Shadow / Self is a film project that combines dance, fashion and music to explore the darker side of the feminine psyche. A story of human struggle told with movement, beauty and light.
Social & External
The people behind it
Geraldine Hakewill
Self
Elizabeth Blackmore
Shadow
Sabina has travelled from Romania to Holmsund in northern Sweden to find a job with her brothers. Elin has just finished school and is enjoying the first day of the summer holidays. That evening they meet, and it's a meeting that lasts forever.
Omnibus film with 11 short films directed by students of the HfG Ulm
Janosch, an interpreter, is called to help during a police deployment at the Port of Hamburg. A young African woman has barricaded herself in a container ship and threatens to commit suicide. In order to get her out, Janosch promises to help her, an offer which bears unexpected consequences.
A single mother struggles with the day-to-day challenges of raising her daughter, holding down a job, and grieving her husband’s death.
After being discovered trying to escape, a woman must survive the night with her abusive girlfriend.
A wide-eyed young postman and a gangster in trouble with the mafia find their lives become inexplicably intertwined when a heady affair attracts danger at every turn.
Once upon the time on a small island named Taiwan, a neighborhood magistrate receives a secret message from space. 'The apocalypse is near...' the magistrate warns his people, however nobody seems to take his words seriously...
After a boat accident where he puts his son Flavio’s life at risk, fisherman Capudemazza decides to never go fishing again. Ten years later a discovery about his son awakens a feeling in him that had been buried.
The story of three people whose lives are pulled into review and assessment when their paths cross. The initial sparks of what could be a new romance plays off against a couple falling out of love, a student and teacher, a father and son, a mother's influence and competing suitors - all explored with sensitivity, delicacy and refined artistry.
A staged cinematic parable, it presents in symbolic images a painful diagnosis of Poles' sense of identity in the 1970s.
Olivia, a young woman living abroad, returns to her hometown in Mexico in the hope of reconnecting with her past. But the violence she witnessed as a child has not abated, and the journey rekindles memories that are impossible to reconcile with.
A blossoming writer learns that his artistic hero isn't all he thought he was in this satirical exploration of how one separates the art from the artist.
Luka moves to a small coastal town to live with his aunt, while his parents are in the middle of a divorce. A sense of numbness seems to hang above the town, but there is also Jana, a girl from the neighborhood who loves to sunbathe. The end of a lazy summer is near...
Montreal 1952, teenager Samuel brings his friend Julien to the neighbourhood steam bath for his weekly routine with Dad. Julien’s first time will be a day to remember.
A troubled "twunk" ventures down a destructive path, searching for a solution to his problems and a way to ensure his sister's continued support.
Iván is a blind man who lives with his wife, Mercedes. They lead a quiet and peaceful life, but an event is about to change everything. Iván will undergo an operation that will restore his sight, something he has always longed for. However, little by little, he will discover that the world he is about to see hides a dark secret.
Hye-ji takes a dirty picture of her body in the bathroom, and uploads it on her social media. Suddenly, a power outage broke out and she went to the living room to raise the fuse box. Then, she saw wrapped red underwear, which her father prepared for his girlfriend.
A teenage girl gets a keyhole look into a dangerous and mysterious world when a tattooed stranger checks into her roadside motel.
Street dancer Skyler comes out of the shadow of her trained dancer sister, Tosha, & joins a dance competition with the Honey dance studio; the prize is a college scholarship.
A down-on-his-luck coach is hired to prepare a team of the best American dancers for an international tournament that attracts all the best crews from around the world, but the Americans haven't won in fifteen years.
A former professional dancer volunteers to teach dance in the New York public school system and, while his background first clashes with his students' tastes, together they create a completely new style of dance. Based on the story of ballroom dancer, Pierre Dulane.
Mal emerges from the shadows of a mystical forest onto a dark coastline where she crosses paths with Dizzy.
At Mr. Rad's Warehouse, the best hip-hop crews in Los Angeles compete for money and respect. But when a suburban crew crashes the party, stealing their dancers — and their moves — two warring friends have to pull together to represent the street.
A drama set in the American South, where a precocious, troubled girl finds a safe haven in the music and movement of Elvis Presley.
After the death of his younger brother, a troubled 19-year-old street dancer from Los Angeles is able to bypass juvenile hall by enrolling in the historically black, Truth University in Atlanta, Georgia. But his efforts to get an education and woo the girl he likes are sidelined when he is courted by the top two campus fraternities, both of which want and need his fierce street-style dance moves to win the highly coveted national step show competition.
A shy teenager living on the Isle of Wight dreams of pop stardom. With the help of an unlikely mentor, she enters a singing competition that will test her integrity, talent, and ambition.
Aspiring small-town musician Chito is determined to make it big. When a clip of him performing one of his songs goes viral, he seizes the opportunity and pushes to carve out a place for himself in the new wave of Mexican-American music... and ultimately gets caught in a game more dangerous than anticipated.
Davey Gordon, a New York City boxer at the end of his career, falls for dancer Gloria Price. However, their budding relationship is interrupted by Gloria's violent boss, Vincent Rapallo, who has eyes for Gloria. The two decide to skip town, but before they can, Vincent and his thugs abduct Gloria, and Davey is forced to search for her among the most squalid corners of the city, with his enemy hiding in the shadows.
XOXO follows six strangers whose lives collide in one frenetic, dream-chasing, hopelessly romantic night.
A young alcoholic ambient musician locks himself in his apartment on a dangerous seven day bender as he attempts to finish his upcoming album.
A famous pianist at the twilight of his career meets a free-spirited music critic who soon becomes his rock as his mental state deteriorates.
Talented but self-centered trumpeter Bleek Gilliam is obsessed with his music and indecisiveness about his girlfriends Indigo and Clarke. But when he is forced to come to the aid of his manager and childhood friend, Bleek finds his world more fragile than he ever imagined.
Ghost is an ideological musician and leader of a jazz band who would rather play his blues in the park to the birds than compromise himself. His peripatetic performances lead him to cross paths with a singer, while his masculinity is thrown into question following a violent brawl.
A talented young singer and aspiring songwriter’s Christian faith and family ties are tested when she defies her worship-pastor father and pursues pop-music stardom in GRACE UNPLUGGED, a moving and inspiring new film that explores the true meaning of success.
When a law student accidentally kills the son of a mob boss in a fight, he finds himself relentlessly pursued by the mob and the police.
The eldest son of a ruthlessly tough MMA champion must fight his way out of the abusive cycle his father has continued.
When a change of circumstances leaves Miriam unable to pay her college tuition, she makes a surprising decision: to start performing in adult films, using the pseudonym Belle Knox. Miriam lies to her family and her friends at school, keeping her double life a secret. But soon rumours spread and Miriam becomes the subject of vicious online attacks and unwanted attention. Miriam fights back: she talks to the media, saying her new line of work empowers her as a feminist. But her confident stand has unintended consequences. Miriam is shunned by her conservative family and her colleagues in the adult film world. One impulsive decision has quickly spiralled out of control - and Miriam's problems are just beginning.
When household tensions and a sense of worthlessness overcome Evan, he finds escape when he clings with the orphans of a throw-away society. The runaways hold on to each other like a family until a tragedy tears them apart.