Synopsis

Matthias is a master of his profession. He’s the perfect chameleon, impeccably at ease in any social situation, wearing any costume, in any character’s skin. Do you need a “cultured boyfriend” to impress your friends?  A “perfect son” to influence your business partners? Or maybe just a sparring partner to rehearse an argument with a spouse? Whatever it is, Matthias is your man! And he is available for rent. Yet, while Matthias excels in all of these roles, just being himself with his partner and among his friends is a real challenge.

With an appealing absurdist tone and humor that deftly balances incisive wit with unbridled funny, Peacock takes the “rent-a” concept to the next level. Performance pieces that take delight in sending up the art world and sharp jabs at aspirational culture combine in this corrosive comedy that lays bare the darker essence of human relationships.

Synopsis

Transplanted from his African homeland to drug lord Pablo Escobar’s infamous Colombian compound, Pepe the hippo reflects on his tumultuous life in this bold, inventive cinematic essay. When Escobar abandons his plan for a private zoo, Pepe escapes to a nearby river, where his hulking presence unsettles the nearby fishing communities. The first and last hippopotamus ever killed in the Americas, he is feared and hunted. Through Pepe’s story, director Nelson Carlos De Los Santos Arias crafts a rich, layered narrative about displacement, dislocation, and the ecological consequences of human hubris. Pepe himself narrates a cacophony of events, from riverside beauty pageants to sentimental cartoons to historical inquiries. And his guttural, ghostly laugh is a constant presence in the film’s soundscape. Unpredictable and playful, Pepe is an unforgettable, immersive cinematic experience.

Synopsis

Through her decade-long quest to piece together fragments of her mother’s life, filmmaker Rachel Elizabeth Seed offers a moving and intimate portrait of Sheila Turner-Seed, who died a few months after Rachel was born. In her lifetime, Sheila shirked societal expectations by exploring the world as a journalist and photographer. Through a wealth of pictures, home movies, television interviews, and newly discovered audio recordings of conversations with iconic photographers such as Henri-Cartier Bresson and Gordon Parks, Seed pays homage to the thrilling life and impressive work of her mother as an artist, best known for her groundbreaking series “Images of Man.”

With inventive visual compositions that play with both cinematic and photographic forms, a hint of humor, and a nod to her mother’s Chicago ties, Seed explores questions of legacy, memory, feminism, and modern photography while attempting to close the gap between herself and the mother she never knew.

Synopsis

Pierre (Vincent Lindon, La Haine, Titane), a devoted father in his fifties, is raising his two sons alone in a “rust belt” city in northern France. While the brothers couldn’t be more different — athletic Fus spends his time on football and cage fighting, while Louis’s nose is buried in his books — the three form a tight-knit family. But as Louis immerses himself in his studies, Fus’s behavior becomes increasingly furtive and distant. When it becomes clear that Fus has been seduced by a local far-right group, an explosive rift develops between him and his union-leader father.

A sense of intimacy and urgency propels this timely family drama from writer-director sister duo Delphine and Muriel Coulin, as The Quiet Son grapples with questions of how to accept and find common ground with loved ones we no longer recognize. What can be forgiven, and what line is too far to cross? The always masterful Lindon stands out as a conflicted father who’s torn between love and hate and hope and despair.

Synopsis

This emotional comic journey follows mismatched cousins David (Jesse Eisenberg) and Benji (Kieran Culkin), who reunite for a tour through Poland to honor their beloved grandmother. But their adventure takes a turn when the odd couple’s old tensions resurface against the backdrop of their family history. Eisenberg, who also wrote and directed, has created a film that deftly mixes the humorous and the heartrending. Fueled by its witty and sophisticated script and winning performances, especially Culkin’s magnetic portrayal of the wild-card relative you can’t — and may not even want to — control, A Real Pain subtly transforms into a compassionate story of family, forgiveness, and resilience.