NEW PERSPECTIVES ON ASIAN CINEMA

From April 5th to June 28th – 2025

Asian cinema returns to the Cine Paz theaters from April 5th to June 28th. Although it may seem like a cliché to say that Spanish distributors are increasingly interested in expanding their catalog of films from the Asian continent, the truth is that Asian cinema has gained greater presence not only in national and international festivals but also in our theaters. The thirteen titles scheduled between April and June 2025 come from Bangladesh, Cambodia, China, Korea, the Philippines, India, Iran, Japan, Kazakhstan, Nepal, Pakistan, Singapore and Uzbakistan, covering films produced between 2018 and 2023. Once You Know (2020) directed by Emmanuel Cappellin will open this quarter’s program.

The selection presented maintains a strong focus on social drama and gender themes, offering multiple perspectives that reflect the cultural identity of the protagonists. This is what these selected films tell us. Some of the featured titles include: Once You Know (Bangladesh), Last Night I Saw You Smiling (Cambodia), Looking for Rohmer (China), A Bedsore (Korea), Beautiful Pain – Belle Douleur (Philippines), Sherni (India), Odyssey of Solitude (Iran), Eternally Younger Than Those Idiots (Japan), The Assault (Kazakhstan), Moosa Lane (Pakistan), Temporary Visa (Singapore) and Aydinlar (Uzbekistan)

These announced titles provide us with a unique window into a world that we might not otherwise access, except through literature and cinema.

Saturday, April 5th, 2025, at 12:00 PM

Confronted with the reality of climate change and resource depletion, filmmaker Emmanuel Cappellin realizes that the collapse of our industrial civilization is inevitable. But how can we continue to live with the idea that the human adventure could fail? To find the answer, Cappellin decides to consult experts and scientists such as Pablo Servigne, Jean-Marc Jancovici and Susanne Moser. Together, they issue a collective and supportive manifesto to prepare a transition as humane as possible.

A documentary filmmaker on environmental and social issues, Emmanuel Cappellin is particularly interested in the different ways of understanding the relationship between man and nature and its consequences. For three years he has been working on the world premiere of Human, by Yann Arthus-Bertrand, and is currently working on his next film Woman, after directing Once you Know, a feature documentary produced by Pulp Films (France).

Saturday, April 12th, 2025, at 12:00 PM

The White Building in Phnom Penh, built as social housing during the 1960s, is about to be torn down. With the agreement of almost all of the 493 resident families, its demolition is intended to make way for a new project to build new flats. Hand in hand with its inhabitants, including his own family, the director portrays the last days of this dying mega-structure, which has witnessed Cambodia’s troubled recent history and which, with its disappearance, leaves only the memory of an era.

Kavich Neang is a filmmaker and director of photography. He was born in Cambodia and grew up with his family in the White Building in Phnom Penh. Throughout his career he has made both documentaries and fiction films. With the news of the eviction and demolition of the White Building, Neang decided to return to the past of his childhood with this last documentary, in order to understand a reality in which this place no longer exists.

Saturday, April 19th, 2025, at 12:00 PM

It is the first LGBTQIA+ film to be authorized for release in China. The story begins with the first meeting of the protagonists and the later secret relationship between them. Zhao Jie and Rohmer decide to travel together to Tibet and on their way, they are involved in an incident that ends with a child’s life. Although they are not responsible for what happened, the guilt they feel creates a tense environment and end up parting ways. However, when Zhao Jie learns that Rohmer has had an accident on a glacier, he goes to find his friend with the intention of helping him and preventing the same thing happening as it did to the boy they were unable to save.

After graduating from university, Wang Chao worked for five years in the steel industry, although he was always interested in films and literature. In 1991, he joined the Beijing Film Academy where he graduated in 1994 and began working as a film critic. While filming Yellow Earth he met Chen Kaige, who hired him as assistant director between 1995 and 1998 for the filming of Farewell My Concubine (1993) and The Emperor and the Assassin (1998). During this time, he wrote several short stories which inspired scripts for a few films. With Orphan of Anyang, a film he shot without authorization, he made his directorial debut. This film was selected in 2001, to participate in the Directors’ Fortnight section of the Cannes Film Festival. In 2004, he made his second film Day and Night and with Luxury Car in 2006 he completed the trilogy about China that he had been working on for more than five years. His fourth and fifth films, Memory of Love (2009) and Fantasy (2014), which show the narrative maturity on the director, were presented in the Uncertain Regard section at the Cannes Film Festival in 2014. Looking for Rohmer (2018) shows the interest of Wang Chao for the critic and filmmaker Eric Rohmer and the Nouvelle Vague, up to the point of making a film about him, although not necessarily biographic. A Woman (2022), until now his latest film, was shown in the last edition of the Asian Film Festival Barcelona | AFFBCN with great public success, after its screening in San Sebastian, where it was nominated to the Golden Shell.

Saturday, April 26th, 2025, at 12:00 PM

The seemingly idyllic domestic life of retired pensioner Chang-sik and his bedridden after a stroke and speechless wife Gil-soon, as well as his caretaker Sook-ok, an undocumented Sino-Korean immigrant, begins to crumble when Gil-soon develops an ulcer that does not heal. After this, old wounds and family grievances are opened in this debut feature by Shim Hyejung, which makes us reflect on the ethics of caring for the elderly and the disabled, as well as the responsibilities we have as family members, social workers or geriatricians.

Shim Hyejung has presented his films in places like PANASIA in Korea, the Academy of Arts in Iran and the JCCAC in Hong Kong. He has also competed in the Jeonju International Film Festival and the Seoul International New Media Festival among many other Korean film festivals. In 2017, his film Camellias in Bloom (2016) was nominated in the short-film section at the 38th Blue Dragon Awards.

Saturday, May 3rd, 2025, at 12:00 PM

Elizabeth is a self-made woman. She is in her 40’s and is bent on living on her own for the rest of her days. After her mother passes away due to a lingering and suffering disease, she meets Jon, a young man 20 years younger than her. When love blooms between them, he tries to convince her that there are no age boundaries in love. Their relationship seems to be fine at first, but then Liz realizes that she can not to be part of the Jon’s dreams.

Joji Villanueva Alonso is a novel filipin filmmaker who studied Law at St. Therese College. After working per 31 years as a lawyer, she decided to venture in the film industry as a producer at Quantum Films. Since that moment she has produced more than 32 films, some of them awarded internationally. The film The Woman in the Septic Tank (2011) was selected for the Filipino Oscars submissions. After working as a producer and suffering cancer, she now works as a filmmaker, with Belle Doleur being her debut feature film.

Saturday, May 10th, 2025, at 12:00 PM

A disillusioned forest officer leads a team of trackers to capture a “man-eating” tigress on the outskirts of the jungle. In her mission, she faces political, local, bureaucratic, and personal obstacles, which become even more complicated due to the presence of a politically connected hunter who manipulates villagers for his own benefit.

Amit Masurkar is an Indian director and screenwriter. He dropped out of engineering studies at the Manipal Institute of Technology at age 20 to pursue cinema. Later, he earned a degree in History from the University of Mumbai. He directed Sulemani Keeda and Newton, which was selected as Best Foreign Language Film at the 90th Academy Awards. Newton also received the Best Screenplay Award at the Asia Pacific Screen Awards.

Saturday, May 17th, 2025, at 12:00 PM

Ahmad is a psychiatrist, believing in the treatment of the soul with the medicine in a positivistic and laboratorial way. But when his wife goes missing, he gets involved in his own delusions. Trying hard to find a trace of her, he desperately asks to all his friends for help. Always prioritizing his wife’s happiness, he is even willing accept her marriage with one of his friends, convinced he would be able to make her happier. But when she manifests her happiness is not completely dependent on a “man”, he sees all his scientific beliefs collapsed.

Born in Tehran in 1980, Hossein Mahkam is a graduate of Philosophy from Tehran University. He’s a veteran theater playwright and director who’s directed several stage productions, has written and published four books of short stories and he’s teaching scriptwriting in film schools as well. As a scriptwriter, he has worked with outstanding Iranian directors such as Abdolreza Kahani (Adam, Twenty and Nothing), Rkhashan Bani Etemad (See you Elena), Mehdi Rahmani (Snow), Vahid Jalilvand (Wednesday, May 9) and Yadollah Samadi (Another’s father).

Saturday, May 24, 2025, at 12:00 PM

In 2023, on the streets of Kabul, a group of women, led by the brave 65-year-old Suraya, protest the Taliban regime, demanding bread, education, and freedom. The story takes us back to 1979, where Suraya and her friend Sima, caught during political turmoil, find themselves on opposing sides of the fight for freedom. Suraya, a staunch communist, joins the pro-Russian movement, while Sima, a conservative Muslim, seeks refuge in tradition and marriage. Despite their differences, they share a strong commitment to women’s rights. As the political situation worsens, their friendship is put to the test, especially when Sima is forced to flee after joining the Mujahideen. Despite the obstacles and being manipulated by political forces, their bond remains strong, revealing that their struggle was about much more than just power.

Roya Sadat is the founder of Roya Film House, Afghanistan’s most important production company, with over 20 years of experience in filmmaking focused on women’s and children’s human rights. Her first feature film, A Letter to the President, made her the first Afghan female director to be shortlisted for the Oscars. She has received multiple international awards, including the International Jury Award at Vesoul IFF, the One Future Prize at Munich IFF, and a Special Mention in the Discoveries Section at the 2019 Asian Film Festival Barcelona | AFFBCN. Additionally, she pioneered the creation of popular television dramas for TOLO TV, earning recognition in the TV industry. Sadat founded the RFH Academy film school and the Herat International Women’s Film Festival, one of the most prestigious in the region. Despite the risks she has faced, her work aims to shed light about Afghan women and drive change in the country. She has been honored with numerous awards, including the 2021 KIMDAEJUNG Nobel Cinema for Peace Award, the U.S. State Department’s International Women of Courage Award, and the Malalai Medal for her brave fight for women’s rights.

Saturday, May 31st, 2025, at 12:00 PM

The story begins with Horigai, a 22-year-old girl who gets a contract as a social worker. Even though she is about to graduate, she feels disenchantment with university, but she meets Inogi, a girl with a tragic childhood, whom she ends up being friends with. When her friend Homine dies, she begins to discover the violence he was capable of and that she could not notice when he was alive.

Born in Kanagawa Prefecture in 1982, Ryohei Yoshino began making independent films while studying at Hosei University. After graduation, he enrolled at the Japan Institute of the Moving Image, where he majored in cinematography and lighting technology. He has won several awards for his short and medium length-films and currently works as a lighting engineer for music videos, radio program director, and in a wide range of other fields.

Saturday, June 7th, 2025, at 12:00 PM

Masked figures with machine guns march into the secondary school in Karatas, take the pupils hostage, and execute one of them. They make no demands. Silent terror is their modus operandi. Seeing as the army will take two days to arrive due to a snowstorm, math teacher Tazshi decides to assemble his own assault team: his ex-wife, the gym teacher, the cowardly school principal, an alcoholic night watchman, the village idiot, and an incompetent chief of police.

Adilkhan Yerzhanov (1982, Kazakhstan) trained as a filmmaker at the Kazakhstan National Academy of Arts. Yerzhanov has twice participated in the Official Program of the Cannes Film Festival with The Owners (2014) and The Gentle Indifference of the World (2018). The Plague at the Karatas Village had its world premiere at IFFR 2016. Yerzhanov won the Asia Pacific Screen Award for Achievement in Directing for his A Dark, Dark Man (2019).

Saturday, June 14th, 2025, at 12:00 PM

A personal family epopee in which the Pakistani director Anita Mathal Hopland reviews the history of both of her families. Moosa Lane is the street name of Pakistan’s capital, Karachi, where half of her family lives, while the other half lives in Denmark. The documentary’s author also brings forward an intimate vision of the lives of the three younger family members and their experience with life and death. The filmmaker explores the generation of youth her age in Pakistan, trying to show at the same time the personal experience of those who live between two cultures, as it is her case. However, her circumstances allow her to discover what connects and separates her from her country and culture of origin and realize that she is not as far away as it seems at first sight.

Anita Mathal Hopland (Kanachi, 1981) graduated from the National Film School of Denmark in 2011 with the short film she presented on her graduation, Underneath the Dark. Hopland made her debut as a feature film director in 2017 with the documentary On the Edge of Freedom, followed by Lost Warrior in 2018 and finally by Moosa Lane in 2022.

Saturday, June 21st, 2025, at 12:00 PM

Jakub is in trouble for overstaying in Bosnia and is faced with the possibility of deportation if he does not obtain a temporary visa within five days. To apply for one, however, he requires money that he does not have. Jakub resists the risky opportunities for easy cash, until he realizes that everyone — including his girlfriend Emira, who is stealing money from work to continue studying— is doing what they must do to survive. Under such circumstances, Jakub begins to grasp the true cost of his cross-border situation.

Ghazi Alqudcy (1983, Singapore) is a film producer, director and writer. He holds a Master of Fine Arts in Filmmaking from Film Factory, an intensive programme created by the Hungarian film director Béla Tarr. Ghazi has produced more than 50 short films, which screened at various international film festivals in Europe and Asia. His directorial debut feature length film, Temporary Visa, was entirely shot in Sarajevo, Bosnia Herzegovina. The film has been presented at the Singapore International Festival of Arts in 2019.

Saturday, June 28th, 2025, at 12:00 PM

The feature film Aydinlar narrates the history of the Aral Sea region, in particular the city of Muynak. The protagonist of the film, Seyit, watches from a young age as the city of Muynak, where he was born, lies in ruins because of the drying up of the Aral Sea. Seyit has been taken care of by his grandfather Nurpeis, who tells him fairy tales about the sea. But as soon as he is not a child anymore, he is forced to leave Muynak to have another fate.

Muzaffarkhan Erkinov was born on 1983. He has worked on many TV series, documentaries and short films. From his trajectory in cinematography, we emphasize films such as Armon, Iqtidar, Yagonam, Kasas, Avlony, Puankare and the one we present, Aydinlar, directed together with Muzaffar Qoraboyev. He has received national awards such as the Tasanno and the Ehtirom, and he obtained a prize at the International Film Festival for Creative Flight, and another at the Eurasian Film and TV Festival for Slavic Tale.

Every Saturday at 12h, from 5th of April to 28th of June of 2025.
MK2 Cine Paz | Calle de Fuencarral, 125, Madrid.
Entry price: 6€

NEW PERSPECTIVES ON ASIAN CINEMA

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