Meet Iranian – New-Zealander Faramarz Beheshti, winner of Best Non-European Independent Documentary at ÉCU 2011 for “Salam Rugby”. It is a story of women rugby players in Iran, which may sound like an anomaly, but as this documentary shows, Iranian women are more than ready to dive into the scrum if only the authorities would let them. Following the Islamic Revolution in 1979 competitive sports for women were actively discouraged and it wasn't until the social reforms of the 90s that wome...

Tuesday night, May 31st, ÉCU hosted its first of our year-round Special Screenings Event in Paris for two films that won awards at the 2011 festival; Paths of Hate, winner of Best Animation, featuring two combat fighters at war with each other; and Salam Rugby, winner of Best Non European Independent Documentary, following the first women rugby class ever organized in Tehran. The evening event which ran from 20h to 23h was held in the eclectic "Café Coutume," ...

ÉCU is excited to host our first post-2011 festival screening, where we will be featuring two “Europe’s Best Independent” awarded films at Café COUTUME, located in central Paris. This showing will be one of many special screenings ÉCU will be hosting in Paris in the next few months. Make sure you sign up with our ÉCU Members Club to get premier access to all of our screenings! To obtain your passes now, click here: ...