The document reviews several films, highlighting their themes and plots. 'Wild Canaries' features a couple investigating a suspicious death in their building, while 'Damnation' examines the shift in attitudes towards dam removal and its environmental impacts. Other films like 'Sweet Dreams', 'The Dark Valley', and 'Ida' explore themes of resilience, tradition, and identity against historical backdrops, each presenting unique narratives that reflect human experiences.

1. Wild Canaries
A freshly comedic take on classic film noir.
Barri (Sophia Takal) and Noah (writer-director Lawrence Michael Levine), a newly engaged Brooklyn couple, are
disheartened by the death of their elderly downstairs neighbor, Sylvia. Though Noah sees nothing unusual about the old
woman's death, Barri suspects foul play and sets out to investigate, enlisting her roommate Jean (Alia Shawkat) to join
her and trail a possible suspect. Tensions mount, however, when the investigation uncovers unsettling secrets
throughout the building—including in their own apartment—and suddenly everyone seems like a reasonable
suspect. Boasting a stellar supporting cast including Jason Ritter (Parenthood), Kevin Corrigan (The Departed), and
Annie Parisse (The Following).

2. DamNation
A sea change in national attitude.
This powerful film odyssey across America explores the sea change in our national attitude from pride in big dams as
engineering wonders to the growing awareness that our own future is bound to the life and health of our rivers. Dam removal
has moved beyond the fictional Monkey Wrench Gang to mainstream. Where obsolete dams come down, rivers bound back
to life, offering wild fish the right of return to primeval spawning grounds, after decades without access. DamNation’s
majestic cinematography and unexpected discoveries move through rivers and landscapes altered by dams, but also
through a metamorphosis in values, from conquest of the natural world to knowing ourselves as part of nature.

3. Sweet Dreams
Bringing ice cream to Rwanda.
This film follows a remarkable group of Rwandan women as they emerge from the devastation of genocide to create a new
future for themselves. Kiki started Ingoma Nshya, Rwanda's first and only women's drumming troupe, open to women from
both sides of the conflict. There was only one requirement: to leave the categories of the past at the gate. For the women—
orphans, widows, wives and children of perpetrators—the group has been a place to begin to live again, to build new
relationships, to heal the wounds of the past. Yet the struggle to survive and provide for their families still persists. So when
Kiki came up with the idea to open Rwanda's first and only ice cream shop, the women were intrigued…

4. The Dark Valley
“The hills are alive with the sound of gunfire.”
Stephen Dalton, The Hollywood Reporter
Somewhere, high in the Alps, a lone rider makes his way along a hidden path and reaches a small village, tucked away
between the steep mountains. This stranger goes by the name of Greider and is met with blatant distrust from the village.
The sons of Old Brenner, the village patriarch, who holds the entire community under his threatening, violent ways would
have chased him away if Greider hadn't given them a fistful of gold coins. Greider introduces himself as a photographer, and
Brenner's sons provide him with shelter for the winter at the house of widow Gader and her young daughter, Luzi. Soon to
be married to her sweetheart, Lukas, Luzi is full of trepidation as the big day draws near because, in this valley, a wedding
comes with a terrible tradition. And whoever opposes this tradition will be subjected to a merciless punishment.

5. The Galapagos Affair: Satan Came To Eden
Truth is stranger then fiction.
This film serves as a fascinating documentary portrait of a 1930s murder mystery as strange and alluring as the famous
archipelago itself. Fleeing conventional society, a Berlin doctor and his mistress start a new life on uninhabited Floreana
Island. But after the international press sensationalizes the exploits of the Galapagos’ “Adam and Eve,” others flock there—
including a self-styled Swiss Family Robinson and a gun-toting Viennese Baroness and her two lovers.

6. Ida
A moving and intimate drama about a young novitiate nun in 1960s Poland
18-year old Anna, a sheltered orphan raised in a convent, is preparing to become a nun when the Mother Superior insists
she first visit her sole living relative. Naïve, innocent Anna soon finds herself in the presence of her aunt Wanda, a worldly
and cynical Communist Party insider, who shocks her with the declaration that her real name is Ida and her Jewish parents
were murdered during the Nazi occupation. This revelation triggers a heart-wrenching journey into the countryside, to the
family house and into the secrets of the repressed past, evoking the haunting legacy of the Holocaust and the realities of
postwar Communism.

7. Supermensch
Capitalist, protector, hedonist, pioneer, showman, shaman. . .
Mike Myers documents the astounding career of Hollywood insider, the loveable Shep Gordon, who fell into music
management by chance after moving to LA straight out of college. Shep befriended Janis Joplin, Jim Morrison, and Jimi
Hendrix. He managed rock stars such as Pink Floyd, Luther Vandross, Teddy Pendergrass, and Alice Cooper, and later went
on to manage chefs such as Emeril Lagasse, ushering in the era of celebrity chefs on television. Stuffed with fantastic
archivial footage, the film traces Shep’s transformation from the 1970s hedonist to today’s practicing Buddhist.

8. Blood and Circumstance
“Sometimes no matter how hard you try, you just don’t get what you want.”
Adapted from the 2006 novel by Fairhope’s own Frank Turner Hollon, Blood and Circumstance is the story of inmate Joel
Stabler. Joel is being examined by a psychiatrist charged with determining whether he is fit to stand trial. The result is both a
psychological puzzle box filled with questions in a world where there are no easy answers, and a chilling story full of
unexpected twists and turns.

9. Maravilla
A true underdog story
This film follows Argentinian boxer Sergio “Maravilla” Martinez as he sets out to reclaim the title of Middleweight
champion. Director Cadaveira offers a fascinating glimpse into today’s boxing landscape. Revealing the politics of
the sporting profession that often places entertainment value over the sport itself.

10. The Trip to Italy
Buon Appetito !
Michael Winterbottom’s largely improvised 2010 film, The Trip, took comedians Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon on a
restaurant tour around England. In this witty follow-up, he reunites the pair for a new culinary road trip, retracing the steps of
the Romantic poets’ grand tour of Italy and indulging in some sparkling banter and impersonation-offs. The two enjoy
mouthwatering meals in gorgeous settings from Liguria to Capri while riffing on subjects as varied as Batman’s vocal
register, the artistic merits of “Jagged Little Pill,” and, of course, the virtue of sequels.

11. Young and Beautiful
Jeune et Jolie
Acclaimed director François Ozon (In the House) helms this erotic tale of sexual awakening. After losing her virginity, 17-
year-old Isabelle takes up a secret life as a call girl, meeting her older gentlemen clients for erotic hotel room trysts.
Throughout, she remains curiously aloof, showing little interest in the encounters or in the money she makes. Ozon slyly
refrains from offering easy answers. As the enigmatic Isabelle, Marine Vacth is magnetic, delivering a star-making breakout
performance in this sleek and sexy coming-of-age drama.