It may be a Netflix world and we’re all just living in it, as the streaming giant is hot on the Lido this year with Bradley Cooper’s ‘Maestro’, Pablo Larrain’s vampire dictator romp and Wes Anderson’s latest — but there are a couple of indie titles that you need to watch. Here’s my list.

THE FEATHERWEIGHT by Robert Kolodny

The true life antics of Italian-American boxer Willie Pep are told in a mockumentary style by first time feature director, film DoP Robert Kolodny. The film is presented by Appian Way Productions, in Association with Golden Ratio Films and Blisspoint Entertainment. And if Appian sounds familiar it’s Leonardo Di Caprio’s company. No less.

James Madio (pictured above) plays former featherweight champ — the winningest fighter of all time — Willie as he attempts a comeback in 1964. Now in his mid-40s, he is down and out in Hartford, Connecticut — living with his immigrant parents, married to an aspiring actress half his age (Ruby Wolf), trying to help his drug-addicted son, and contending with mounting debts — when he decides to make a return to the ring. A documentary camera, making this a film within a film, is there to witness it all unclose and personal and the film is a wonderful wonderful watch. 

Directed by Robert Kolodny. Produced by Steve Loff, James Madio, Bennett Elliott, Robert Greene, and Asger Hussain and Executive Produced by Steve James, Jennifer Davisson and Michael Hampton, The Featherweight is written by Steve Loff with cinematography by Adam Kolodny. 

The Featherweight screens in the Orizzonti section.

PET SHOP DAYS by Olmo Schnabel

After producing one of my fave films of 2019 Giants Being Lonely directed by Grear Patterson, Olmo Schnabel is directing his film feature titled Pet Shop Days. In it, he’s returned to working with many of his friends and crew from Giants Being Lonely, which had me at hello.

Pet Shop Days, earlier named “Pet Shop Boys”, which resulted in that band’s biggest hit ‘West End Girl’ getting stuck in my head, tells the following story, as per the film’s official synopsis: “In an act of desperation, impulsive black sheep Alejandro flees his home in Mexico. On the run from his unforgiving father, Alejandro finds himself in New York City where he meets Jack, a college age pet store employee with similar parental baggage. Together the two enter a whirlwind romance sending them down the rabbit hole of drugs and depravity in Manhattan’s underworld. When Alejandro’s past threatens to catch up with him, Jack is forced to choose between his family and a life on the run.”

Pet Shop Days stars Jack Irv, Dario Yazbek, Willem Dafoe, Emmanuelle Seigner, Camille Rowe and Peter Sarsgaard. It is written by Schnabel and Irv with Galen Core.

The film screens in Orizzonti Extra.

BACKSTAGE by Afef Ben Mahmoud and Khalil Benkirane

This is a film near and dear to my heart. Both Benkirane and his real life partner Ben Mahmoud have had this passion project brewing for a while and in Doha, during the DFI’s Qumra incubator back in March of this year, we lucky few got to watch twenty minutes of the film. Even without all the final color grading and all the goodies that make a film good enough to face an audience, the film was magnificent. The couple manage to capture the magic of the woods and how nature manages to change the relationships between men. 

Backstage stars Ben Mahmoud, who happens to be a renowned and very beautiful Tunisian actress as well as a filmmaker, Palestinian star Saleh Bakri, famed choreographer Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui who also worked on the dance sequences for the film, Sofiane Ouissi, Hajiba Fahmy, Ali Thabet, Abdallah Badis, Salima Abdel-Wahab, Nassim Baddag and Sondos Belhassen. It is a Lycia Productions and Mesanges Films project and it is co-produced by IOTA Production, Les films de l’Altaï, DUO film, Metafora Production. With the help of the Doha Film Institute of course!

Backstage screen as part of the Giornate degli Autori lineup.

STOLEN by Karan Tejpal

What if you could put all your favorite genres and influences into one film, what would that project look like for you? I asked myself that question many times and for me, it’s a blend of Hindi independent cinema — a-la Anurag Kashyap — with Hitchcockian influences, all tied neatly into a super heroine film. And guess what? Stolen turned out to be just that. I won’t say any more so as not to spoil the experience for you, but what starts out in the darkness of a night, in a sleepy town in India, on a train platform in the middle of nowhere turns into the ride of your life. And there is a heroine within it who may not wear a Wonder Woman costume but she’s just as badass and just as exciting to watch.

Stolen stars Abhishek Banerjee, Shubham, Mia Maelzer, Harish Khanna and Sahidur Rahaman.

The film screens as part of Orizzonti Extra and is the first feature by Karan Tejpal, who previously assisted directors on Bollywood hits like Carry On, Munna Bhai with Sanjay Dutt, as well as 3 Idiots with Aamir Khan. He co-wrote the script with Agadbumb and Gaurav Dhingra.

BYE BYE TIBERIAS by Lina Soualem

I started with a mockumentary and I’ll end with a documentary, one that packs a punch. Lina Soualem’s Bye Bye Tiberias is the work of a daughter of Palestine going home, but not in the traditional sense. Because being Palestinian makes everything unconventional. Not to mention challenging and loaded with gravitas.

Soualem uses home videos, photos, stock images even to tell the story of three generations of Palestinian women, her grandmother, her famous actress mother Hiam Abbass and her own. The result is a work of art that should be required viewing for all diplomats and politicians before they ever set foot in Israel or in the West Bank. But it also very personally ponders the question “can you ever really go home again?”

Bye Bye Tiberias is a France, Palestine, Belgium and Qatar co-production and is written by Soualem and Nadine Naous, in collaboration with Gladys Joujou. Producers include Jean-Marie Nizan, Guillaume Malandrin and Ossama Bawardi.

The film screens in the Giornate degli Autori lineup.

P.S. An extra credit entry belongs to:

SKY PEALS by Moin Hussain

This film promises to be one of those gems that you discover by chance at a festival and it turns out to be the one you walk away feeling the strongest about. The story, by London-based filmmaker Moin Hussain, deals with a man named Adam Muhammed, who leads an isolated life while trying to avoid anything unexpected. When he hears that his estranged father Hassan has died, Adam finds himself thrust out of his comfort zone in search of answers. Was his father who he thought he was, and if not, what does make Adam?

Sky Peals was produced by Michelle Stein of Escape Films and executive producers are David Kimbangi, Kristin Irving, and Caroline Cooper Charles. The cast features Faraz Ayub — for those who watch BBC series he played Fawad in the crime drama Silent Witness and DC Deepak Kapoor in Line of Duty — Natalie Gavin, Claire Rushbrook, Simon Nagra, Steve Oram, Jeff Mirza, and Bill Fellows. Bankside is handling sales for this UK production.

The film screens in the Critics’ Week lineup in Venice.