News

If Summer 2023 box office has a shot of meeting its optimistic $4 billion projection, the June movie lineup needs to step up. Since May 5, when the season began with Marvel release “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3,” receipts are down over five percent from last year. To achieve $4 billion, returns now through Labor Day would have to be 26 percent ahead of 2022, when box office totaled just under $3.4 billion.

It’s still doable, but the variables are… more variable after May failed to meet its optimistic expectations. “The Super Mario Bros. Movie” didn’t hold as well as hoped, and everything beyond the three top releases proved to be only modest contributors.

Despite three lucrative franchises in “Guardians of the Galaxy,” “The Little Mermaid,” and “Fast X,” May will total about $760 million. That’s down from $785 million in 2022, which had only two franchises with “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness” and “Top Gun: Maverick.

If you purchase an independently reviewed product or service through a link on our website, Variety may receive an affiliate commission.

Like any anticipated Disney release, “The Little Mermaid” has inspired dozens of imaginative product launches and collaborations ahead of the film’s May release. But the best of the bunch might be this haircare set from Carols’ Daughter, made specifically for those with natural curls and textured hair to perfect their own mermaid locs.

The Vanilla Leave-In Conditioner Set, a limited-edition release for Black hair made in collaboration with the Disney film, is a nod to Halle Bailey’s decision to maintain her natural hair in her portrayal as Ariel. Bailey’s long, textured locs seen in the film, which she achieved without a wig, is an important moment for representation and Bailey’s identity, as the movie presents Disney’s first Black Ariel (and first Black princess in a live-action movie.

By Nathaniel R

Apologies for the radio silence. I've been struggling with my newish day job (had to finally admit last year that movies weren't keeping a roof over the head *sniffle* and go back to corporate America) but I have hope that I a personal rhythm / balance will soon be found again. For the holiday weekend I saw no movies but visited friends who have a home on Fire Island.  I'd already seen the weekend's big draw, Disney's live action remake of their own fable The Little Mermaid...

Weekend Box Office (actuals)

May 26th-29th...

My 3-year-old’s poor, unfortunate soul.

On Saturday, the family Maglio — me, my wife, and our two daughters, aged 3 and 6 — reclined for the 2:45 P.M. showing of “The Little Mermaid” at the Cinemark Hazlet 12 in Hazlet, New Jersey. Well, the 3-year-old didn’t move her chair; upright, it was already like a queen-sized bed to her. Plus, she ended up spending the vast majority of the movie on my wife’s lap. (More on that in a bit.)

For the 6-year-old, it was just her second time in a theater for a movie; her first experience was “Frozen II.” Then the pandemic hit, and her little sister rounded out the family. For the 3-year-old, Memorial Day Weekend 2023 marked her first time in an actual movie theater.

Our older princess is very much into Disney Princesses, so she has been looking forward to this for a while. The younger one...

Universal Pictures’ Fast X cruised to another easy win at China’s theatrical box office over the weekend, earning $17.6 million for a cumulative total of $109.9 million.

Disney’s The Little Mermaid, though, is clearly sinking rather than swimming in the China market. The Rob Marshall-directed film, starring Halle Bailey as Ariel, opened to just $2.5 million — on the far low end for Disney’s live-action remakes in China.

The Little Mermaid was outearned by a pair of holdovers and a new anime release. Local road comedy Godspeed, already a month in cinemas, added $6.8 million to a total that now sits at $145.4 million. Disney/Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 took $4.9 million for a $79.6 million cume. Japanese anime feature Sword Art Online the Movie opened to $3.8 million, with local ticketing app Maoyan forecasting it to top out in China with around $5 million.

A little over a week ago, Fast X...

For the third time this month, an expensive franchise sequel did decent-not-spectacular business. “The Little Mermaid” (Disney) should gross around $95.5 million for three days, around $118 million for four days. The top three films amassed all but $23 million of the holiday weekend’s $162 million total gross, down $15 million from last year.

In this summer season of expensive and familiar films, the pressure will increase for something to exceed expectations. This was a weekend that, on paper, should have had a very good shot of beating 2022. While no one expected “Mermaid” to outstrip the $126 million opening of “Top Gun: Maverick,” this weekend also had the backing of another major franchise in its second week with “Fast X” (Universal). Last year, the no. 2 film was the month-old “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness,” which grossed $16 million. “Fast X” grossed $23 million.

Perhaps more concerning is the comparison to Disney’s billion-dollar 2109 hits “Aladdin” and “The Lion King.

Disney, we know, has problems. There’s streaming, the contentious relationship with 2024 Republican presidential candidate/Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, the fates of Hulu and Searchlight, layoffs — but as the dominant film distributor for the last decade, its film slate is known as a reliable source of strength. In 2023, that’s no longer a sure thing.

In the summer of 2019, Disney films represented 43 percent of the season’s $4.3 billion domestic take. Some box-office analysts have suggested that it’s possible that we could see a $4 billion summer — up $600 million from a resurgent 2022. However, May’s shortfalls make this is unlikely — and much of that falls to Disney.

“Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3” opened May 5; the live-action remake of “Mermaid” opened in previews today. Upcoming are “The Boogeyman” (June 9), “Elemental” (June 16), “Indiana Jones and Dial of Destiny” (June 30), and “Haunted Mansion” (July 28). It’s a slate as mainstream as a studio can muster.

The Little Mermaid’s brain trust of director Rob Marshall and producer John DeLuca decided early on that verisimilitude was the name of the game. They knew that their live-action reimagining of the 1989 animated classic couldn’t have it both ways, so they opted for photorealism at every turn instead of a hybrid of realistic and fantastical elements. That meant Ariel’s (Halle Bailey) beloved sea-creature sidekicks of Flounder (Jacob Tremblay), Sebastian (Daveed Diggs) and Scuttle (Awkwafina) had to be reinvented as well.

“We knew right from the beginning that we were gonna create a photoreal world underwater,” Marshall tells The Hollywood Reporter. “We’ve had an animated film, but … we’re now in a live-action genre. We want to believe we’re in that space, so there was no version of creating a Flounder that didn’t look like a fish. There was no version of creating a crab...

The star of Disney’s big-budget live action remake of The Little Mermaid, due in theaters on May 26, says seeing a black mermaid on screen when she was younger would have “changed my whole life.”

Halle Bailey told the UK’s Guardian:

“If I would have had a black mermaid, that would have been insane, that would have changed my whole perspective, my whole life, my confidence, my self-worth. You’re able to see a person who looks like you, when you’re young? Some people are just like, oh, it’s whatever, because they’ve had it their whole life. It’s nothing to them. But it’s so important.”

When it was announced, back in 2019, that Bailey had won the role, #NotMyAriel started trending on social media and has continued to be a response to new posters and trailers for the film, which also stars Jonah Hauer-King, Daveed Diggs,...

The Little Mermaid’s Halle Bailey and Jonah Hauer-King created a special bond while filming Rob Marshall’s live-action reimagining of Disney’s 1989 animated classic, and Hauer-King isn’t afraid to be a fanboy of his mega-talented co-star. The Atlanta and London natives play the roles of mermaid Princess Ariel and Prince Eric, respectively, which Jodi Benson and Christopher Daniel Barnes memorably brought to life 34 years ago in John Musker and Ron Clements’ animated film. Thus, Bailey and Hauer-King always approached the material with reverence and respect for the original film, even if their story took a couple of detours to familiar destinations.

Bailey — who is one half of the sisterly musical duo Chloe x Halle — had to play out an accomplished singer’s worst fear as Ariel, in that she had to imagine a reality where she’s lost her voice. However, she made a point to sing live...

Javier Bardem is gushing over Austin Butler’s work as Feyd-Rautha Harkonnen in “Dune: Part Two.” “Seeing him bald or seeing him with hair, he’s an amazing creature to look at,” Bardem told me at the world premiere of “The Little Mermaid” in Los Angeles. “You can look at him for hours and go, ‘Oh, my God — how beautiful you are.’”

Bardem continued, “On top of that, he’s so nice. He’s so generous, so funny and so committed. He has done an amazing job. I’ve only had a couple of moments with him, but I would see him and it was like, ‘Wow, [he] is the character.’”

Feyd-Rautha is the evil nephew of Baron Harkonnen (Stellan Skarsgård) and the brother of the sadistic Glossu Rabban, played by Dave Bautista. The two brothers are in competition to become the Harkonnen family’s successor on the planet Arrakis.

A...

Paris-based outfit Reel Suspects has acquired “The Three,” directed by up-and-coming Armenian-Russian filmmaker Anna Melikyan. “The Three” will have its international premiere at Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival and will be distributed in Russia by Disney in December.

Penned by Melikyan and Evgenia Khripkova, “The Three” revolves around a husband, a wife and another woman.

The cast is headlined by local stars Konstantin Khabenskiy, Viktoriya Isakova, and Yulia Peresild, a young Moscow theater actor. Melikyan produced the film through her banner Magnum film company, along with Natella Krapivina and Artem Vasilyev.

“We are really exited to work on Anna’s most recent work. A subtle romance driven by an amazing cast and signed by a wonderful cinematographic camera work. Festivals and buyers will fall surely under the charm,” said Matteo Lovadina, the CEO of Reel Suspects, who will start selling the film at the American Film Market, which kicks off Monday.

San Sebastian — Carlos Piñeiro’s “Sirena” (“Mermaid”) came into last month’s Sanfic Festival in Santiago Chile buzzing from the news that it had been selected, along with another Sanfic work in progress “The Prince,” to participate in the San Sebastian’s Films in Progress competition.

“Sirena” is a black and white look at the conflict between tradition and modernity. It starts off following the drowning of a well-known engineer in Lake Titicaca, some time in 1984. A commission put together to recover the remains of the man are gathered on a small boat, crossing t0 an island inhabited by a group of indigenous families. Conflict arises when the families who recovered the body refuse to give it up, in fear that it will adversely affect the upcoming harvest. Frustrations boil over and cultures clash as the irritated commission members want little more than to collect the body and leave. One gets drunk,...

Contemporary Chinese Cinema is a column devoted to exploring contemporary Chinese-language cinema primarily as it is revealed to us at North American multiplexes.The Monkey King 3: Land of BeautyThis year’s Lunar New Year week was the biggest ever, almost doubling the box office take from last year, with grosses over 850 million American dollars. Traditionally the busiest movie-going time in the Chinese-speaking world, packed with crowd-pleasing star vehicles, this year’s holiday was dominated by four major releases, each of which was also released in North America.1 Three sequels opened here on February 16th, The Monkey King 3, Monster Hunt 2 and Detective Chinatown 2, while Operation Red Sea opened the following Friday, February 23rd. While none of the four has had the impact stateside of The Mermaid’s historic run two New Years ago, they’ve all proven to be hits at home. Soi Cheang’s Monkey King sequel opened first,...

Peter Webber to head jury, David Puttnam to deliver lecture during fifth edition of the Ukranian festival.

Golden Bear winner Black Coal, Thin Ice and the Camera D’Or recipient Party Girl [pictured] are among the 12 films selected for the International Competition at the fifth edition of the Odessa International Film Festival (Oiff), which runs July 11-19.

UK director Peter Webber will head the jury composed of Ukrainian film-maker Sergei Loznitsa, Israeli actress Jenya Dodina, Belorussian actress-director Olga Dykhovichnaya and French actor-critic Jean-Philippe Tessé.

The other films in the running for the Golden Duke award are:

Bryan Reisberg’s social and psychological drama Big Significant Things (Us)Levan Koguashvili’s feelgood film Blind Dates (Georgia)Director and painter Lech Majewski’s Field of Dogs (Poland)Alonso Ruizpalacios’ road movie debut Güeros (Mexico)Valentin Hotea’s social and psychological drama Roxanne (Romania)Anna Melikyan’s Kinotavr award-winner Star (Russia)Maximilan Erlenwein’s psychological thriller Stereo (Germany)Tribeca winner [link=nm...

Roskino and Russian Cinema Fund to make presentations.

Russian cinema will be represented by not one, but two stands at the Marché du Film much to the bewilderment of some in the industry.

While Roskino, the successor to the former state film organisation Sovexportfilm, is the official organiser of the Russian Pavilion with support from the Ministries of Culture and Foreign Affairs, the Russian Cinema Fund is backing the Russian Cinema stand in the Festival Palais.

Both initiatives will be having presentations of extracts from completed films or works in progress to sales agents, distributors and festival programmers.

Roskino’s line-up on May 17 will include Natalia Meshaninova’s The Hope Factory [pictured], Igor Voloshin’s Moscow-Russia Express, the documentary Rudolf Nureyev. A Rebel Demon, and Sergei Dvortsevoy’s My Little One, co-produced by the late Karl Baumgartner.

The Russian Cinema Fund will follow three days later – on May 20 - with its own showcase of 19 projects at various stages...

Exclusive: Slate includes Garry Bardin’s animation trilogy Three Strains - Rondo, Exodus, Elegia and Anna Melikyan’s The Star.

New films by animator Garry Bardin and Anna Melikyan are among the titles added by fledgling Russian sales agent Ant!pode Sales & Distribution to its Efm lineup.

Anton Mazurov and his sales team will be taking presales on Bardin’s animation trilogy Three Strains ­ Rondo, Exodus, Elegia, which is currently in postproduction and will be premiered at international festivals later in the year; Melikyan’s third feature The Star coming after her award-winning Mermaid (Rusalka) which was the Panorama opening film in 2008; and Alexey Fedorchenko’s The Angels of the Revolution, a romantic drama set in the Russian avant-garde period.

In addition, international distribution is being handled on venerated documentary film-maker Maria Razbezhkina’s latest project The Optical Axis (Opticheskaya Os), which had its world premiere at Dok Leipzig last October, and six feature...

Mermaid (Rusalka) Directed by: Anna Melikyan Cast: Masha Shalayeva, Yevgeni Tsyganov, Mariya Sokova Running Time: 1 hr 55 mins Rating: Unrated 32nd Portland International Film Festival Country: Russia English?: Nope. Subtitled. Plot: Alice (Shalayeva) grows up in a small seaside village where she attends a school for the mentally disabled because she refuses to speak. But after moving to Moscow with her family, she meets Sasha (Tsyganov). She saves his life, falls in love with him and becomes his housekeeper to get close to him. Who’s It For? Mermaid is a sophisticated fairytale. Adults and older teens who don't mind subtitles and like a bit of magical realism should really enjoy this film. Overall I've seen a few Russian movies in my day, and Mermaid isn't like any of them. Sure, it's a...

Year: 2007

Release date: Unknown

Director: Anna Melikyan

Writer: Anna Melikyan

IMDb: link

Trailer: link

Review by: quietearth

Rating: 6 out of 10

The introductor to this film told us writer/director Anna Melikyan's influences were Amelie and the Hans Christian Andersen fairy tale The Little Mermaid, pointing out that the latter was one of the only fairy tales with a sad ending although I'm pretty sure we could flip some Brother's Grimm and disprove that. This was a whimsical tale about a girl, conceived in the water, who had the power to control nature (although she barely used it) which had a fantastic beginning like so much odd film fare, but then lost its way down some non-existent path halfway through which was too bad. I was thinking to myself "this is a solid 8!", it was really that brilliant with it's perfect acting, beautiful and inventive shots, and spots of comedy,...

• Last year’s fiasco over the Academy award Foreign Film nominations proved that: the voting process and those who were placing X’s on the ballot form were running a system that was as faulty as New Orleans’ levees. This year there will likely be no omissions or screw ups such as last year’s mistake of leaving the Palme d’Or winner 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days out of the process and there won't be the usual favoritism towards already established directors. The task of watching 67 films will be made a lot easier because 2008’s batch include a fivesome of films that stick out like a sour thumbs because of their style, substance and beauty. I don’t care how old these Academy voters are: they’ll end up seeing the same thing that I and thousands of other critics saw. Predestined to be represented come Oscar night in February,

...

A record 67 countries have submitted films for consideration for best foreign-language film for the 81st Academy Awards, Academy president Sid Ganis said Friday. Nominations will be announced on Thursday, Jan. 22, and the awards will be presented on Sunday, Feb. 22.

The complete list of foreign-language submissions follows. For more details on some of the films, visit THR.com/foreignoscars.

Afghanistan, "Opium War," Siddiq Barmak

Albania, "The Sorrow of Mrs. Schneider," Piro Milkani and Eno Milkani

Algeria, "Masquerades," Lyes Salem

Argentina, "Lion's Den," Pablo Trapero

Austria, "Revanche," Gotz Spielmann

Azerbaijan, "Fortress," Shamil Nacafzada

Bangladesh, "Aha!," Enamul Karim Nirjhar

Belgium, "Eldorado," Bouli Lanners

Bosnia and Herzegovina, "Snow," Aida Begic

Brazil, "Last Stop 174," Bruno Barreto

Bulgaria, "Zift," Javor Gardev

Canada, "The Necessities of Life," Benoit Pilon

Chile, "Tony Manero," Pablo Larrain

China, "Dream Weavers," Jun Gu

Colombia, "Dog Eat Dog," Carlos Moreno

Croatia, "No One's Son," Arsen Anton Ostojic

Czech Republic, "The Karamazovs," Petr Zelenka

Denmark,...

Moscow -- Director Anna Melikyan's "The Mermaid" (Rusalka) will represent Russia in the race for the 2009 foreign-language film Oscar.

Produced by Magnum for Central Partnership, "The Mermaid" has won both domestic and international awards. Its star, Masha Shalayeva, took home the best actress award last year at Russia's Kinotavr film festival. The film later claimed the Fipresci Prize for the Panorama sidebar at the Berlinale and the World Cinema Dramatic Directing Award at Sundance.

Melikyan told Russian TV channel Rossiya that she was surprised by the committee's decision and happy that "The Mermaid," her second film, was selected.

Russia's previous entry for the foreign-language Oscar race, Nikita Mikhalkov's "12," won a nomination.

Audience members gave Doris Dorris' Cherry Blossoms -- Hanami the best film Golden Space Needle Award at the 34th Seattle International Film Festival, which ended Sunday. The jury's grand prize went to Tony Barbieri's "Em."

At the 25-day fest, the jury awarded a special jury prize to writer-director Russell Brown for The Bluetooth Virgin.

Within the fest's New Directors Showcase competition, the grand jury prize was awarded to Yves-Christian Fournier's Everything Is Fine, while the special jury prize was bestowed on Anna Melikyan's Mermaid.

The grand jury prize for documentary was presented to Isaac Julien's Derek, and special jury prizes were awarded to Raphael Mathie's Combalion and Timothy Hotchner's Accelerating America.

The short film winners were Rebecca Dreyfus' "Self Portrait With Cows Going Home and Other Works: A Portrait of Sylvia Plachy" in the documentary category, with Christina Voros' The Ladies picking up the special prize; Luis Cook's The Pearce Sisters in the animation category, with Kim Slate's Home winning the special prize; and Atul Taishete's Rewind in the narrative category. Narrative special jury prizes were handed out to Amy Gebhardt's Walnut, Paddy Considine's Dog Altogether, Teemu Nikki's A Mate and Steph Green's New Boy.

John Grigsby's Introduction to Lucid Dreaming and Adam Keker's "On the Assassination of the President" earned honorable mentions for inventive filmmaking.

Among the films screening tonight at AFI Dallas is the acclaimed, Russian feature Mermaid. The movie concerns a young girl who leaves the seaside for the city where she has a fateful encounter with a businessman. Mermaid has been making the rounds on the festival circuit -- director Anna Melikyan has picked up awards at Berlin and Sundance -- and there's also been a lot of buzz concerning its shocking ending. (No...

PARK CITY -- A romantic contemporary fairy tale, Mermaid charms on multiple levels with sweet-natured whimsicality and creativity.

This is a surefire festival selection that's destined to live happily ever after on DVD and European TV. Russian writer-director Anna Melikian's film recently won the World Cinema Directing Award at last month's Sundance Film Festival.

Mermaid introduces Alisa (Anastasiya Dontsova) following her birth six years earlier to a stocky single woman (Maria Sokova) after a seashore skinny-dipping en-counter with a wayward sailor. The young girl grows up independent and headstrong, to the extent that when her mother refuses to let her study ballet, Alisa takes a vow of silence and keeps it for more than a decade.

Relegated to a special-ed school because of her refusal to speak, she discovers an unusual ability to make wishes come true that even allows her to influence the weather. One day she conjures up a major hurricane that destroys her seaside home, forcing Alisa and her mother, along with her dotty grandma, to relocate to Moscow.

Now 17, Alisa (Masha Shalaeva) flourishes in her new urban environment but still can't get a break as she's denied admission to college because of her low test scores. Taking a job as a walking cell phone mascot, she's able to covertly observe big-city life. When she comes upon the drunken, suicidal young businessman Sasha (Yevgeni Tsyganov), she saves him from drowning and is instantly smitten.

Abandoning her nonverbal habits, Alisa insinuates herself into his life as a house-cleaner. His inspiration to cast her as a spokes-model for his shady business of selling real estate on the moon to gullible customers suggests that he might have a romantic interest in Alisa. Even her role in two more life-saving interventions can't distract Sasha from his neurotic, high-maintenance girlfriend (Irina Skrinichenko), launching a mismatched rivalry between the two women.

Shalaeva radiates as the offbeat Alisa, surrounded by a capable cast of similarly fanciful characters. Despite some peculiar plot developments, Melikian's light touch keeps the pell-mell narrative from derailing.

Drawing on her background in TV and musical productions, Melikian combines an inventive visual sensibility in the film's realistic sequences with digitally enhanced, brightly colored fantasy scenes, skillfully shot by cinematographer Oleg Kirichenko.

MERMAID

Magnum Studios in association with Central Partnership

Credits:

Screenwriter-director: Anna Melikian

Producer: Ruben Dishdishian

Director of photography: Oleg Kirichenko

Production designer: Ulyana Ryabova

Music: Igor Vdovin

Costume designer: Irina Grashdankina

Editor: Oleg Kirichenko

Cast:

Alisa: Masha Shalaeva

Sasha: Yevgeni Tsyganov

Mother: Maria Sokova

Young Alisa: Anastasiya Dontsova

Running time -- 114 minutes

No MPAA rating...

Distributors steered clear of most films up for sale at the recent Sundance Film Festival, but the talent on display generated excitement, with agencies pouncing on actors, directors and writers.

Many of the fest's top winners also topped the agency lists. WMA signed writer-director Courtney Hunt, whose illegal immigration drama Frozen River won the Dramatic Grand Jury Prize, and her film's star, Melissa Leo (21 Grams, NBC's Homicide), who was repped by Don Buchwald and Associates. Hunt's feature debut also scored a distribution deal from Sony Pictures Classics.

WMA also picked up writer-director Andrew MacLean, whose Alaskan thriller Sikumi (On the Ice) won the jury prize in short filmmaking. The Inupiaq filmmaker recently helmed the full-length docu "When the Season Is Good: Artists of Arctic Alaska."

Russian writer-director Anna Melikyan won the world cinema directing award for her romantic fable Mermaid, then won representation from Endeavor, which is selling the film. Her Central Partnership Sales House production, a follow-up to her 2004 comedy Mars, will be screened at the Berlin International Film Festival.

And while Andrew Fleming's comedy Hamlet 2 didn't win any awards, it won the unofficial $10 million grand prize from Focus Features for the biggest acquisition of the year. Skylar Astin garnered some of the film's biggest laughs as an overly dramatic drama student, earning him a deal with UTA in his feature debut.

BERLIN -- Soren Kragh-Jacobsen's Danish political thriller What No One Knows, South African crime drama Jerusalema by Ralph Ziman, Love & Other Crimes by Serbia's Stefan Arsenijevic's and apocalyptic fantasy Before Fall from Spain's Javier Gutierrez are among the titles that have been selected for the Berlin International Film Festival's Panorama sidebar.

The 2008 lineup, which also features the sci-fi dystopia of Mexican director Alex Rivera's Sleep Dealer and the China-to-Moscow murder chase in Brad Anderson's thriller Transsiberian, includes several genre titles amidst the usual mix of serious art house films (represented this year by such titles as Beautiful by Korea's Jaihong Juhn and Russian director Anna Melikyan's Mermaid.)

One of the highlights of this year's Panorama is certain to be the world premiere of Madonna's directorial debut -- the drama Filth And Wisdom, starring Stephen Graham and Richard E. Grant.

Organizers will announce the full Panorama lineup in the coming days.

• There were 983 submissions from 15 countries in this category and apart from a couple of names, I know not one of the final selections below. World Cinema Dramatic Competition"Absurdistan" (Germany), directed by Veit Helmer, written by Helmer, Zaza Buadze, Gordan Mihic and Ahmet Golbol, about a sex strike by village women that threatens a young couple's first night together."Blue Eyelids" (Mexico), directed by Ernesto Contreras, about the ramifications of a single woman's winning of a beach trip for two."Captain Abu Raed" (Jordan), directed and written by Amin Matalqa, concerning an aging airport janitor who relates tall tales to local kids who think he's a pilot."The Drummer" (Hong Kong), directed and written by Kenneth Bi, the story of a young man who matures from reckless gangster to serious grownup due to the influence of Zen drumming."Elite Squad" (Brazil), directed by Jose Padilha ("Bus 174") and written by Braulio Mantovani and Padilha,

...