The 4th Annual Philip K. Dick European Science Fiction Film Festival returns this week
Following the
FRIDAY, OCTOBER 27, 2017:
Filmclub 813 e.V. (Hahnenstraße 6 50667, Cologne, Germany)
Block One: “The TransHuman Seduction”
Time: 7:00pm – 9:00pm
Breaker (2017)
Director: Philippe McKie
Run Time/Country: 11 min, Japan/Canada
Synopsis: In tomorrow’s Tokyo, the technologically-enhanced body of a young mercenary hacker is overrun by a sentient data weapon. Wanted, the parasitic A.I becomes her only ally as she is chased across the city by those seeking to salvage it.
Convergence (2017)
Director: Bryce Kraehenbuehl
Run Time/Country: 7 min, Australia
Synopsis: Upon waking at his desk, a computer scientist discovers that he has developed a sentient computer. As the scientist realizes the computer is not yet fully functional, it begins to ask for more than he expected.
Hum (2016)
Director: Stefano Nurra
Run Time/Country: 15 min, UK
Synopsis: A grieving plumber seeks out a disgraced quantum physicist to rid himself of a tormenting hum.
Sociopaths (2016)
Director: A.T.
Run Time/Country: 5 min, Japan
Synopsis: A girl encounters an android on the street. She finds something strange about the experience and decides to follow the android to give it a “message.”
Noriko (2016)
Director: Christian Jilka
Run Time/Country: 30 min, Austria/Germany
Synopsis: In dystopian future times at the end of human civilization, a man lost his wife and decides to bring her back to life by building her a robot twin. This, however, displeases the community’s priest for in his eyes it is an act of blasphemy.
Upload (2017)
Director: Marcelo Takeo
Run Time/Country: 11 min, Brazil
Synopsis: A man is the only survivor on the planet, spending his time with digitized recordings – the only remaining vestiges of mankind. Now with the imminent destruction of the world by the Sun, he must find a way to save these memories.
Mayflower (2017)
Director: Christopher Goodman
Run Time/Country: 8 min, UK
Synopsis: A young engineer wakes up from cryo-sleep during a routine deep space flight on the star freighter ‘Mayflower’. The ship’s computer informs him that he was awoken due to a false alarm. But all is not as it seems.
Block Two: “Fight the Future”
Time: 9:00pm – 11:00pm
No Guarantee (2016)
Director: Stuart Black, Nick Mather
Run Time/Country: 6 min, UK
Synopsis: A couple living in the ruins of London 2056 must decide whether they should upload their consciousnesses into the mysterious Cloud 9.
Zarr-Dos (2017)
Director: Bart Wasem
Run Time/Country: 7 min, Switzerland
Synopsis: An epic and odd nightmarish comedy about the abuse of almighty power.
Tears in the Rain (2017)
Director: Christopher Grant Harvey
Run Time/Country: 11 min, South Africa
Synopsis: An engrossing look into the world of Philip K. Dick’s legendary novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? (1968) and its motion picture adaptation Blade Runner (1982).
After We Left Our Homes (2016)
Director: Marc Adamson
Run Time/Country: 9 min, UK
Synopsis: Under a dictatorship that has banned music, a man hides a recording until he is caught and imprisoned. Whilst paying for his crimes he stumbles across a repository of confiscated items, leading to a series of events that will forever change the city.
The Parcel (2016)
Director: Wilke Weermann
Run Time/Country: 17 min, Germany
Synopsis: In a world where it is normal to be alone, a man gets a package for his supposedly dead neighbor and the supernatural object drives him insane. After neighbors begin to stalk him, he realizes that there is a secret organization that wants to destroy his life. So he starts his counterattack.
Moving On (2016)
Director: Benjamin Addams McAllister, Bruce McAllister
Run Time/Country: 7 min, USA
Synopsis: It is a near-future America where scientists have discovered how to talk to ghosts, and the Justice Department gathers testimony from the ghosts of murder victims. A lone technician at a desert listening station spends his days and nights recording the testimony of the ghosts assigned to him.
Adam (2016)
Director: Veselin Efremov
Run Time/Country: 5 min, Denmark
Synopsis: In a dystopian future, an organic body is a privilege easy to lose and a convict awakens to the grim reality of having been transferred into a mechanical shell.
Split Ticket (2016)
Director: Alfred Thomas Catalfo
Run Time/Country: 20 min, USA
Synopsis: In 1947, newly-minted congressmen John F. Kennedy and Richard Nixon travel to Pennsylvania where they must make a fateful decision. A supernatural drama based on true events.
SATURDAY, OCTOBER 28, 2017:
Filmclub 813 e.V. (Hahnenstraße 6 50667, Cologne, Germany)
Block One: “The Lurking Shadow”
Time: 7:00pm – 9:00pm
A Penny Dropped (2017)
Director: A.D. Cooper
Run Time/Country: 5 min, USA
Synopsis: A desperate woman seeks help from an unlikely source in a dark place. Neither of them realize that their futures will be decided by the flip of a coin.
The Plan (2016)
Director: Pierre Teulières
Run Time/Country: 13 min, France
Synopsis: In an isolated mansion, a creature follows the orders of his master in order to accomplish a shady plan that will change the world. Meanwhile, a desperate father is looking for his missing daughter.
Abrakadabra (2017)
Director: Benedykt Zasadzki
Run Time/Country: 29 min, UK
Synopsis: A woman arrives in London from Eastern Europe and wanders the city alone. In a museum, she acquires telepathic contact with an ancient Egyptian spiritual entity. In a vision, she is raped and impregnated by the entity and descends into madness.
Exposure (2017)
Director: Lucas Rios
Run Time/Country: 2 min, Argentina
Synopsis: A man breaks into a little girl’s bedroom with evil intent but as he lurks through the darkness, he’ll come to know evil has much to fear in the light, as he’ll find there are more horrific things than his intent.
The Dollhouse (2017)
Director: Kyra Elise Gardner
Run Time/Country: 7 min, USA
Synopsis: A loving tribute to growing up in the world of the psycho killer doll, Chucky.
Beyond the Doors (2016)
Director: Brent Murray
Run Time/Country: 8 min, USA
Synopsis: A man’s quest to find the perfect cuckoo clock will cost him much more than he could ever imagine. Based on a story by Philip K. Dick.
Beastly Things (2017)
Director: Zoe Chevat
Run Time/Country: 5 min, USA
Synopsis: A young street artist encounters a vicious group of local schoolchildren, and learns what truly makes a monster.
Bride of Frankie (2017)
Director: Devi Snively
Run Time/Country: 19 min, USA
Synopsis: In this feminist adaptation to Mary Shelley’s “Frankenstein,” a not-so-mad scientist builds a mate for her mentor’s lonely creature with electrifying and deadly results.
Block Two: “Loss and Remembrance”
Time: 9:00pm – 11:00pm
AYLA (2017)
Director: Elias
Run Time/Country: 86 min, USA
Synopsis: A man haunted by the mysterious death of his four-year-old sister brings her back to life thirty years later as an adult woman, with dire consequences. Starring Dee Wallace (E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, Cujo) and Tristan Risk (American Mary, The Editor).
THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 2, 2017:
L’Hybride (18 Rue Gosselet 59000, Lille, France)
Block One: “Doppelgänger”
Time: 7:00pm – 9:00pm
Adam Peiper (2015)
Director: Mónica Mateo
Run Time/Country: 16 min, Spain
Synopsis: The inlayer of a task tank works tirelessly on what seems to be a monotonous and mechanized day over and over, which will become a nightmare.
Buddha of Superposition (2017)
Director: Alexis Kirke
Run Time/Country: 11 min, UK
Synopsis: A woman is a Buddhist and singer and has schizophrenia. Buddha of Superposition uses innovative story-telling techniques to take the audience inside her mental illness.
Quantum Satori (2016)
Director: Samuel Vanclooster
Run Time/Country: 14 min, Belgium
Synopsis: A science fusion short that mirrors its public’s interpretation through a thought-provoking maze of film scenes.
Transmission (2017)
Director: Tom Hancock, Varun Raman
Run Time/Country: 18 min, UK
Synopsis: In the future nightmare state of Britannia, a political prisoner finds himself violently oscillating between death and delirium.
Neverness (2016)
Director: Mohamed Imane Chahdi
Run Time/Country: 5 min, Morocco
Synopsis: His inspiration vanishing with his wife’s passing away, a would-be writer finds refuge in his banking job. Emotionally stuck, time comes to a standstill. Adam must find a way to make it tick again. Inspired by the writings of Jorge Luis Borges.
Monsieur Hernst (2016)
Director: Vincent Cappello
Run Time/Country: 15 min, France
Synopsis: Monsieur Hernst has forgotten everything including his own identity and his doctor pushes through the ages of his life trying to recover the memory of the event that brought him to this moment.
Flutter (2016)
Director: Vladimir Todorov
Run Time/Country: 10 min, USA
Synopsis: In this animated film about despair, hope and the power of love, a man is trapped in a body that keeps him pinned to the ground. While others can defy the laws of gravity and fly freely above his head, he can only watch from a distance. He is an outcast, destined to trudge through life.
Block Two: “The Shadow Emerges”
Time: 9:00pm – 11:00pm
Popsy (2016)
Director: Julien Homsy
Run Time/Country: 18 min, France/Canada
Synopsis: A man’s addiction to poker leads him into deep trouble and forced to cover his debt, he reaches a point of no return. Adapted from a short story by Stephen King.
Synchronous (2016)
Director: Ricardo Fernández Jiménez
Run Time/Country: 14 min, Colombia
Synopsis: A man whose consciousness has the ability to live in two parallel worlds simultaneously must help a dangerous gangster to win a bet. But everything changes when he meets a woman.
The Bridge (2016)
Director: Keith Richner
Run Time/Country: 5 min, USA
Synopsis: Bridges can connect or divide us. Where we end up might not always be where we planned.
An Eldritch Place (2016)
Director: Julien Jauniaux
Run Time/Country: 16 min, Belgium
Synopsis: When a man accepts a job as a night watchman. he discovers the obscure secret hiding in his garage.
FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 3, 2017:
L’Hybride (18 Rue Gosselet 59000, Lille, France)
Block One: “After the Apocalypse”
Time: 7:00pm – 9:00pm
Adam (2016)
Director: Veselin Efremov
Run Time/Country: 5 min, Denmark
Synopsis: In a dystopian future, an organic body is a privilege easy to lose and a convict awakens to the grim reality of having been transferred into a mechanical shell.
Notturno (2016)
Director: Clemente Bicocchi
Run Time/Country: 10 min, Italy
Synopsis: Can just a little change in the daily routine make all our confidence fall? This science fiction story explains a lot about contemporary society.
Epilogue (2017)
Director: Matthias Bloom
Run Time/Country: 10 min, Sweden
Synopsis: The world as we know it no longer exists and mankind is forever lost. A mannequin in a house once filled with life gets to feel the fading memories and emotions of the family that once live there.
Oak (2016)
Director: Yann Giroud
Run Time/Country: 18 min, UK
Synopsis: Two brothers encounter a chance of salvation for humanity. Could post-apocalyptic tourism destroy it?
The Plan (2016)
Director: Pierre Teulières
Run Time/Country: 13 min, France
Synopsis: In an isolated mansion, a creature follows the orders of his master in order to accomplish a shady plan that will change the world. Meanwhile, a desperate father is looking for his missing daughter.
Methane Momma (2016)
Director: Alain Rimbert
Run Time/Country: 40 min, France
Synopsis: Life on Earth has disappeared because of global warming, greenhouse gas emissions and wars and survivors wander in space aboard spacecrafts. In one of them, MEL, a scientist biologist is sent to retrieve a space module becoming crazy while seeking traces of water on a unknown planet. While seeking the prospecting module, he has an accident and merges into the ether and then his conscience takes the form of a cloud of methane. In a cave that seems empty of all life, as he regains consciousness, he sees a female cloud of methane with whom he falls in love. Stars Melvin Van Peebles (Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song).
Block Two: “Man and Machine”
Time: 9:00pm – 11:00pm
Juliet (2015)
Director: Marc-Henri Boulier
Run Time/Country: 12 min, France
Synopsis: In a near future, the SEED Company launches with great fanfare JULIET1, the first generation of synthetic pleasure beings. But as technology evolves and new styles come and go it becomes more difficult for mankind to find their own place.
The Weaving (2016)
Director: Arthur Mercier
Run Time/Country: 15 min, France
Synopsis: A teenager has an appointment with a guidance counselor but unfortunately, the latter is missing when the boy enters the office and has been replaced by a strange machine. At the end of the meeting, he will discover much more about himself than ever before.
Io (2016)
Director: Imad Hatem
Run Time/Country: 45 min, France
Synopsis: The life of “Me” changes when the famous cyber-activist “Sad Monkey” gets interested by him.
Answer Me (2017)
Director: Marco Antonio Barajas
Run Time/Country: 13 min, Mexico
Synopsis: The film serves as a metaphor that revolves around four essential points: Time, Death, Love and Technology.
The Otherworld (2017)
Director: Florence Kosky
Run Time/Country: 18 min, UK
Synopsis: A group of friends holiday on ancient ground, and the veil between reality and the otherworld grows thin.
Orbital Inn (2016)
Director: Pierre Alain M’barga
Run Time/Country: 16 min, France
Synopsis: Year: 2076. Global population: 24 billion. To avoid chaos, nations have agreed on radical measures. It is now forbidden to conceive or raise a new child. This story focuses on a man, his wife and their young son who is not supposed to be.
Festival Passes:
To purchase passes to the festival, please visit philipkdickfilmfestival-europe.com.
Filmclub 813 e.V. (Hahnenstraße 6 50667, Cologne, Germany):
Venue Website: www.filmclub-813.de
Regular Price: €6
Student Discount: €5
Filmclub Membership: €4
L’Hybride (18 Rue Gosselet 59000, Lille, France):
Venue Website: www.lhybride.org
Regular Price: €4
L’Hybride Membership: Free Admission
About The Philip K. Dick European Science Fiction Film Festival:
The Philip K. Dick European Science Fiction Film Festival launched in October 2013 and has screened events in Lille, France, Cologne, Germany and Łódź, Poland. Organized by individuals and filmmakers who understand both the challenges and rewards of telling a unique story in an independent environment, the festival represents the deep analyses and philosophical views of internationally renowned novelist Philip K. Dick, whose work has inspired generations of writers and filmmakers all around the world. In spotlighting such genius, this is a festival created for filmmakers by filmmakers.
Connect With Us:
Program Office Contact: 917-362-9337
Website: philipkdickfilmfestival-europe.com
Twitter: twitter.com/PhilipKDickFest
Facebook: facebook.com/ThePhilipKDickFilmFestival
Meetup: meetup.com/The-Philip-K-Dick-science-fiction-Film-Festival
