International Premiere
A film student and her family drive to the desert to shoot a scene for her latest film, but things quickly deteriorate and nothing goes as planned. In this dry comedy, family dynamics and prickly relationships foster a tense situation where it’s unclear whether they will ever manage to cooperate and become a team. Starring Maya Yadlin’s real family, this is a simple film that works thanks to excellent direction, a smart script, and fine performances that create great chemistry between the actors, especially the hilariously deadpan father. Convincing from the first scene and a wonderful surprise.
Community Partner
Israel Yadlin, Stella Yadlin, Dana Yadlin, Maya Yadlin
Israel
2021
In Hebrew with English subtitles
Featured in:
International Shorts: Family Ties
The bonds of family form the basis of this program of short films. Bonds with history and responsibility—sometimes close, sometimes strained—now and for the future.
Missing VIFF? Check out what's playing at the VIFF Centre
Mistura
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Departures
Two lads meet at an airport gate and begin monthly trips to Amsterdam together. Their chemistry is off the charts, but it's Jake who's calls the shots while Benji is the one who's emotionally invested. Comparisons to Pillion and Trainspotting are on mark.
Time and Water
Sara Dosa (Fire of Love) turns her attentions from volcanoes to glaciers in this singular, personal collaboration with the Icelandic writer Andri Snær Magnason, who ruminates on the loss of ties to family and to landscape.
The Richest Woman in the World
Isabelle Huppert plays cosmetics CEO Marianne in this teasingly ambivalent satire inspired by the Bettancourt Affair, when L'Oreal heir Francoise Bettancourt scandalized France by frittering away her fortune on a notorious celebrity photographer.
Le rêve américain
This French crowdpleaser about a couple of nobodies who set themselves up as basketball player agents hits all the right story beats. You wouldn't believe it except that it happens to be true.
Image: © Mika Cotellon
Credits
Producer
Encore Films
Screenwriter
Maya Yadlin
Cinematography
Omer Weiss
Editor
Maya Yadlin
Art Director
Lital Gerzy, Ella Harrison
Director
Maya Yadlin
Maya Yadlin studied at the Minshar School of Art in Tel Aviv and has been working as a freelance editor since 2014. Most of her films are about her family, in which she acts along with her real family members. Her first short film Fine (2018) screened at the Warsaw Film Festival and Filmschoolfest Munich. Her second short film As You Like (2020) premiered at the Show Me Shorts Film Festival in New Zealand. In 2022, her short film Killing Ourselves premiered at the Jerusalem Film Festival, where it won Best Live Action Film.