Synopsis

Nino, a gay teen from a deeply religious family, is the continual target of homophobic attacks by the neighborhood boys. His parents decide to temporarily move the family to a pious village in the countryside, where the legend of the Almamula — a monster that haunts the forest waiting to take those who commit impure acts — frightens the community’s youth into hushed submission. Amidst the summer heat, Nino’s desires and impulses are unignorable, and he finds himself seeking out temptation and sin. To escape from a reality rife with repression and hypocrisy, Nino willingly succumbs to the mysteries of the forest.

A rich and seductive fable, Carnal Sins is a darkly stunning first feature from Juan Sebastián Torales that blurs the borders of fantasy and reality, religion and myth.

Synopsis

Austrian filmmaker Jessica Hausner (Little Joe) returns to the director’s chair with a provocative thriller out of this year’s Cannes Film Festival. Mia Wasikowska (Alice in Wonderland, Crimson Peak) stars as Ms. Novak, a nutrition teacher at an elite prep school whose dogma of “conscious eating” quickly devolves into cult-like conformity for a group of seven teens. By the time their parents realize how extreme this so-called “Club Zero” has become, it may be too late to break Ms. Novak’s spell over her students.

A mannered, impeccably constructed combination of dry satire and gross-out body horror, Club Zero takes aim at Instagram “wellness” culture and social conformity. A typically controversial statement from an iconoclastic director, it’s bound to be the one of the most talked-about films at this year’s Festival.

Synopsis

The heartfelt story follows two 10-year-olds, Malik and Eric, as they revel in the freedoms of boyhood and the joys of friendship. The projects are their playground, and every stairway, roof, and stretch of blacktop is just another place for adventure. But when violence comes to their neighborhood, their safe haven is fractured, and Malik’s mother Dolores (Jurnee Smollett) must decide whether to stay or move away.