Seventeen-year-old Alem desperately wants to go on a school trip to Italy, but he doesn't have the money. An orphan, he lives with his grandmother and has no cash for extra expenses. If he could find the necessary funds, he'd no longer be the pitiful kid who's always the worst off; instead, he'd be on a par with his richer classmates. And so Alem - whose coarse exterior hides a young man suffering from a sense of inferiority - decides to solve his eternal poverty through one dangerous act. In Precious, director Irfan Avdić demonstrates a knack for capturing situations that, although unimportant for some, are cruel and painful for others.

In one hour two boys will commit suicide. One hour that they share with the internet. Sixty minutes full of wondering whether the whole thing is a provocation, a bad joke, or a seriously intended act. But it is not just the online voyeurs who have their doubts. So does one of the two teenagers, Hugo, although his friend Boris is determined to do as he promised. During this short period of time, the relationship between the two undergoes several transformations, but the clock ticks on mercilessly... A carefully constructed and formally sophisticated film with a surprisingly strong emotional punch - all this is Lun Sevnik's Playing.

Fourteen-year-old Leah lives in an isolated cabin with her ten-year-old brother Theo and their grandmother. Leah is going through a difficult period in her adolescence: though still firmly rooted in the world of children, she is slowly taking on the worries of an adult. A sad event that unexpectedly affects their lives marks the definitive end of one period in Leah's life. She now finds herself responsible for her younger brother, but she carries out the task with the ease of a child. In the sensitively shot The Last Children of Paradise, the landscape surrounding the characters becomes a natural backdrop for a story about losing a sense of security that had felt like paradise.

The city has been ruined by war: most homes have no electricity, and the water mains dried up long ago. One morning, widow Tea decides to wash her hair, but by an unfortunate coincidence she loses the last remnants of her carefully stored water reserves. In an attempt at replacing her loss, she sets out on a life-threatening journey into a world where everybody must rely on themselves, because life without basic commodities does not favor cooperation and a bullet can come from anywhere. This is war-ravaged Sarajevo, and the story - although it sounds like something from a post-apocalyptic drama - is made all the more horrifying by the fact that it's recent history.

After being kidnapped by aliens, copy shop employee Harijs Bērziņš doesn't quite feel at home in his skin. His unusual experience slowly but surely turns him into an outcast, family and friends suddenly feel like strangers, and even the mysterious ufologist Vilma doesn't exactly elicit his trust. While the two of them try to find a common language, the gray alien mother gives birth to Harijs's child... He Was Called Chaos Bērziņš combines a playful style with a love of experimenting with form and material. Latvian director Signe Birkova cleverly reworks old sci fi clichés, placing them into new and fresh contexts.

Alice is undergoing treatment for breast cancer. Although an operation is successful, chemotherapy and the resulting hair loss remind the young woman that her struggle for survival is not yet over. Although her boyfriend Moritz tries to be supportive, he isn't capable of fully understanding her state of mind (or at least that's how it seems to Alice). Her shame at her operation-scarred body continues to place a barrier between her and the one person who should be closest to her. Alice tries to overcome her demons, but her reserves of strength are limited. Touch Me is a sensitive, highly intimate film about the feelings of anxiety that accompany an uncertain future, but also about having the courage to live with those fears.

Hana, Bažo, Maja, and David have always been inseparable. But as they approach thirty, their paths begin to diverge. Hana gets married, Bažo goes to work in Canada, and Maja moves in with her boyfriend. In David's life, however, nothing changes, and he himself isn't sure whether or not that's a good thing. He would certainly be better equipped to face his problems among friends rather than in lonely isolation. Using the naturally charismatic David as example, this energetic, subtly ironic film comments on the void that often grows between the world of carefree partying and the settled life of adulthood, a reality that takes some people by surprise.

When Lukas tells his students to shoot a short film for homework, he has no idea that timid Vendela's first movie will upset the delicate balance in his classroom, where the topic of bullying has never come up. The girl wants to be a vlogger and will do anything to get more likes, and even Lukas can't escape the battle that erupts. At a time when more and more of real life takes place on social media, nobody is safe. Get Ready With Me uncovers the cruel reality of today's adolescents, who often derive their self-worth from the success of their Instagram alter-egos. In their hands, a cellphone can easily become a devastating weapon with just one click.

While the natural landscape of northern Columbia is being ravaged by heavy industry, the members of the Wayuu tribe fight to practice their ancient rituals and to maintain the traditions they inherited from their ancestors. After their father's death, however, sisters Vivian and Yandris lose the last bond tying them to the tribe and feel that this life may no longer be for them. Overcoming inner doubts, the girls decide to run away... Columbian director Jorge Cadena's picture moves between drama and documentary as it captures an ethnographically precise, impressionistically poetic portrait of two young women who find the courage to challenge their tradition-bound environment.

The transformation of the landscape over time, the impact of technology on nature, the contrast between modern industry and the mystery inherent in the breathtaking Scottish landscape. All these topics come together in this hybrid documentary, which follows in the footsteps of Walter Glass, a man who mysteriously disappeared while investigating a nuclear reactor. Working with a strictly specified timeframe, British-Columbian director Natalie Cubides-Brady employs geometrically precise shots of the power plant's ruins to seek the answer to a question: How deep are the environmental scars that humans have left their descendents?