Renaissance

Director: Christian Volckman

Year: 2007

A beautiful young woman, Ilona Tasuiev is violently kidnapped. Initial attempts to find her are in vain, but no ransom has been demanded. As the snow falls, and Officer Karas takes over the investigation, he knows that he holds Ilona's future in his hands. The cop sinks deeper and deeper into the urban jungles that are the new Parisian districts, governed by local mafia and militia: cities within a city, dedicated to partying and forbidden pleasures. Karas finds a connection between Ilona and disgraced scientist, Jonas Muller, and he meets Ilona's sister, Bislane, an organizer of underground techno raves. Karas constructs an intriguing picture of the missing girl, a child of war and exile, envied for her beauty, possessed of a brilliant imagination and a passion for perfection. As he retraces Ilona's movements, he senses he has unwelcome company, and his stalkers will do anything to get in his way. Karas is spied on and threatened, witnesses are assassinated, someone tries to kill him. The cop no longer knows if his quarry is victim or villain, angel or monster. To locate her becomes a matter of life or death for Karas, and maybe for the whole of civilization. She holds the scientific key to the ultimate question, whether man can be made God: the Renaissance protocol.

Director: Stuart St Paul

Year: 1998

In nineteenth century rural England, a German hussar serving with King George III's personal cavalry, Matthaus Singer, falls madly in love with Frances Groves, the only daughter of a West Country solicitor. Based on the short story 'The Melancholy Hussar' by Thomas Hardy

Director: Sara Nourizadeh

Year: 2026

Set in a mosque waiting room in 1980s South Wales, and inspired by the true story of writer-director Sara Nourizadeh's parents, a young couple whose relationship crossed boundaries of culture, faith and expectation. At a time when Iranian politics dominated UK headlines and shaped public attitudes, a Welsh woman and her Iranian fiancé prepare for an Islamic conversion ceremony – a requirement they must fulfil if they are to marry. What follows is a quietly charged and emotionally intimate portrait of two people trying to navigate a moment that is both deeply personal and subtly political. As they wait for the ceremony to begin, small details – a trembling hand, a whispered joke, a fleeting moment of doubt – reveal the emotional stakes beneath the surface. Their conversation dances between humour and tension, affection and uncertainty, reflecting the push and pull of family pressures, cultural misunderstandings, and their own hopes for the future. Authentic VHS archive footage of the real couple is interwoven within this scripted drama, grounding the film in lived experience and offering an unexpectedly tender glimpse into the decades that followed.