Night Moves
Saturday, 8.45pm, Marina Mall Vox 1
The second of two Jesse Eisenberg films at the festival, this political thriller has The Social Network star as a radical environmentalist who links up with Dakota Fanning and Peter Sarsgaard to blow up a dam. The film deals with both the lead up to and the aftermath of this act of eco-terrorism, questioning the motivation and integrity of the activists and asking where, if anywhere, the line lies between commitment and fanaticism.
Canopy
Saturday, 9pm, Marina Mall Vox 3
For a debut feature, this is impressive stuff. In Aaron Wilson’s engrossing thriller, a downed Australian Second World War airman is stranded in a thick South-east Asian jungle with a Chinese resistance fighter. Despite sharing no common language, their only hope of survival lies with each other. Beautifully captured in Singapore’s exotic wilderness and mangrove swamps, Canopy is a war drama with a difference.
Qissa
Saturday, 9pm, Marina Mall Vox 6
One of India’s finest actors, Irrfan Khan has been causing a stir in Abu Dhabi for his performance in this sweeping historical drama set amid the chaos of India’s 1947 partition. Having fled his home and lost everything during the separation and ethnic cleansing that followed, a Sikh’s man obsessive wish for a male heir looks destined to fail when his fourth daughter is born. Rather than resigning himself to fate, however, he takes matters into his own hands by raising his new baby as a boy.
