Unlimited

The Ethiopian intellectual Anberber returns to his native country during the repressive totalitarian regime of Haile Mariam Mengistu and the recognition of his own displacement and powerlessness at the dissolution of his people's humanity and social values. After several years spent studying medicine in Germany, he finds the country of his youth replaced by turmoil. His dream of using his craft to improve the health of Ethiopians is squashed by a military junta that uses scientists for its own political ends. Seeking the comfort of his countryside home, Anberber finds no refuge from violence. The solace that the memories of his youth provide is quickly replaced by the competing forces of military and rebelling factions. Anberber needs to decide whether he wants to bear the strain or piece together a life from the fragments that lie around him.

Todor, a Serbian smuggler in Trieste, Italy, earns his daily bread by smuggling fake brand cigarettes. He sails out in a small boat to collect his freight if there is enough mist to make his illegal mission possible. One day he reluctantly accepts a much larger cargo. In the crate he finds a wounded and drugged woman. Todor decides not to deliver the freight and takes the woman home with him. He takes a chest full of stones to his client and it soon becomes apparent that he has got himself into big trouble with this manoeuvre. Todor takes care of the woman, who slowly but surely overcomes her fear of him. By the time he manages to get her a passport, an unbreakable bond has silently grown between them and he asks her to go away with him. Fate decides otherwise.

On November 1, 1954, near Ghassira, a small village lost in the Aurès, a couple of French teachers and an Algerian boss were the first civilian victims of a seven-year war which would lead to the independence of Algeria. More than fifty years later, Malek Bensmaïl returns to this Chaoui village, which has become “the cradle of the Algerian revolution”, to film, throughout the seasons, its inhabitants, its school and its children.