In a poor provincial town, the ragamuffin boys are frenziedly drilled for combat, and at nights the local elite, gathered in a pool room, boasts of fictitious biographies, while bands of boys amuse themselves with bloody fights on trashy vacant plots… One of the most vivid staples of the postwar...
Spurred by his own postmodern musings and the growing inequality, corruption, and kill-or-be-killed ethic of post-Soviet Kazakhstan, a solitary philosophy student steers his directionless life toward the commission of a violent crime, which leads to growing guilt.
Living in Almaty, Kazakhstan, a young man is preparing to become a bus conductor. One day, in between wandering the city streets and going to the movies, he makes the acquaintance of a female student.
Marat works as a personal driver in Almaty, capital of Kazakhstan. When he hits a Mercedes, the nightmare begins. The loan he accepts to pay for the damages puts him at the mercy of a Mafia boss.
Kairat, a teacher of mathematics, accidentally meets Aslar, along with whom he studied in university. Askar invites him to his home, where Kairat becomes acquainted with Togzhan, the wife of Askar. And he falls in love with her. Though this love was mutual, they couldn't step over the obstacles...
A filmmaker, Kobessov, awakens from an anxiety nightmare: during the preview of his newest film, the projectionist mixes up the reels and begins to show a bad karate film by accident. Although Kobessov objects to the mix-up, the public is ecstatic and refuses to allow the projectionist to interrupt...
Chouga is a beautiful, rich and beloved young woman. She is thirty and lives in Astana, the Kazak new capital. She is married to a famous scientist in his sixties and has a seven-year-old son. Her brother and sister-in-law live in Almaty. The couple is tearing apart and Chouga’s brother requests...
A 12-year-old boy from the isolated steppes in Kazakhstan has first encounter with the outside world when he is sent to a children's clinic with a treatable heart condition. It is here that he gets his first taste of the pain and pleasure of love when he falls for a kindly young nurse. His crush...
The stranger is John, an American visiting Kazakhstan as part of an exchange programme for "medical expertise". He meets the local people who lead a free and simple life. With his new friends, John will live through a series of adventures. He spends four very strange days with a friend and...
Didar is a poet, but he cannot live from his poetry. He has to write early in the mornings before setting out for his day job as a newspaper editor. Didar is surrounded by a sense of crisis, not just because of his economic situation but also due to discussions at work about the diminishing...
An eight year old boy has no mother and misses very much a female presence in his life. When a young nurse comes to take care of his ill father, the boy falls in love with her.
This program features three digital short films by Asian filmmakers. Singapore veteran filmmaker Eric Khoo's NO DAY OFF (39 min) records the life of a maid who leaves her husband and baby for Singapore. Darezhan Omirbayev's ABOUT LOVE (38 min) is a bitter love story based on Anton Chekhov's novel,...
The Story of Kazakh Cinema – Underground of Kazakhfilm
02015HD
A film director and an actor have worked till midnight at a film studio. A security guy locked all doors and so now our heroes have to look for an exit, walking through the studio and meeting various people on their way – famous Kazakh film directors, film critics and just strangers.
Art and life are different worlds, separated by an impassable abyss. Where there is life, there is no art, and vice versa. Young artists have to make that choice, sometimes from a rather young age.
Anthology film by the group of young Kazakh filmmakers trained by Sergey Solovyov. Includes novels about love-driven suicide attempt, tank division and a summer camp for children. Was never finished.
