Xavier Rombaut

Young Hearts

Fourteen-year-old Elias increasingly feels like an outsider in his village. When he meets his new neighbour of the same age, Alexander, Elias is confronted with his burgeoning sexuality.

The virgin and child

Young Yazidi Kurd immigrant Avesta is seven months pregnant. Freshly escaped from the hellish underworld of ISIS, she has just one thought in mind: getting revenge on the man who forced her into slavery. When she arrives in Brussels, she locates and attacks members of his family in order to force him out of his ISIS-linked hiding and bring him before the courts. At the same time, Avesta finds sanctuary at a refugee centre in Brussels. Despite her post-traumatic mutism, she meets Yassemine, an interpreter of Kurdish origin who offers her support and tries to get her to talk. Yassemine helps Avesta take her first steps in Belgium and brings her to see Babette, a nurse in the city centre. The exam shows that her unborn baby is doing well, but horrible scars are revealed on Avesta's body.

Summer Brother

As Brian cares for his severely mentally disabled brother over a sweltering summer holiday he is forced to grow up, and finds unexpected love and affection.

When We Lost to the Germans

After the lost final against Germany, everyone is hungover; in the summer town it remains quiet. Jonas and Dan bump into each other and decide to explore the neighbourhood to see if there is anything going on. Meanwhile, the realisation sinks in that their classmate Catootje has been missing for five days - could she still be alive?

Kanun

The story homes in on Lorik, who's barely thirty years old yet who works as an enforcer for the Albanian mafia in Brussels, alongside his mentor Aleks. And when Lorik falls in love with Sema, a Fine Arts student of Turkish origins, his past comes back to haunt him: a man hailing from Lorik's village in Albania, whose father was killed by the latter's uncle, tracks down the young man and demands that his family's debt be paid for in blood, as per the Kanun tradition. In short, he asks the clan for Lorik's death.

Summerlight and Then Comes The Night

The village is brimming with stories and if you listen closely it might tell you a few. Perhaps the one about the businessman who dreams in Latin, or the one about the delicate boy who carves moorland birds, or maybe the one of the open-air sexual affair that has explosive consequences.

Otto the Barbarian

Otto, a seventeen-year-old punk, becomes involved in the social services investigation of his girlfriend Laura’s death. He is caught up in a vicious circle created by his parents, his mute grandpa and Laura’s mother. Laura is still part of his life through video recordings that he edits constantly, trying to make sense of the events. Through this process, Otto must take his portion of the responsibility for what happened.

Holiday

Maurice’s (26) family organizes a weekend getaway. The balance of power between the different generations seems to be blurred, but is he willing to keep up appearances just like the others?

Binti

Binti is a 12-year-old girl of Congolese origin who dreams of becoming a famous vlogger like her idol Tatyana. But when the police raid her home and try to deport her and her father Jovial, they are forced to flee. Binti meets Elias and befriends her. While Binti helps Elias to vlog about his 'save-the-okapi-club', she hatches the perfect plan: her dad has to marry Elias’s mom, so they can stay in Belgium.

Bloody Marie

Marie Wankelmut, once successful comic artist, lives among the prostitutes in Amsterdam's Red Light District. Nowadays drunken and bold, she gets into one conflict after another. A gruesome sobering event at her neighbors, forces her to take action.

August

August is a carefree boy who likes to discover the world and to play outside with his best friend Lize. One day, he encounters the seamy side of life and suddenly Lize doesn't want to see him anymore.

Before the Last Curtain Falls

This documentary tells the story of great love, bitter disappointments and self-doubts - but most of all of courage. The courage to take risks, try something new and be yourself - no matter what age. The film dives deeply into the exceptional and heart-warming stories of a group of transsexuals and drag queens in their sixties and seventies, who summon up their bravery to take to the stage one last time. For two years they have been touring in five continents, basking in the success of a spectacular show called "Gardenia", directed by Alain Platel and Frank Van Laecke. Now, as the show comes to a close, the glamorous aging performers must leave the limelight and go home to the quiet lives they left behind.

Las Meninas

Belen, a young woman from Murcia, grows up in a family of hysterical women. When her grandmother Marta passes away, a legacy issue emerges. The ex-husband of Marta, Fernando, appears to have built up a new life in Ghent and inherits a part of the capital. The family is furious and wants to get hold of the money while Belen tries to fight the hatred and travels to Ghent. Will she solve the issue or simply get to know better her grandfather? Belen searches for the truth about her family and about herself and discovers that wisdom lies in the art of acceptance.

Empire of Dust

Lao Yang is head of logistics of the group. He is responsible for the equipment, building materials and food (mainly chickens) to arrive in the isolated Chinese prefab camp. The Congolese government was supposed to deliver these things but so far the team hasn't received anything. With Eddy (a Congolese man who speaks Mandarin fluently) as an intermediate, Lao Yang is forced to leave the camp and deal with local Congolese entrepreneurs, because without the construction materials the road works will cease. What follows is an endless, harsh, but absurdly funny roller coaster of negotiations and misunderstandings, as Lao Yang learns about the Congolese way of making deals.

Venus vs. Me

A young girl Marie faces the troubles of growing up when her mother takes a new boyfriend home.