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In the culture-clash comedy “Meet the Barbarians,” actor-director Julie Delpy lays bare a number of Western hypocrisies. The film follows several townspeople in the struggling French commune of Paimpont, who vote to welcome a handful of Ukrainian refugees, but are caught by surprise when a Syrian family shows up instead. The ensuing response runs the gamut from clumsy to hostile, which Delpy captures by applying a documentary-like lens to the town’s fabric, and to their Arab guests. The result is a movie that, though it never quite achieves the dramatic highs for which it aspires, proves eye-wateringly funny.

The film flies out the gate with an energy reminiscent of “The Office,” as bumbling mayor Sébastien Lejeune (Jean-Charles Clichet) regales a TV news crew with his plans to welcome a Ukrainian family. The city council votes overwhelmingly in favor. Even potential holdout Hervé Riou (Laurent Lafitte), the sour-faced town plumber,...

Until its full plot unfolds, viewers are likely to assume “Meet the Barbarians” is a sweetly nostalgic comedy. And in some ways, they’d be right. Director Julie Delpy structures her new film as a fairy tale, going so far as to introduce the action with a literal “Once upon a time in Paimpont …”

She gives us a delightful setting, heroes and villains, five distinct acts and a strong moral lesson. But while the tale is timeless, the time is two years ago. And Paimpont, a charming hamlet in Brittany, could be any number of small towns or big cities today.

Paimpont happens to be an ancient village so tiny, everyone is involved in every decision. When the film begins, the mayor, Sébastien (Jean-Charles Clichet), is proudly announcing a new initiative: Paimpont has decided to adopt a family of Ukrainian refugees. The whole town is vibrating with excitement, until they...

After a great success of their short film “Mare Nostrum” (2016) which bagged 36 awards internationally, Syrian directors Rana Kazkaz and Anas Khalaf unite again, this time for their long-feature debut “The Translator” which celebrates its world premiere in the First Feature Competition of PÖFF (Tallinn Black Nights).

“The Translator” is screening at Vesoul International Film Festival of Asian Cinema

The brilliant Ziad Bakri of “Mare Nostrum” is the titular character Sami Najjar, a man whose calm life in Australia comes to an end when his brother Zaid gets arrested by Bashar al-Assad’s regime in Damascus. With scary prospects of losing his third close family member after mother and father, Sami makes a dangerous decision of flying over to Syria. He is known and not welcome back due an incident he was responsible for, and the trip needs a careful preparation involving crossing the border in an unorthodox way.

The...

At Cph:Forum, Eurimages Award goes to Maria Back’s Psychosis in Stockholm; 31 projects pitched.

Cph:dox expanded its industry offerings this year by adding a Work-in-Progress session on the eve of its Cph:forum for six Nordic documentaries currently in production or post-production.

Short presentations including footage was shown for projects including:

The Acali Experiment (Swe/Den/Ger/Us), dir Marcus Lindeen, prod Erik Gandini

The story will examine what happened when Mexican anthropologist Santiago Genovés tried a unique experiment in 1973, putting 10 people on a raft for a 101-day voyage to study human behaviour. Lindeen brought the participants together for the first time in 43 years to talk about Genoves’ manipulative behaviour. “I wanted make a reunion and let them talk about their memories of what happened on the raft,” he said. “We let the subjects make a study of the scientist.” The team aims to deliver the film in the autumn.

Contact: gandini@fasad.se

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Qatari Institution funds 26 projects from 14 countries.

The Doha Film Institute has announced the latest recipients of its grants programme.

Six of the grantees premiere in Cannes this year: Apprentice and Dogs premiere in Cannes, Divines, in Directors’ Fortnight and Diamond Island, Mimosas and Tramontane in Critics’ Week.

The Dfi also backed Asghar Farhadi’s Palme d’Or contender The Salesman but not as part of grants programme.

“I think it’s testament to the strength of our grants programme, the exciting new filmmakers emerging from our region and beyond, and the high quality of the films we are pleased to be able to support,” said said Fatma Al Remaihi, CEO of the Doha Film Institute.

A total of 26 projects from 14 countries – comprising 13 narrative features, six documentaries, three experimental or essay works and four short films – received funding for development, production or post-production in the spring 2016 funding round.

“The number of established film-makers applying has increased following the opening...

Exclusive: Netflix to launch Us-Danish documentary Knox in autumn; Screen speaks to key doc companies about their lineups.

The Danish documentary world has been going from strength to strength – and not just Joshua Oppenheimer’s Danish productions The Act of Killing and The Look of Silence.

Screen spoke to three of Denmark’s most prominent documentary production companies last week in Copenhagen, to talk about their slates, which include a new Netflix title with exclusive access to Amanda Knox, two Syrian documentaries, and a Tribeca premiere about insects as a sustainable food source.

All the companies said Danish documentaries were booming thanks in part to generous support systems from the Danish Film Institute, which has specialist documentary funding consultants, to help them create such a range of work now.

As Signe Byrge Sorensen of Final Cut For Real says: “There is a long tradition here for documentary, and its also very diverse. People do all...