78TH Foreign Language Film Submissions

Pinocchio, written and directed by Matteo Garrone, is based on the 1883 Italian children classic The Adventure of Pinocchio by Carlo Collodi.   The familiar story, popularized worldwide by the Disney cartoon of 1940, is retold with renewed accuracy to the original version.

Asuran (Demon) is a Tamil language action drama written and directed by Vetrimaaran and produced by Kalaipuli S. Thanu.

Rome, Italy, the early 1980s: four friends, Giulio, Gemma, Paolo and Riccardo are 16 and have their whole life ahead of them. The Best Years, co-written and directed by Gabriele Muccino, is a heartfelt story about a friendship among four people that starts when they are teenagers in the tumultuous early 1980s.

Three-time National Award winner, Dr. Bijukumar Damodaran’s film, Trees Under the Sun is a saga of a deprived and underprivileged family belonging to the Dalit (untouchable) community of India.

The Goddess of Fortune (La Dea Fortuna), by Turkish-Italian director Ferzan Ozpetek, is the story of a gay couple in crisis, whose daily routine is upended when their best friend Annamaria (Jasmine Trinca) asks them to take care of her children, Martina, 12, and Sandro, 9, while she is undergoing diagnostic tests for migraines in a Rome Hospital. Arturo (Stefano Accorsi) is a frustrated writer working from home as a translator, Alessandro (Edoardo Leo) a successful plumber who goes out to his job every day and supports the family.

For any enthusiast of space exploration, Yuri Gagarin will forever be known as the first man ever to journey into space. His fame was such that after his 1961 orbital voyage, the Soviet cosmonaut travelled around the world to receive kudos.

In her third movie, Between Heaven and Earth, Palestinian director, Najwa Najjar, continues to explore her nation’s plight through the eyes and experiences of her characters. Here a handsome middle-class couple, Tamer, played by Firas Nassar (Fauda, Foxtrot), and Salma, played by Mouna Hawa (In Between), are trying to get divorced, but the court rejects their petition because Tamer’s identity papers don’t match the court records, so they embark on a road journey across Israel and Palestine, searching for his roots.

In her narrative feature debut, Oscar-nominated documentarian Heidi Ewing (Jesus Camp), brings to the screen I Carry You with Me, a poignant and heartfelt film based on the real-life love story of Ivan Garcia and Gerardo Zabaleta. The movie unfolds in three separate timelines: we move seamlessly between our protagonist’s childhood and early adulthood, where a very closeted Ivan (Armando Espitia) first meets Gerardo (Christian Vazquez) at a gay bar, to finally middle age, where the real men play themselves.

Following the disappearance of his 6-year-old son, who went missing while on a trip with his father, Elena (played by Marta Nieto) is desperate to find him. This was the premise of Madre, a short film directed by Spanish director Rodrigo Sorogoyen, winner of a Goya Award in 2017 and nominated for an Oscar in 2020.

We are a lot happier with 0. 05 percent alcohol in our blood.