Winner:  Best Screenplay, Cannes Film Festival, 2011

Footnote is the tale of a great rivalry between a father and son. Eliezer and Uriel Shkolnik are both eccentric professors, who have dedicated their lives to their work in Talmudic Studies. The father, Eliezer, is a stubborn purist who fears the establishment and has never been recognized for his work. While his son, Uriel, is an up-and-coming star in the field, who appears to feed on accolades, endlessly seeking recognition. Then one day, the tables turn. When Eliezer learns that he is to be awarded the Israel Prize, the most valuable honor for scholarship in the country, his vanity and desperate need for validation are exposed. His son Uriel, meanwhile, is thrilled to see his father's achievements finally recognized but, in a darkly funny twist, is forced to choose between the advancement of his own career and his father's. Will he sabotage his father's glory? Footnote is the story of insane academic competition, the dichotomy between admiration and envy for a role model, and the very complicated relationship between a father and son.


“It's one of the smartest and most merciless comedies to come along in a while. It centers on an area of fairly narrow interest, but in its study of human nature, it is deep and takes no prisoners.“  -Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun Times

Whit Stillman's DAMSELS IN DISTRESS follows a trio of beautiful girls who set out to revolutionize life at a grungy East Coast College the dynamic leader Violet Wister (Greta Gerwig), principled Rose (Megalyn Echikunwoke) and sexy Heather (Carrie MacLemore). They welcome transfer student Lily (Tipton) into their group which seeks to help severely depressed students with a program of good hygiene and musical dance numbers. The girls become romantically entangled with a series of men -- including slick Charlie (Brody), dreamboat Xavier (Hugo Becker) and the mad frat pack of Frank (Ryan Metcalf) and Thor (Billy Magnussen)who threaten the girls' friendship and sanity.

The acting and the music are delightful, the jokes arrive on schedule, and everything sort of glows. -Newsday

Even were it not so delightful, Damsels in Distress, set at a fictional upper-crust college, would deserve a watch for its dialogue alone. -NPR

[A] digressive, whimsical, silly and ridiculously fun movie... -Salon.com

Stillman and his actors do things that you just don't see and that you wish the movies had more of. -Oregonian

WINNER: BEST FILM - Golden Globes, Italy
NOMINATED: BEST FILM - Cannes Film Festival

Nanni Moretti joins forces with the great French actor Michel Piccoli to tell the story of Melville, a cardinal who suddenly finds himself elected as the next Pope. Never the front runner and completely caught off guard, he panics as he's presented to the faithful in St. Peter's Square. To prevent a world wide crisis, the Vatican's spokesman calls in an unlikely psychiatrist who is neither religious or all that committed, played by Moretti, to find out what is wrong with the new Pope. As the world nervously waits outside, inside the therapist tries to find a solution. But Cardinal Melville is adamant: he does not want the job, or at least needs time to think it over. What follows is a marvelous insight into the concept of a human being existing behind the title of God's representative on Earth.

"WE HAVE A POPE has great heart" -Roger Ebert

"Mr. Moretti finds broad comedy in the antics of some clerics, who can seem as sweet as children, but in Melville there is pathos and there is tragedy, and not his alone." -New York Times

"We Have a Pope" is a nuanced, moving and profoundly humane exploration of doubt, faith, weakness and resolve." -Washington Post

Winner of the Grand Jury Prize at this year’s Cannes Film Festival, this deeply moving new film by the Dardenne Brothers delves into the emotional life of troubled 11-year-old Cyril (newcomer Thomas Doret). When his father (Jérémie Renier) abandons him, Cyril obsessively tries to find his bicycle—after all, his father must have cared about him enough not to sell that off, he reasons. Almost by accident, he becomes the ward of a kind hairdresser (Cécile de France), a woman who seems surprised to find herself so determined to help him. With his wild, unpredictable behavior and his disastrous search for father figures, Cyril risks losing her—though she refuses to give up without a fight. Full of heartbreaking betrayals and unexpected grace, The Kid with a Bike is a film about a child, abandoned to the elements, learning to become good.


“A quietly rapturous film about love and redemption.”  Manohla Dargis, New York Times

Winner:  Grand Jury Prize at Cannes Film Festival 2011

As teachers, administrators, kids and parents struggle to find answers, The Bully Project examines the dire consequences of bullying through the testimony of strong and courageous youth. Through the power of their stories, the film aims to be a catalyst for change in the way we deal with bullying as parents, teachers, children and society as a whole.

"A documentary as vivid as any horror film, as heartbreaking as any Oscar-worthy drama." -Time

"Bully forces you to confront not the cruelty of specific children - who have their own problems, and their good sides as well - but rather the extent to which that cruelty is embedded in our schools and therefore in our society as a whole."  -The New York Times

“The best social documents on film do more than show you what's wrong in the world - they make it personal. Bully does that with a passion.”  -Peter Travers, Rolling Stone