular dystrophy, to a tense and turbulent journey into the depths of her sexual identity. She races to her sexual spring before her body betrays her.

Montreal, a multigenerational house loaded with books, paintings and knick-knacks, so many memories revived on the evening of one last Christmas Eve. Luc, a retired pediatrician and teacher in his eighties, lives with his son François, a pediatrician like his father, and François' wife Esther. Suffering and physically diminished, the old man has now decided to end his life. In a corrosive and sensitive verbal joust, he asks his son to end his days in privacy. The son then takes him on an existential and circus-like journey through the streets of Montreal where the father is supposed to go to his final destination, a hospital where he will be confronted with his ultimate wish: the choice between the finality of medical aid to die or a return to square one, the small pleasures of what remains of his life, alive.

Bombarded by thousands of images every day, are we still able to truly see them, especially those of conflict and its aftermath? Helen Doyle takes us on a quest for the meaning of images and discovers a vast palette of contrasting images which shock and compel.

Alexis, a talented and proud student of the National Ballet School of Cuba, spends his life practicing chassé and entrechats with his girlfriend and dance partner Yelenia. However, when his family moves to Florida to be reunited with his sister, he must adjust his expectations and dreams to a radically new environment. Alexis, facing rejection and homesick for his native Cuba, feels lost and alone. He must find his way in the world of American ballet while remaining faithful to his roots.