“my favorite film of the festival, bar none – watching this devastating portrait of a family trying to glue itself back together, you wonder how China, on its way to becoming the world’s richest nation, will avoid civil war if it doesn’t also attend to the needs of the millions of poverty-stricken families like this one.” – [Read More]

“”It’s a huge honour to be admitted to Sundance,” says Lixin Fan, who is here with The Last Train Home. A former broadcast journalist in his native China, Mr. Fan documented the world’s biggest human migration that happens every year as factory workers head out of the cities and cram onto trains bound for small villages for the holidays.” [Read More]

“…a beautifully shot, haunting and haunted large-scale portrait….conveys the enormity of this exodus while bringing you close to a family whose fraught efforts to reunite are symptomatic of a deeper struggle affecting China.” [Read More]

Austin, Texas: South by Southwest is arguably one of the world’s coolest festivals — although I’ve also heard the fest’s convergence of Music, Film, and Interactive described as “Spring Break for Nerds”. In either case, EyeSteelFilm is happy to announce that both Taqwacore: The Birth of Punk Islam and Last Train Home have been selected to SXSW 2010 (in the 24 Beats per Second, and Best of Fests sections, respectively). It is also rumored that many Taqwacore bands, as well as the author of the novel “The Taqwacores”, Michael Mohammed Knight, and director Omar Majeed will all be on hand with us for a massive Taqwacore concert / party co-presented with our U.S. distributor, Lorber Films. But so far that is just a rumor. Also of note: an awesome panel (everyone loves a good panel) on the tools needed for indie distribution, featuring Laure Parsons, Jon Reiss, Brians Chirls, Liz Ogilvie (B-Side) and Mila Aung-Thwin (EyeSteelFilm). See you there!

2010 SUNDANCE FILM FESTIVAL ANNOUNCES FILMS IN COMPETITION | Sundance Festival 2010.

LAST TRAIN HOME – in Sundance Documentary Competition!

WORLD CINEMA DOCUMENTARY COMPETITION

• “Enemies of the People” (Cambodia-U.K.) – Directed by Rob Lemkin and Thet Sambath, which recounts the shocking revelations that ensue when a young journalist whose family was killed by the Khmer Rouge befriends the perpetrators of the Killing Fields genocide. World premiere.
• “A Film Unfinished” (Germany-Israel) – Directed by Yael Hersonski, in which film found in Nazi archives reveals the means used to stage Warsaw ghetto life. World premiere.
• “Fix Me” (France-Palestinian Territories-Switzerland) – Directed by Raed Andoni, in which Andoni seeks different forms of help for a relentless headache in his hometown of Ramallah. International premiere.
• “His and Hers” (Ireland) – Directed by Ken Wardrop, in which 70 Irish women offer insights into the relationships between women and men. World premiere.
• “Kick in Iran” (Germany) – Directed by Fatima Geza Abdollahyan, about the struggles of the first female Taekwondo fighter from Iran to qualify for the Olympic Games. World premiere.
• “Last Train Home” (Canada) – Directed by Fan Lixin, which focuses on the ordeals of a Chinese migrant worker who, along with many others, tries to reunite with a distant family. U.S. premiere.
• “The Red Chapel” (Denmark) – Directed by Mads Bruegger, about a journalist without scruples, a self-proclaimed spastic and a comedian travel to North Korea under the guise of a cultural exchange visit to challenge the totalitarian regime. U.S. premiere.
• “Russian Lessons” (Georgia-Germany-Norway) – Directed by Olga Konskaya and Andrei Nekrasov, which looks into ethnic cleansing in Georgia revealed by an investigation of Russian actions during the 2008 war. World premiere.
• “Secrets of the Tribe” (Brazil) – Directed by Jose Padiha, which examines the scandal and infighting within the academic anthropology community regarding the representation and exploitation of indigenous Indian in the Amazon Basin. World premiere.
• “Sins of My Father” (Argentina-Colombia) – Directed by Nicolas Entel, which delves into the life and times of Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar through the eyes of his son, who fled Colombia to lead his own life. North American premiere.
• “Space Tourists” (Switzerland) – Directed by Christian Frei, a humorous look at billionaires who pay large sums to travel into outer space for fun. North American premiere.
• “Waste Land” (U.K.) – Directed by Lucy Walker, which reveals how lives are transformed when international artist Vik Muniz collaborates with garbage picker in the world’s largest landfill in Rio de Janeiro. World premiere.