Elefant Films

In a small village in the Danube Delta, where traditions are confronted with new material purposes, a teenage girl is becoming a woman. This is the story of Ryna, a 16 year old girl, working as an motor mechanic in Sulina, who strives to find her identity next to a father who is firmly denying her femininity.

Traumatized and suffering from amnesia after witnessing a terrible accident, a man who calls himself P.J. is admitted to a hospital, where psychiatrist Alan Shearson tries to get him on the path to recovery. But Dr. Shearson's boss wants to hand over the patient to the state mental ward, and the man's bitter ex-girlfriend is reluctant to help.

The film intertwines historical events and intimate memories. I observe how architecture represents the transformations of society and those who give form to this architecture. We follow the journey of Munio, my father, born in 1909 in Silesia, Poland, the son of a tenant farmer of a Prussian junker. At the age of 18, Munio goes to Berlin and Dessau to meet Walter Gropius, Kandinsky and Paul Klee at the Bauhaus. In 1933, the Bauhaus was closed by the Nazis, who accused Munio of treason against the German people. Munio was imprisoned, then deported to Basel. He left for Palestine. Upon his arrival in Haifa, he began a career as an architect and adapted European modernist principles to the Middle East.

A diverse cross-section of Israeli society converges in a single multi-use building, the Shikun. As people of different languages, origins and generations come together in highly theatrical encounters, they grapple with the current state of affairs. In a poignant metaphor inspired by Eugène Ionesco’s famous play “Rhinoceros”, some begin to turn into rhinoceroses, while others resist.

Jonathan Vogel (Guillaume Depardieu) would like to turn back the clock and undo the accident that led to his disability and destroyed his life. When he learns that Stivlas Karr (Carlo Brandt), a well-known professor and geneticist, has developed a gene therapy for regenerating the human body, he makes an appointment with him for some clinical tests. But the therapy doesnt go according to Professor Karrs plan and leads to unexpected results. Jonathan, whose life is now in danger, has become aware that there is only one person who can help him: Alice (Alysson Paradis), the professors daughter.

An unhappy family in a remote village in Calabria: Luisa is at war with the world since day one. She is juggling odd jobs, her love for her children and granddaughter, and her feuding with her mother, brother, and sister-in-law. While the two women exchange insults and call in the cops, three elderly aunts, a tragicomic chorus, try in vain to keep the peace.

At Milan’s Niguarda public hospital, the unconventional Dr. Bini leads a bold mission overseeing aspiring parents undergoing in vitro fertilization and the journeys of individuals reconciling their bodies with their gender identities. He navigates the constraints set by a conservative government and an aggressive market eager to commodify bodies.

Located on the île de la Cité, in the middle of the Seine, the Paris Law Court looks like an impenetrable fortress. Like Kafka’s castle, it guards its secrets well. It is the place of power. The filmmaker, who worked there for several years as a crime reporter, is extremely familiar with its labyrinthine spaces, its practices, its ceremonies. She comes back to it now, while the Courthouse, such as she knows it, is about to disappear: its relocation is planned in 2017. So, she explores it, camera in hand, on the traces of her experience.

An Italian descendent inherited 5000 hectares of virgin forest in Chaco Paraguaio. He tries to stop deforestation to intensive farming and livestock, while advocating for native Guaraní Nandevas.