Los Angeles Lift-Off Winners 2017

Right Between Your Ears (next screening with Lift-Off in Sydney)

Dir. Sheila Marshall
Synopsis:Many people have a strong sense that their views are right and couldn’t possibly be wrong. So how do we come to hold an unshakable conviction and why is it hard to consider that we could be mistaken? Through the eyes of a group of people convinced that they knew the date of the end of the world, ‘Right between your Ears’ explores how people believe, how we turn beliefs into certainties, and mistake them for the truth. A stock trader with a young family, a philosophy student about to graduate and a retail manager who became so convinced she quit her job of 18 years. As they face the consequences of their conviction, neuroscience and social psychology offer insight into how we can become convinced we're right, even when we’re wrong.

The Man who Loves to Hurt Himself (next screening with Lift-Off in London)

Dir. Anthony Short
Synopsis: A look at the man's 25+ year career as an extreme performer and his reflection of his life. A documentary about the musician, not the music itself: not a typical "music" documentary but rather a "musician" documentary. It explores how he balances life, love and money with his artistic passions and the undeniable effect his fans express to him about the life altering meaning it has had on them. I spent 2 years following him around the U.S., listening to his inner thoughts and questions about life like a fly on the wall. The film does not attempt to judge nor elevate him. This reflects the conversations he has with himself in his head - a first-person account. In his own words he guides us through his world by stream of consciousness which reveals an unexpected but extremely uplifting message about passion of art and love of life. If you were to have your life flash before your eyes right before you die...this film is what Steve Austin might see about himself."

All or Nothing (next screening with Lift-Off in Amsterdam)

Dir. Alexander Lauritzen
Synopsis: A personal and inspiring story about a woman's life long fight against the regime of Cuba. Being a young woman when the Communist Revolution happened in 1959, Berta has spent her entire life fighting for her belief, rights and principles.
Berta and her adult son, Sami, has been thrown in and out of jail the last 40 years, as they have refused to follow the degrading and inhuman laws and rules of the Communist Revolution.
Where no justice live and where your friends and family eventually will turn against you for their own survival, the distinction between paranoia and reality is often blurred. Berta and Sami have been separated from the society, and are now forced to live in an abandoned and destroyed building without electricity or water.
Powerless to a regime where it is impossible to rebel, the bond between mother and son is the only thing keeping them alive. It's all or nothing..