ICM Poll: Stuck in the Middle East

A film comprised of three interconnected vignettes that depict women at three stages of life in Iran. The first part centers on a young girl on her ninth birthday who is told that she can no longer play with the boys she had been playing with only the day before because she is now a woman. Told from the perspective of a 9-year-old girl who does not feel like or know what the word "woman" refers to, we see how devastatingly this affects both the girl and the boy with whom she had been friends. The second part is about a young woman who decides to enter a bicycle race against her husband's wishes. As first, the husband and then increasing numbers of men from her village ride beside her on horseback to convince her to return home. The race begins to symbolize a freedom that she desperately wants from the limitations that have been placed on her. Finally, the third part shows us an old woman who has come into some money and is now free to do what she wants. The way she chooses to use this freedom, however, makes one wonder just how free she is.

An enterprising Saudi girl signs on for her school's Koran recitation competition as a way to raise the remaining funds she needs in order to buy the green bicycle that has captured her interest.

A married couple are faced with a difficult decision - to improve the life of their child by moving to another country or to stay in Iran and look after a deteriorating parent who has Alzheimer's disease.

While Ranaa and Emad, a married couple, are participating in a production of "Death of a Salesman," she is assaulted in their new home, which leaves him determined to find the perpetrator over his wife's traumatized objections.

The mysterious disappearance of a kindergarten teacher during a picnic in the north of Iran is followed by a series of misadventures for her fellow travelers.

An Israeli film director interviews fellow veterans of the 1982 invasion of Lebanon to reconstruct his own memories of his term of service in that conflict.

An Palestinian surgeon living in Tel Aviv discovers a dark secret about his wife in the aftermath of a suicide bombing.

Documentary where Iranian filmmaker Abbas Kiarostami reflects on his own film-making techniques, drawing from his own films - and Ten (2002) in particular.

A group of Lebanese women try to ease religious tensions between Christians and Muslims in their village.

In a post-Taliban Afghanistan a young woman (Agheleh Rezaie) attends school against her conservative father's will, hoping to learn more about democracy to fulfill her dream of being the country's next president.

Two sisters become victims of the patriarchal, ultra-orthodox society.

The story of a Palestinian widow who must defend her lemontree field when a new Israeli Defense Minister moves next to her and threatens to have her lemon grove torn down.

In Majdal Shams, the largest Druze village in Golan Heights on the Israeli-Syrian border, the Druze bride Mona is engaged to get married with Tallel, a television comedian that works in the Revolution Studios in Damascus, Syria. They have never met each other because of the occupation of the area by Israel since 1967; when Mona moves to Syria, she will lose her undefined nationality and will never be allowed to return home. Mona's father Hammed is a political activist pro-Syria that is on probation by the Israeli government. His older son Hatten married a Russian woman eight years ago and was banished from Majdal Shams by the religious leaders and his father. His brother Marwan is a wolf trader that lives in Italy. His sister Amal has two teenager daughters and has the intention to join the university, but her marriage with Amin is in crisis. When the family gathers for Mona's wedding, an insane bureaucracy jeopardizes the ceremony.

A documentary about real divorce cases in Iran's tribunals.

When five orphan girls are seen innocently playing with boys on a beach, their scandalized conservative guardians confine them while forced marriages are arranged.

When five Kurdish prisoners are granted one week's home leave, they find to their dismay that they face continued oppression outside of prison from their families, the culture, and the government.

A brother and sister who run away from home find sanctuary in a deserted nature reserve. When the sister falls into the trap of a psychopathic killer, the brother sets out on a race against time to find help. In a twist of fate the rescue of the sister becomes inadvertently intertwined with the lives of a group of young tennis players, a ranger and his dog, as well as a team of policemen.

A Turkish man travels to Istanbul to find the daughter of his father's former girlfriend.

A Christian boy escapes to Israel from famine-stricken Ethiopia by pretending to be Jewish.

Historical fresco recounting the life and times of the Prophet Mohammed, the last of the Abrahamic religion, in the sense that, according to Islam, he completed and sealed the monotheistic revelation made to Abraham.

A look at the life of philosopher and political theorist Hannah Arendt, who reported for 'The New Yorker' on the trial of the Nazi leader Adolf Eichmann in Jerusalem.

Returning to civilian life after twenty-seven years in the army isn't as easy as David had hoped. It's hard to re-establish daily contact with his family, with the dimension of his home and, above all, with the new Israel, an ultra-competitive society obsessed with success. Thus, the opportunity to join a company which produces nutritional supplements seems like a possible escape to be seized without hesitation. But David doesn't know how much his country has changed.

Two childhood friends are recruited for a suicide bombing in Tel Aviv.

Baran, a Kurdish independence war hero, is now sheriff in Erbil, the capital city. No longer feeling useful in this society now at peace, he thinks about quitting the police force, but instead agrees to be stationed in a small valley, at the very borders of Iran, Turkey, and Iraq. It is a lawless territory, right at the heart of illegal drug, medication and alcohol trafficking. Having arrived in the small village, he refuses to bow down to Aga Azzi, the seriously corrupt tribal chief and absolute ruler of the area. Baran meets Govend, the village school teacher, who is also rejected by the villagers. Like Baran, she represents another law, that of the young and autonomous Kurdish state. Govend is all the more vulnerable as she is not a married woman.

A portrait of one of the hot-spots of the Westbank. You will never get as close to the main obstacle of the Palestinian-Israeli contemporary peace process.