The Great Man's Lady

In Hoyt City, a statue of founder Ethan Hoyt is dedicated, and 100 year old Hannah Sempler Hoyt (who lives in the last residence among skyscrapers) is at last persuaded to tell her story to a 'girl biographer'. Flashback: in 1848, teenage Hannah meets and flirts with pioneer Ethan; on a sudden impulse, they elope. We follow their struggle to found a city in the wilderness, hampered by the Gold Rush, star-crossed love, peril, and heartbreak. The star "ages" 80 years.

The Last Ferry

One of the passengers on a ship carrying Poles on a cruise in December 1981 is a dissident high school teacher sent abroad by Solidarity. He is under surveillance of the secret police, anxious to get their hands on the info that he is carrying. When the ship is in the middle of the Baltic sea, martial law is declared and the ship is militarized. The captain announces he will turn and return the home port. Many anguished passengers put the life vests on and jump into the sea, where they are picked up by two German ships. The teacher, however, decides to return to Poland and continue the struggle for freedom.

A Mexican Fable: Murder and the Feather Boa

La Vanessa was the organiser of the first gay rights march in Chiapas State, Mexico. Four years after her murder in 1992, this study of mexican transvestite culture documents a period of fear marked by 29 brutal murders. It originally aired in '96 as part of Channel 4's Latino Nights line-up ("a season of programmes from and about Latin America"), and--aside from showing up at a few niche trans-festivals here and there--seems to have disappeared altogether after that.

Marco Zenni Apresenta: Só Ria!