Leap year: Ano Bisiesto

Winner of the prestigious Camera D Or prize for Best First Feature at the 2010 Cannes Film Festival, and one of the most controversial films of the year, LEAP YEAR (Ao Bisiesto), from Mexico, is the outstanding debut feature film of Australian director Michael Rowe, a character study on loneliness, featuring an extraordinary leading performance by Mnica Del Carmen (Babel), supported by Gustavo Snchez Parra (Amores Perros, Man on Fire). This highly charged sexual thriller, set within the small confines of a Mexican apartment, follows 29 days in the dispirited life of freelance journalist Laura Lopez, as she moves from one anonymous sexual encounter to another. Soon, Laura meets a man by the name of Arturo, and it is not long before she is submitting to demeaning sexual acts as part of their relationship, a tragic psychological reaction to a secret trauma from her past, which occurred on the previous leap year. When Laura marks a red square around an upcoming date on her calendar wall, the wheels are set in motion for what will turn out to be a startling conclusion.