Georgi and the Butterflies
Dir: Andrey Paounuv
Bulgaria, 2004, 60 mins, col

Winner of the Silver Wolf Award at IDFA 2004. The fine line between brilliance and lunacy. Georgi and the Butterflies tells the story of a man and his dream.

Dr. Georgi Lulchev, a psychiatrist, neurologist, administrator, amateur chef, entrepreneur and Director of the Home for Psychologically Challenged Men, attempts to turn around the mismanaged hospital situated in a former 16th century monastery 20 km away from Sofia.

Dr. Lulchev works to create a farm where the patients can raise snails, ostriches and pheasants, produce silk fibres and soy bread. In a country where 80 percent of the population lives in poverty, every day is marked by the struggle to survive. To overcome the shortage of funds, the Director organises different activities for subsistence. During the last 15 years, Georgi has tried to implement some unconventional business ideas, failed and resumed his efforts with unflagging enthusiasm.

This is a story full of optimism, snails, ostriches, silk, charity, soy bread, schizophrenics, foreign investors, Western hunters, misery and compassion. Compassion, business and butterflies.

See the Georgi and the Butterflies website.

El Perro Negro - Stories from the Spanish Civil War
Dir: Péter Forgács
Netherlands/Hungary 2005, col/b&w

El Perro Negro - Stories from the Spanish Civil War is a poetic collage of amateur films and quotes of men and women who took part in the Spanish Civil War.

A personal documentary that gives an impression of the mood and time in which this class war took place.Joan Salvans Piero and Ernesto Diaz Noriega are the protagonists, their films and stories lead us through Spain in the thirties and forties of the last century. Ernesto, a middle class student from Madrid, survived the war. Joan, a Catalan industrialist, was killed six days after its outbreak.

Screening at
Aberdeen Belmont
Glasgow Film Theatre
Edinburgh Filmhouse
London Ritzy
Cambridge Arts Cinema
York City Screen
Manchester Cornerhouse
Sheffield Showroom

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The Swenkas
Dir: Jeppe Rønde.
Denmark 2004, 72 mins, col/b&w

This documentary is a portrait of the Swenkas, a small group of working men in post-apartheid South Africa. Men who take great pride in putting on a flashy suit and stand out as an inspiration for others.

Men who every Saturday night leave their grimy overalls behind and wear their best Carducci or Pierre Cardin suits to impress the weekly selected judge. But the group has to restructure when after their leader's demise, they have to find a new chief. Slowly the deceased leader's son, 31 year old Sabelo is being prepared to follow in his father's footsteps.

The film shows how the 'dressing up' is an integrated part of their spiritual and mental life - past, present and future.

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