San Francisco, CA - Dec 8, 2010 - The Global Film Initiative announced today nine award-winning narrative feature films from Argentina, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Brazil, China, Georgia, India, Iran, Kyrgyzstan and Uruguay that will headline the Global Lens 2011 film series.

"This year's lineup really does break new ground for the series," says Susan Weeks Coulter, Board Chair of the Global Film Initiative. "The films are unusual and intriguing, wildly creative, experimental at times and quite different from previous editions of Global Lens."

Global Lens 2011 will premiere a number of festival-headliners, including Federico Veiroj's homage to Uruguayan cinephile culture, A USEFUL LIFE (Official Selection, Toronto International Film Festival), Iranian auteur Mohammad Rasoulof's visually arresting cultural mythology, THE WHITE MEADOWS (Special Jury Award,
Dubai International Film Festival), and Zhang Lu's brooding and timely portrait of Chinese-Korean border
politics, DOOMAN RIVER (NETPAC Award, Pusan International Film Festival).

The upcoming series also features U.S. premieres of Diego Lerman's dystopian portrait of sexual psyche in
mid-80s Argentina, THE INVISIBLE EYE (Directors' Fortnight, Cannes International Film Festival), veteran Kyrgyz director Aktan Arym Kubat's entrepreneurial charmer, THE LIGHT THIEF (FIPRESCI Award, Eurasia International Film Festival), and BELVEDERE--Ahmed Imamović's picturesque image of post-war life in a
Bosnian refugee town, and follow-up to his controversial first feature, Go West. 

The 2011 series is rounded out by Georgian newcomer Levan Koguashvili's ironical tale of daily life and drug addiction in Tbilisi, STREET DAYS (VPRO Tiger Award, International Film Festival Rotterdam), Sérgio
Bianchi's noir-like visage of urban tension in a São Paulo suburb, THE TENANTS (Best Script, Rio De Janeiro International Film Festival), and Sidharth Srinivasan's fiercely independent chronicle of caste and class in rural India, SOUL OF SAND (Official Selection, Toronto International Film Festival).

Global Lens, now in its eighth year, will premiere January 13-28, 2011, at the Museum of Modern Art before embarking on a yearlong tour of over thirty-five cities across the United States and Canada. The series will be simultaneously released throughout the year on Virgin America airlines, and selections will also be presented in Washington, D.C. in January as part of a newly established partnership with the Smithsonian Institution.

Global Lens 2011 films:

• BELVEDERE, dir. Ahmed Imamović, Bosnia-Herzegovina, 2010*
  Fifteen years after the ethnic cleansing of Bosnian Muslims during the Balkan conflict, a determined widow searching for the remains of her husband and son quietly attempts to rebuild her life by caring for her troubled extended family.
  
  

• DOOMAN RIVER, dir. Zhang Lu, China, 2009
  Two boys on opposite sides of the Chinese-Korean border strike a playful friendship that comes under scrutiny
  and strain after a series of thefts in a nearby town lead Chinese residents to cast suspicion on North Korean refugees.
   
• THE INVISIBLE EYE (LA MIRADA INVISIBLE), dir. Diego Lerman, Argentina, 2010*
  Against the backdrop of Argentina's mid-80s military regime, an overzealous young teacher develops an
  unusual obsession with one of her students after she is asked to keep a watchful "eye" over the happenings
  at an elite Buenos Aires private school.
   
• THE LIGHT THIEF (SVET-AKE), dir. Aktan Arym Kubat, Kyrgyzstan, 2010**
  A humble electrician intent on enlivening his windswept valley with electricity unwittingly strikes a deal with a
  rich politician whose corrupt ambitions threaten to upend the electrician's dream to build windmills in his village.
   
• SOUL OF SAND (PAIRON TALLE), dir. Sidharth Srinivasan, India, 2010*
  A watchman at an abandoned mine is drawn into a bizarre triangle after a wealthy landlord's daughter and her
  lower-caste lover seek refuge from a masked killer wreaking havoc across the Indian countryside.
   
• STREET DAYS (QUCHIS DGEEBI), dir. Levan Koguashvili, Georgia, 2010**
  A well-meaning heroin addict whose life and status seem to worsen by the day, finds himself caught between serving a prison sentence and selling out the son of his former classmate.
   
• THE TENANTS (OS INQUILINOS), dir. Sérgio Bianchi, Brazil, 2009
  After three mysterious men move into a smoky São Paulo suburb, a neighboring couple becomes obsessed with
  the men's clandestine activities and the ozone of violence that descends upon their once-tranquil neighborhood.
   
• A USEFUL LIFE (LA VIDA ÚTIL), dir. Federico Veiroj, Uruguay, 2010**
  After financial troubles and a dwindling audience force an art-house cinema to shut its doors permanently, its
  most devoted employee is suddenly left without a "home" and forced to adjust to life outside of the theater.
   
• THE WHITE MEADOWS (KESHTZAR HAYE SEPID), dir. Mohammad Rasoulof, Iran, 2009
  Rowing through the salty waters of a vast marsh, a boatman quietly collects and combines the tears and
  confessions of nearby island residents into a dreamlike mythology of modern Iran.

Global Lens 2011 will also present the award-winning visual masterpiece, OPERA JAWA (dir. Garin Nugroho, Indonesia) as part of the Initiative's retrospective program, Chairman's Choice, which was established in 2009
to re-introduce exceptional films from the Global Lens Collection for theatrical exhibition. OPERA JAWA
originally appeared in Global Lens 2008.

  * indicates U.S. premiere
** indicates U.S. premiere and official submission to Foreign Language category of 2011 Academy Awards