Blijven Gaan

Five seniors, the eldest is 91 years old, train together in a gym in Rotterdam to keep fit. But the body falters and their environment is getting smaller and smaller. By doing sports, the seniors support each other: origin and social status disappear. The gym fraternizes and gives the elderly unprecedented pleasure. Despite the fanatical sports, the decline is unstoppable. This documentary also shows the seniors alone at home and the confrontational fight against the body that is becoming stiffer, with the realization that that battle is always lost in the long run.

Symphonie Atonale

Hoteliér

Karaokeparatiisi

Evi, Finland’s most experienced karaoke hostess, wants to hug her customers’ pain away. With thousands of bars and kilometres behind her, yet again she packs her equipment and travels through the northern landscapes of Finland. Toni, the shyest guy in the world, catches everyone’s eye on the stage. Kari is searching for love and sings in his empty karaoke car repair shop. Elina can hardly walk because of Parkinson’s, but punk songs make her dance. Laura sings because talking is too painful. Karaoke Paradise is a story of how the Finns have found a unique way out of loneliness.

Te gek moment

Humorous, melancholy documentary about copywriter, photo model and poet Frans Vogel (1935-2016). A handsome kid who became involved in the art world of the 1950s. Thanks to his absurd humor and provocative behavior, Vogel became a familiar face on the Rotterdam art scene.

A Falta Que Me Faz

In the Espinhaço Mountains one winter, a group of small-town Brazilian girls are experiencing the end of their youth. Impossible romances leave marks on their bodies and the surrounding landscape. Each of the friends finds her own particular way to overcome the loneliness and to live within a tangle of uncertainty.

Greta Garbo: Leave Me Alone

An urgent, timely and compelling portrait of Hollywood icon Greta Garbo, whose fame, isolation and loneliness still captures us.

Die geheimnisvollen Inseln

Like ghosts, the temporarily shut down cruise ships lie in the port of Hamburg. A young man comes into town and is stranded on the riverbank, waiting for a message. He watches couples strolling along in the sunset and gets himself some sweets. In a moment of collective pause, ISLANDS IN THE CITY captures a fragile romance. There is a departure in the air, the destination of which no one seems to know.

My AI Lover

Follows Yo, Siyuan and Mia, three young women who, using the mobile application Replika, have formed romantic relationships with virtual partners. This short documentary captures the richness of these bonds, from philosophical questions to intimate moments to the real sense of security and companionship afforded by these artificially intelligent lovers.

Werner We Love You

When Werner Herzog was still a child, his father was beaten to death before his eyes. His mother was overwhelmed with his upbringing and thereupon shipped him off to one of the toughest youth welfare institutions in Freistatt. This was followed by a career as a bouncer in the city's most notorious music club and an attempt to start a family. Today, the 77-year-old from Bielefeld lives with his dog Lucky in a lonely house in the country. Despite adverse living conditions, he has survived in his own unique and inimitable way.

Tylko dzień i noc

A pandemic, a time of hard lockdown, when contact with other people is severely limited. The most common means of communication are online conversations, which the director uses to talk to people who, like him, are stuck alone in their apartments.

Eu também não te vejo daqui

Yannick

At 41 years old, the Quebecois conductor Yannick Nézet-Séguin has established himself as one of the most gifted maestros of his generation, with numerous prestigious posts with some of the world’s greatest orchestras already under his belt, including the Philadelphia Orchestra and the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra (music director), London Philharmonic Orchestra (principal guest conductor), and the Orchestre métropolitain de Montréal. One week before Nézet-Séguin's official nomination as music director of the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra in 2008, filmmaker Christiaan van Schermbeek met the maestro for the first time. The once-in-a-lifetime event inspired Schermbeek to begin this documentary project, giving us a fascinating glimpse into the life of a truly extraordinary individual.

Reila

Atentamente

ATENTAMENTE is a film that, through the sensation of the time passing by and the presence of the death that wanders into a nursing home, allows us to feel the life through the illusion that love brings along. Libardo and Alba, a couple of elders who met each other at the nursing home where they live, they fall for, they become boyfriends and start to struggle in order to find fifty thousand pesos to rent a room for one night at a hotel so they can have a privacy moment, since at the nursing home where they live is not possible to have that. While struggling they must face each other, face their fears, their limitations, their pains, their time as well as their fragility so they can construct that moment in which they meet love. A struggle that seems to be easy, but for them is an odyssey against time, against their limitations and their own ghosts.

Ofelia

At 88 years old, Ofelia reflects on her life under the attentive gaze of her grandchildren. Family, love, disputes, adventures, and tragedies. A story brimming with characters that, as a result of the passing of time, leaves Ofelia as the sole witness to recount it

El extranjero (o El Pamperon't)

Miguel returns to his homeland with anticipation, ready to showcase a film he stars in at a local film festival. His heart yearns for the thunderous applause of adoring fans, yet reality may paint a different picture. In this poignant essay, we delve into the nuanced shapes of loneliness, even amidst company.

1964-1968 Trams in Amsterdam, Rotterdam en Den Haag

Ermitaños

In the midst of the chaos of México City, a group of eight bachelor millennials who call themselves ´The Hermits´, open the doors to their tiny apartments in the historic Ermita Building, in the yet-to-be gentrified neighborhood of Tacubaya, and share their life experiences in a time when precarity changes the way in which we love, feel and relate to each other. As we explore the homes of these eight neighbors, we also witness their personalities intersect in a Whatsapp chat, a virtual space that functions as a supporting system that helps them face the adversities that living alone in this city brings.

Näkymättömät

Three perspectives on loneliness, how it feels and how it can be survived: “If I could just dance with somebody once more.”