[caption id="attachment_30728" align="aligncenter" width="1000"]
Apuntes para una película de atracos (Notes for a Heist Film).[/caption]
Thirteen first or second films by European, Asian and Latin American directors that will be competing for the Kutxabank-New Directors Award at the 2018 San Sebastián Film Festival.
Koldo Almandoz (San Sebastián, 1973) has had an intense career in the world of short films, linked to the Kimuak programme and to the San Sebastián Festival, which programmed his first short, Razielen itzulera (The Return of Raziel), in 1997 in Zabaltegi, the section in which two decades later he presented his first full-length film, Sipo Phantasma (Ghost Ship), after premiering it in Rotterdam. Oreina (The Deer) is his second feature film.
Elías León Siminiani (Santander, Spain, 1971), nominated for a Goya for Mapa (Map), is now presenting Apuntes para una película de atracos (Notes for a Heist Film). For her part, Nataliia Meshchaninova (Krasnodar, Russia, 1982), who competed in Rotterdam with her first full-length film, Kombinat ‘Nadezhda’ / The Hope Factory, focuses on the vet on a farm in Serdtse Mira / Core of the World. And after Ama Doren / Hold my hand, Ismet Sijarina in Nëntor i ftohtë / Cold November returns to the War in the Balkans, in this case to its background, when Kosovo’s autonomy was suppressed.
Hadrian Marcu (Brăila, Rumanía, 1976) will be presenting Un om la locul lui / A Decent Man, about a man who is torn by an emotional conflict, that was selected last year in the first Glocal in Progress, the industry activity at the Festival aimed at European films in non-hegemonic languages. It stars Bodgan Dumitrache, who won the Silver Shell for best actor last year for his performance in Pororoca.
The selection also includes the first film by Francisco Marise (La Plata, Argentina, 1985), Para la Guerra (To War), coproduced by the filmmaker, Javier Rebollo, who also takes part in the editing process, and the first film by Hiroshi Okuyama (Japan, 1996), the award-winning music video director, who makes his debut with Boku wa Iesu-sama ga kirai / Jesus.
The short by Inés María Barrionuevo (Córdoba, Argentina, 1980), La quietud (2012), competed in the official section at Locarno, and her first feature film, Atlántida (2014), was selected at the Berlinale in the Generation 14plus section. In Julia y el zorro (Julia and the Fox) she deals with a woman and her twelve-year-old daughter who are going through a mourning process. The director, producer and actress Lila Avilés (Mexico, 1982), after working in theatre and presenting shorts at international festivals, in her first full-length film, entitled La camarista (The Chambermaid), describes the everyday life of one of the so-called ‘chambermaids’.
After winning awards in his short-film career (with films like Teneriffa), Hannes Baumgartner (Männedorf, Switzerland, 1983) has been inspired in his first feature film Der läufer / Midnight Runner, by the true story of an athlete who starts to commit robberies and lead a double life.
Snow, the graduation film by Laurits Flensted-Jensen (Aarhus, Denmark, 1985), was selected at Rotterdam and was chosen as best documentary short by the Danish Academy. His fictional short Melon Rainbow was once again programmed at the Dutch festival and won the most important award at Odense. Neon Heart is his first full-length film.
After taking part in the Short Film Corner at Cannes with Grasshopper, the Vietnamese director Ash Mayfair (Ho Chi Minh City, 1985) is presenting her feature-film debut at San Sebastián with The Third Wife, whose screenplay was chosen by Spike Lee as the winner of his Spike Lee Film Production Fund Award in 2014.
The short film Luisa no está en casa (Luisa is not Home) by Celia Rico Clavellino (Seville, 1982) was chosen in the Short Film Corner at Cannes and at Venice and won the Gaudí award for best short. Her first full-length film, Viaje al cuarto de una madre (Journey to a Mother’s Room), whose screenplay took part in the Berlinale Talents Script Station Lab, stars Lola Dueñas and Anna Castillo.
The remaining titles making up the New Directors section will be announced in the coming weeks.
APUNTES PARA UNA PELÍCULA DE ATRACOS (NOTES FOR A HEIST FILM)
LEÓN SIMINIANI (SPAIN)
Elías is a film director who dreamed of making a heist movie. During the summer of 2013 he reads a news story about the arrest of ‘The Vallecas Robin Hood’, the leader of ‘the sewers gang’. He then feels that he has found the opportunity to make his dream come true. He sends him a letter to the prison where he is serving his sentence. Against all odds, Elías receives a reply three weeks later. Robin Hood agrees for him to come and visit him in prison.
BOKU WA IESU-SAMA GA KIRAI / JESUS
HIROSHI OKUYAMA (JAPAN)
Cast: Yura Sato, Riki Okuma
Yura is a young boy whose family leaves Tokyo to live with his grandmother in the snowy countryside. Not only must he fit in at a new school, but it’s a Christian one. At first he is puzzled when he and his classmates are called to ‘worship’, but he gradually adjusts to his new environment. One day, in the middle of a prayer, he sees a very small Jesus appear before him. Each wish Yura makes to Jesus comes true, and he starts to have faith in the power of the Lord.
DER LÄUFER / MIDNIGHT RUNNER
HANNES BAUMGARTNER (SWITZERLAND )
Cast: Max Hubacher, Annina Euling, Luna Wedler, Sylvie Rohrer, Christophe Sermet, Saladin Dellers
Jonas Widmer is one of the best runners in Switzerland and his focus is to attend the Olympic games. Besides the sport Jonas is a successful cook and plans to move in with his girlfriend Simone. But Jonas perfect life gets disturbed by the increasing memories of his late brother. He starts a tragic double life by robbing young women at night. After a true story.
JULIA Y EL ZORRO (JULIA AND THE FOX)
INES MARÍA BARRIONUEVO (ARGENTINA)
Cast: Umbra Colombo, Pablo Limarzi, Victoria Castelo Arzubialde
Julia, an ex-actress, and her daughter Emma move into a mansion in a village in Córdoba, Argentina. It is winter and Julia needs to fix up the house so she can sell it. Quite a while has gone by since the death of her husband and Emma’s father, but they are still in mourning. The days go gloomily by. Grief has made Julia quiet and cool with her daughter. One night Julia meets Gaspar, a life-long friend of hers. Gaspar tries to convince Julia to take part in a theatre competition. Julia, Emma and Gaspar find a way to rebuild their lives by starting a rather uncertain project to form a new type of family.
LA CAMARISTA (THE CHAMBERMAID)
LILA AVILÉS (MEXICO – USA)
Cast: Gabriela Cartol, Teresa Sánchez
Eve is a young chambermaid working in one of the most luxurious hotels in Mexico City, an exclusive glass tower inhabited by guests so wealthy she can only imagine their lives through intimate fantasies of the belongings they’ve left behind. Long, laborious shifts prevent Eve from caring for her child while she helps guests with their own children, but she believes her situation will improve if she gets promoted to work at executive-level suites, for which she accepts a grueling schedule. In keeping with this goal, she also enrolls in the hotel’s adult education program…
NËNTOR I FTOHTË / COLD NOVEMBER
ISMET SIJARINA (KOSOVO – ALBANIA – FORMER YUGOSLAV REPUBLIC OF MACEDONIA)
Cast: Kushtrim Hoxha, Adriana Matoshi, Emir Hadzihafizbegovic, Fatmir Spahiu, Majlinda Kosumovic, Bislim Mucaj, Lum Veseli, Aurita Agushi
In the beginning of the ’90s, Yugoslavian Government cancelled the autonomy of Kosovo, dissolved its Parliament and closed down the National Television. Whole institutional life was reorganized by new authorities, while the majority of citizens responded with peaceful demonstrations. During this evil time, Fadili who is working as an archivist has to choose between two options, being aware that both of them are wrong. In this way, he involuntarily and unwillingly, ‘swallows’ the shame, endures the pressure coming from all sides and deals with the bad reputation for just one reason: to provide welfare for his family.
NEON HEART
LAURITS FLENSTED-JENSEN (DENMARK)
Cast: Victoria Carmen Sonne, Niklas Herskind, Noah Skovgaard Skands
Neon Heart is a story about three people chasing life and each other. Laura is on her way to a porn film casting. Niklas is trying to take care of two men with Down’s Syndrome, and Frederik is out to gain respect as a hooligan. In glimpses and fragments of past and present, we follow the three characters on a journey full of taboos and desires. With a cast of mainly non-actors in authentic environments, Neon Heart confronts its audience with a world we would rather not look at.
OREINA (THE DEER)
KOLDO ALMANDOZ (SPAIN)
Cast: Laulad Ahmed, Patxi Bisquert, Ramón Agirre, Iraia Elías, Erika Olaizola
Khalil is a rootless young man who lives on the edge of town, where the industrial estates merge into the river and the marshes. Khalil gets by as best he can and spends his time with an old poacher, who shares a house on the riverbank with a brother who he hasn’t spoken to in years. On the banks of the marshes, the tides mark the time for love and heartbreak, friendship and revenge.
PARA LA GUERRA (TO WAR)
FRANCISCO MARISE (CUBA – ARGENTINA – SPAIN)
Para la guerra explores the memory and loneliness of a Cuban former internationalist soldier by observing his body and (extra)ordinary gestures. This is a bloodless war film without any shooting; a film about a wound, that ‘Sledgehammer’, ‘ El Rayado’, Andrés, has, this special forces veteran who tries to find his colleagues from the commando that survived their last mission 30 years ago.
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Core of the World (Serdtse Mira[/caption]
SERDTSE MIRA / CORE OF THE WORLD
NATALIIA MESHCHANINOVA (RUSSIA)
Cast: Stepan Devonin, Dmitriy Podnozov, Jana Sekste
Egor is a veterinarian on a rural farm which doubles as a hunting dog training center. He is a grown man, but deep inside he is a child who has been hurt and abandoned by everyone, including his own mother. All he wants is to care for the animals and to feel part of the close-knit family he works for. When animal rights activists invade this fragile microcosm, throwing off its delicate balance, Egor’s world begins to crumble… Or so it seems.
THE THIRD WIFE
ASH MAYFAIR (VIETNAM)
Cast: Trần Nữ Yên Khê, Mai Thu Hường, Nguyễn Phương Trà My, Nguyễn Như Quỳnh
In 19th century rural Vietnam, 14-year-old May becomes the third wife of wealthy landowner Hung. Soon she learns that she can only gain status by asserting herself as a woman who can give birth to a male child. May’s hope to change her status turns into a real and tantalizing possibility when she gets pregnant. Faced with forbidden love and its devastating consequences, May finally comes to an understanding of the brutal truth: the options available to her are few and far between.
UN OM LA LOCUL LUI / A DECENT MAN
HADRIAN MARCU (ROMANIA)
Cast: Bogdan Dumitrache, Ada Gales, Madalina Constantin, Iulian Postelnicu, Adrian Titieni
Petru is a drilling engineer living in a community of oil industry workers. Petru is quite conflicted. On one hand he is about to get married to his pregnant girlfriend Laura, on the other he is involved with the wife of one of his colleagues, Sonia, who had a serious work-related accident. His new life seems to begin while she feels hers is ending. Everything is thrown into chaos when Laura finds out about his relationship with Sonia. He feels guilt-ridden but also responsible for the upcoming baby. Participant in the first edition of Glocal in Progress.
VIAJE AL CUARTO DE UNA MADRE (JOURNEY TO A MOTHER’S ROOM)
CELIA RICO CLAVELLINO (SPAIN- FRANCE)
Cast: Lola Dueñas, Anna Castillo, Pedro Casablanc
Leonor wants to leave home, but she doesn’t dare to tell her mother. Estrella doesn’t want her to leave but is unable to keep her by her side either. Mother and daughter will have to face this new stage in life in which the world that they share starts to fall apart.
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The Black Book (Le cahier noir)[/caption]
The latest films by Claire Denis, Simon Jaquemet, Kim Jee-woon, Naomi Kawase, Benjamín Naishtat, Valeria Sarmiento and Markus Schleinzer are the first films confirmed to be competing for the Golden Shell at the 66th San Sebastián Film Festival.
Claire Denis (Paris, 1946), the director of Beau travail or White Material, will be competing for the first time for the Golden Shell with High Life. In this science-fiction film, Denis is working once again with Juliette Binoche, after Un beau soleil intérieur (Let the Sun Shine In) -which won the SACD Award in the Directors’ Fortnight at Cannes ex aequo last year with Philippe Garrel- and Robert Pattinson.
For Naomi Kawase (Nara, Japan, 1969) this will be her second time in the Official Section, after she presented Genpin, which won the Fipresci Award, in 2010. Now, after taking part in Un Certain Regard and in the Official Competition at Cannes with her last two films, An / Sweet Bean and Hikari / Radiance, respectively, she will be coming to San Sebastián with Vision, shot in her native province. The film also stars the French actress Juliette Binoche and the Japanese actor, Masatoshi Nagase (An, Hikari, Paterson).
Kim Jee-woon (Seúl, 1964) will also be competing for the Golden Shell for the second time. After presenting Ang-ma-reul bo-at-da / I Saw the Devil in San Sebastián in 2010, the South Korean director will be taking part withIllang: The Wolf Brigade, the Korean remake of Jin-Roh, the anime written by Mamoru Oshii (Ghost in the Shell) about the Keberos Panzer Cops, a violent police force.
This is also the second time that Valeria Sarmiento (Valparaíso, Chile, 1948) will be competing as a director in the Official Section, after presenting Elle more than two decades ago, in 1995. But Sarmiento’s links to the Festival go back to a previous decade, at the beginning of her career, when she won the Grand Prix Donostia for Best New Director in 1984 with Notre mariage, her first fictional feature film. The last time that she took part in the Festival was in Zabaltegi, where her film As Linhas de Torres / Lines of Wellington was programmed in 2012. The French/Portuguese coproduction Le cahier noir / The Black Book is inspired by the novel Livro Negro de Padre Dinis, by Camilo Castelo Branco, who also wrote Mistérios de Lisboa, which was edited by Sarmiento and which won Raúl Ruiz the Silver Shell for best director in San Sebastián (2010). El Livro Negro de Padre Dinis can be considered to be a prequel of the character that also appears in Mistérios de Lisboa.
Rojo is the third feature by Benjamín Naishtat (Buenos Aires, 1986), whose debut film, Historia del miedo (History of Fear), was one of the films chosen in Films in Progress 24, competed in Berlin in 2014 and was also screened in Horizontes Latinos. With his second film, El movimiento (The Movement, 2015), he formed part of the official section in Locarno. Rojo, with a cast including Darío Grandinetti, Andrea Frigerio and Alfredo Castro, is set in Argentina in the 1970s, on the eve of the military dictatorship.
Markus Schleinzer (Vienna, 1971), who competed in the official section at Cannes with his debut film, Michael, will be presenting his second feature film, Angelo, in San Sebastián. Schleinzer, who wrote together with the director, Michael Sturminger, the screenplay for Casanova Variations, which competed for the Golden Shell in 2014, now focuses on the story of an African who is Europeanised by force in a story starring Makita Samba, Alba Rohrwacher and Larisa Faber.
In 2014 Simon Jaquemet (Zurich, 1978) premiered his award-winning first film, Chrieg / War, in the New Directors section at the Festival. With his second film, Der unschuldige / The Innocent, he is back in San Sebastián in the Official Section, with the portrait of a woman trapped by her past in a religious community.
The other films that make up the Official Section will be announced in the next few weeks.
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ANGELO[/caption]
ANGELO
MARKUS SCHLEINZER (AUSTRIA – LUXEMBOURG)
Cast: Makita Samba, Alba Rohrwacher, Larisa Faber
The story of Angelo, an African born in the 18th century, who is brought to Europe at the age of 10. Becoming a servant at the court of enlightened nobility, he is able to use his otherness to be an appreciated guest and attraction for the members of high society. Being close to the emperor he decides to marry Magdalena, a young maidservant, with whom he falls in love. Doing so, Angelo inevitably suffers from the rejection from the court. On the height of his prestige, he has to realize, that his otherness will never be erased. He will never know a normal life, and he will always remain an outsider. Based on true events.
DER UNSCHULDIGE / THE INNOCENT
SIMON JAQUEMET (SWITZERLAND – GERMANY)
Cast: Judith Hofman, Christian Kaiser, Thomas Schüpbach, Urs-Peter Wolters
Ruth works in a neuroscience research lab, as much as she’s part of an extreme traditionalist and conservative Christian family. She suddenly finds herself facing her own past when her former lover reemerges after disappearing twenty years in jail, putting into question her feelings, her life and soon her faith.
HIGH LIFE
CLAIRE DENIS (FRANCE – GERMANY – UK – POLAND – USA)
Cast: Robert Pattinson, Juliette Binoche, André Benjamin, Mia Goth
Deep space. Beyond our solar system. Monte and his infant daughter Willow live together aboard a spacecraft, in complete isolation. A solitary man, whose strict self-discipline is a protection against desire –his own and that of others– Monte fathered the girl against his will. His sperm was used to inseminate Boyse, the young woman who gave birth to her. They were members of a crew of prisoners: space convicts, death row inmates. Guinea pigs sent on a mission to the black hole closest to Earth. Now only Monte and Willow remain. And Monte is changed. Through his daughter, for the first time, he experiences the birth of an all-powerful love. Willow grows, becoming a young girl, then a young woman.
ILLANG: THE WOLF BRIGADE
KIM JEE-WOON (SOUTH KOREA)
Cast: GANG Dong-won, HAN Hyo-Joo, JUNG Woo-sung, KIM Mu-Yeol, HAN Ye-ri, CHOI Min-ho, HEO Joon-ho
In 2029, after the governments of North and South Korea announce a 5-year plan to reunify the country, strong sanctions by the world’s powerful nations cripple the economy and lead to a hellish period of chaos. With the appearance of an armed anti-government terrorist group called The Sect which opposes reunification, the President creates a new police division called the Special Unit which amasses significant political power. However the intelligence service Public Security, which sees its own influence drop, hatches a plot to annihilate the Special Unit. Amidst this bloody struggle between two ultra-powerful institutions, rumors emerge of a secret ‘Wolf Brigade’ being formed within the Special Unit. The human weapons who are called wolves, ‘Illang’ (The Wolf Brigade).
LE CAHIER NOIR / THE BLACK BOOK
VALERIA SARMIENTO (FRANCE – PORTUGAL)
Cast: Lou de Laâge, Stanislas Merhar, Niels Schneider, Jenna Thiam, Fleur Fitoussi, David Caracol, Vasco Varela da Silva, Tiago Varela da Silva
The story of the adventures, in the twilight of the eighteenth century, of a singular couple formed by a little orphan with mysterious origins and his young Italian nurse of a similarly uncertain birth. They lead us in their wake, from Rome to Paris, from Lisbon to London, from Parma to Venice. Always followed in the shadows, for obscure reasons, by a suspicious-looking Calabrian and a troubling cardinal, they make us explore the dark intrigues of the Vatican, the pangs of a fatal passion, a gruesome duel, banter at the court of Versailles and the convulsions of the French Revolution.
ROJO
BENJAMIN NAISHTAT (ARGENTINA – FRANCE – NETHERLANDS – BRAZIL – FRANCE)
Cast: Dario Grandinetti, Andrea Frigerio, Alfredo Castro
In the mid-1970s a stranger arrives in a quiet provincial town. At a restaurant, for no apparent reason he starts to assault Claudio, a well-known lawyer. The community supports the lawyer and the stranger is humiliated and gets thrown out. Later on the way home, Claudio and his wife Susana are intercepted by the stranger who is determined to take terrible revenge on him. The lawyer then starts out on a road of no-return, of death, secrets and silences.
VISION
NAOMI KAWASE (JAPAN – FRANCE)
Cast: Juliette Binoche, Masatoshi Nagase
Jeanne, a French journalist, comes to Japan in search of ‘Vision’, a rare medicinal herb said to strip away all spiritual anguish and weaknesses in human beings. She knows that ‘Vision’ only appears once every 997 years under special conditions and that time is near. Aki, a wise villager who knows the forest well, prophesies the arrival of the mysterious ‘One’ and then disappears. Tomo, who was devoted to Aki, works as a keeper of the forests and is beginning to sense, instinctively, recent changes in the mountains. Is there a connection between the disappearance of Aki and the changes taking place in the forest? Will Jeanne succeed in finding the phantom herb Vision? A millennial event is taking place in the Yoshino mountains of Nara, opening a door to the One and the true potential of human existence.
SOME LIKE IT HOT[/caption]
Since 2012, the Venezia Classici of the Venice International Film Festival has been presenting the world premieres of a selection of the best restorations of classic films conducted over the previous year by film libraries, cultural institutions and productions all over the world. Curated by Alberto Barbera in collaboration with Stefano Francia di Celle, Venezia Classici also presents a selection of documentaries about cinema and its filmmakers. The Jury, chaired by Italian director Salvatore Mereu (Three Steps Dancing, Pretty Butterflies), is composed of 26 cinema history students – nominated by their professors – from Italian universities, DAMS performing arts courses, and Ca’ Foscari University of Venice, and will award the VENEZIA CLASSICI AWARD for the BEST RESTORED FILM and the BEST DOCUMENTARY ON CINEMA.
The numerous restored masterpieces in the Venezia Classici section of the 75th Venice International Film Festival include: The Night of the Shooting Stars (1982) by Paolo and Vittorio Taviani, Il posto (1961) by Ermanno Olmi, The Ascent (1976) by Larisa Shepitko, The Place Without Limits (1977) by Arturo Ripstein, The Brick and the Mirror (1964) by Ebrahim Golestan, Adieu Philippine (1962) by Jacques Roziers, Last Year in Marienbad (1961, Golden Lion at the Venice International Film Festival) by Alain Resnais, Some Like It Hot (1959) by Billy Wilder, Street of Shame (1956, Special Mention at the Venice International Film Festival) by Kenji Mizoguchi, The Night Porter (1974) by Liliana Cavani and Love, Thy Name Be Sorrow (1962) by Tomu Uchida.
The 75th Venice International Film Festival will be held at the Lido from August 29 to September 8, 2018; it is directed by Alberto Barbera and organized by the Biennale chaired by Paolo Baratta.
The list of the films selected for the Venezia Classici section of the 75th Festival:
A brand-new video clip debuted today from the highly anticipated 
Marjan van der Haar and Bero Beyer[/caption]
Marjan van der Haar, an experienced film industry professional, has been named the new managing director of International Film Festival Rotterdam (IFFR) as of October 1, 2018. Most recently, she was the managing director of Film Producers Netherlands (FPN) from 2010 until 2018. Working alongside festival director Bero Beyer, Van der Haar will be charged with the organization and day-to-day operational management of IFFR. This includes financial policy-making, branding and communication, and solidifying subsidies and sponsorships programs. IFFR’s 48th edition takes place from Wednesday January 23, to Sunday, February 3, 2019
Van der Haar, on her new position: “My connection to IFFR goes way back. I fondly remember volunteering at the last festival edition having Hubert Bals at the steering wheel. This great adventure sparked my career in the film industry. Ever since, I’ve been a vigorous defender of the type of soulful and remarkable films IFFR is known for – as a program coordinator at IFFR, in the world of film sales and in representing Dutch producers for FPN. I’m honoured and excited to return to IFFR, a festival that plays an important role in the international film scene while simultaneously being closely intertwined with the thriving city of Rotterdam, both through its audience and local partnerships. I look forward to working together with the team to strengthen IFFR’s position even further as we roll up to the 50th anniversary edition.”
Pieter Broertjes, chairman of the board of IFFR: “Marjan brings a lot to the table. Her experience in the film industry and her extensive network are sure to be of high value to the festival. But her open personality is equally important. We’re confident she’s a great fit for the IFFR team and as one half of the festival’s two-person leadership set-up.”
Festival director Bero Beyer: “Marjan will be a great asset to IFFR! I’ve known her for quite some time as an ambitious film professional with a heart for our kind of cinema. Together we will continue doing what the festival has always done: giving a voice to daring cinema, promoting innovation and spearheading new distribution models.”
He adds: “IFFR’s 50th edition is only a few years away. I look forward to working with Marjan to reach the aspirations we have formulated for our anniversary edition and to consolidate and build on the adventurous festival expansions we have achieved in recent years.”
About Marjan van der Haar
After finishing her studies in Theatre Science, Film and Television and Cultural Management in Utrecht in 1991, Marjan van der Haar started working at IFFR’s program department. In this role she coordinated the research of films and was responsible for the program’s budget and logistic planning.
In 1995, Van der Haar left IFFR and started working in film sales – first as a sales executive at Fortissimo Films from 1995 until 1999, and later as Fortissimo’s general manager from 2000 to 2010. The distribution agency was known for its good taste in arthouse cinema and international reach. During her time at Fortissimo, Van der Haar had a close connection to IFFR, often visiting the festival’s co-production market CineMart as a film professional.
From November 2010 until 2018, Van der Haar served as managing director of Film Producers Netherlands, the Dutch association set up to stimulate a dynamic, creative and internationally oriented film industry in the Netherlands. FPN represents the majority of Dutch producers and advances their opportunities worldwide by collaborating with international co-production and distribution partners, among other things.
Van der Haar (1964) has two sons and lives in Amsterdam.
L-R: Michelle Rodriguez, Viola Davis, and Elizabeth Debicki star in Twentieth Century Fox’s WIDOWS. Photo Credit: Courtesy Twentieth Century Fox.[/caption]
The international premiere of Academy Award-winner Steve McQueen’s Widows will open this year’s 62nd BFI London Film Festival on Wednesday October 10 at the Cineworld, Leicester Square.
Co-written by McQueen and best-selling novelist and screenwriter Gillian Flynn and starring Academy Award-winner Viola Davis, Widows is a complex thriller about a group of women with nothing in common except a debt left behind by their dead husbands’ criminal activities. A star-studded ensemble cast includes: Viola Davis, Michelle Rodriguez, Elizabeth Debicki, Cynthia Erivo, Colin Farrell, Daniel Kaluuya and Jacki Weaver with Robert Duvall and Liam Neeson.
From Steve McQueen (12 Years a Slave) and co-writer Gillian Flynn (Gone Girl) comes a blistering, modern-day thriller set against the backdrop of crime, passion and corruption. Taking place in contemporary Chicago, amid a time of political and class turmoil, tensions build when Veronica (Oscar-winner Viola Davis), Alice (Elizabeth Debicki), Linda (Michelle Rodriguez) and Belle (Cynthia Erivo) take their fate into their own hands and conspire to forge a future on their own terms. Widows also stars Liam Neeson, Colin Farrell, Robert Duvall, Daniel Kaluuya, Lukas Haas and Brian Tyree Henry. Based on the TV series “Widows” by Lynda La Plante, the film sees Steve McQueen serve as producer, together with Iain Canning, Emile Sherman and Arnon Milchan.
Widows will be released in cinemas across the UK and Ireland on November 9, 2018.
The 62nd BFI London Film Festival in partnership with American Express takes place from Wednesday October 10 – Sunday October 21, 2018.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6S3phVSi0tI
Egged on by Nettie and encouraged by her supportive fiancé (Common), Jennifer yearns to know more and sets out on a journey, 30 years later, to find those people from her past – the children, now adults, who also attended the camp back then – and eventually the coaches themselves. But the more she learns, the more her memories shift and the more questions she unearths. As Jennifer’s frustration mounts, she finds herself turning inward to get to the truth, imagining conversations with her 13-year-old self (Isabelle Nélisse) and even Mrs. G and Bill in an effort to understand how and why events occurred so long ago.
An unforgettable meditation on the elusive nature of memory, The Tale is the first narrative feature from Jennifer Fox, whose documentary films have earned international acclaim for their groundbreaking artistry and unflinching honesty. Based on Fox’s own life story, THE TALE sees the filmmaker bravely pushing forward the boundaries of conventional storytelling, creating a dialogue between past and present to illustrate the interplay between memory and trauma.
“My goal was not to ask, ‘Did this happen?,’ because I always remembered it,” explains writer and director Fox. “It was, ‘How and why did it happen, and how and why did I spin it as a positive story?’ There was a lightbulb moment when I was making another film about women all around the world, and it seemed that every other woman – regardless of class, culture or color – had an abuse story to tell. Their stories just floored me, because they had a system or a paradigm that looked like my story. Suddenly, I couldn’t see it as my own private little narrative and knew that it was time to investigate what happened in the open space of a fictional film.”
[caption id="attachment_30723" align="aligncenter" width="1200"]
The Tale Director Jennifer Fox[/caption]
The Tale is produced by Jennifer Fox, Oren Moverman, Laura Rister, Mynette Louie, Simone Pero, Lawrence Inglee, Sol Bondy, Regina K. Scully, Lynda Weinman and Reka Posta. Julie Parker Benello, Dan Cogan, Geralyn Dreyfous, Wendy Ettinger, Abigail E. Disney, Robert & Penny Fox, Jayme Lemons, Amy Rodrigue, Ali Jazayeri, Jason Van Eman, David Van Eman, Ross Marroso and Ben McConley are executive producers.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tXpYsr3AL4U
Based on a real-life crime that took place in Berne, Midnight Runner (2018) will screen at the 14th Zurich Film Festival. The Swiss production is one of twelve films to compete for the Golden Eye in the festival’s FOCUS competition section. Director Hannes Baumgartner and the producers Stefan Eichenberger and Ivan Madeo from Contrast Film will be in Zurich to present their film.
Midnight Runner tells the story of successful long-distance runner Jonas Widmer, who, in addition to training for the Olympic marathon, is a hard-working chef and forms one half of a stable relationship. Jonas becomes increasingly haunted by memories of his dead brother after failing to defend a home-race title. Unable to express his inner suffering in words, the protagonist’s growing despair leads him to live a tragic double life.
Zurich-born director Hannes Baumgartner based his feature film on a real-life Swiss crime. Transposed to the present day, Baumgartner’s interpretation of the actual case is subjective. He presents an ambivalent on-screen character, the actions of whom he attempts to understand as a result of a densely woven network comprising formative experiences, repressive processes and inner turmoil.
Midnight Runner is Hannes Baumgartner’s debut feature film. Baumgartner worked on the screenplay together with author Stefan Staub. Actor Max Hubacher, recent winner of the Swiss Film Award for Best Actor for his role in MARIO (2018), plays the lead. Luna Wedler can be seen in a supporting role. This up-and-coming Swiss actress was a guest at last year’s Zurich Film Festival with the winning film BLUE MY MIND (2017).
Midnight Runner celebrates its world premiere screening at San Sebastian Film Festival, the Zurich Film Festival’s partner festival. The film hits Swiss cinemas on October 4, 2018, distributed by Filmcoopi Zürich.
MEMOIR OF WAR, Emmanuel Finkiel’s haunting adaptation of seminal author Marguerite Duras’ semi-autobiographical novel “The War: A Memoir” starring Mélanie Thierry (THE PRINCESS OF MONTPENSIER) in a riveting performance as Duras will be released via Music Box Films. An emotionally complex story of love, loss, and perseverance against the backdrop of war, MEMOIR OF WAR will open in New York on August 17 at Film Forum and The Film Society of Lincoln Center, and in Los Angeles on August 24 at the Laemmle Royal. Other cities will follow.
It’s 1944, and Duras is an active Resistance member along with her husband, writer Robert Antelme, and a band of fellow subversives in Nazi-occupied Paris. When Antelme is deported to Dachau by the Gestapo, she becomes friendly with French collaborator Rabier (Benoît Magimel) to gain information at considerable risk to her underground cell. But as the months wear on without news of her husband, she must begin the process of confronting the unimaginable. Through subtly expressionistic images and voiceover passages of Duras’ writing, Finkiel evokes the inner world of one of the 20th century’s most revolutionary writers.
Marguerite Duras was a highly successful novelist, memoirist, screenwriter, essayist and experimental filmmaker. Her script for Alain Resnais’ seminal film HIROSHIMA, MON AMOUR earned her an Oscar nomination for Best Original Screenplay. She went on to write over 30 novels and direct 19 films. Duras won the Prix Goncourt (France’s most distinguished literary prize) for “The Lover.” “The War: A Memoir” (“La Douleur”) was written in 1944 and first published in 1985. The book has been translated and released in over 20 countries.
Award-winning writer-director Emmanuel Finkiel began his career as an assistant director to Bertrand Tavernier, Krzysztof Kieslowski, and Jean-Luc Godard. His first outing as a filmmaker, MADAME JACQUES ON THE CROISETTE, won a César Award for Best Short Film. His first feature length film, VOYAGES, which follows the travels of three elderly Jewish women whose lives were touched by the Holocaust, earned him two César Awards (Best First Film and Best Editing) and the Youth Award in Cannes. In 2008, he won the prestigious Jean Vigo Award for NOWHERE PROMISED LAND which debuted at the Locarno Film Festival. He has also directed documentaries including CASTING (2001) and JE SUIS (2012).
LEMONADE[/caption]
The Sarajevo Film Festival announced the lineup of its 2018 Feature Film Competition Program. The lineup includes the World Premieres of ALL ALONE, LOVE 1. DOG, ONE AND A HALF PRINCE and THE PIGEON THIEVES.
40 Years in the Making: The Magic Music Movie[/caption]
Magic Music is one of the most fondly remembered bands of the Boulder Revolution of the late 60s and early 70s. Living in a makeshift camp up in the mountains, they would delight local residents and university students with their original songs, acoustic instruments, and light harmonies; their growing popularity brought them to the brink of success more than once. Unfortunately, they never signed a record deal and eventually broke up in 1975.