Returned from Rotterdam: IFFR 2015

Posted on by harrietwarman

The end of January saw this intrepid reporter attend International Film Festival Rotterdam (21 Jan – 1 Feb) for the first time, where I was selected to take part in their Trainee Programme for Young Film Critics, alongside Tina Poglajen, Rueben Demasure and Oris Aigbokhaevbolo. Whilst there, I contributed preview/interviews for the festival’s newspaper, The Daily Tiger, sat on the FIPRESCI jury (where me and my fellow trainees had one, collective vote) awarding the prize to the best film in the Bright Futures strand, and had the pleasure of ‘expert meetings’ with established critics and editors, Clarence Tsui (The Hollywood Reporter), Wendy Mitchell (Screen International) and Jay Weissberg (Variety).

I also managed to see thirty-one films in total, write three reviews for CineVue, and one focused report on the strand Signals: WTF?! for the forthcoming edition of Little White Lies. I got very little sleep, learned at lot and met some truly fantastic people.

Solos by Joanna Lombardi
Solos by Joanna Lombardi

Highlights from the programme were Ana Lungu’s Self Portrait of a Dutiful Daughter, a thoughtful, witty piece looking at the ‘late’ coming of age of a young woman inheriting her parents apartment, that exposes the learned behaviours that oppress her. Solos by Joanna Lombardi examined the financial and cultural restrictions on distributing exactly the kind of films that IFFR celebrates, following four friends as they attempt to attract audiences to independent film screenings in rural Peru. With improvised dialogue, the relationship between the friends emerges gradually, and their endeavour becomes ever more absurd, as audiences shift from one to zero. Lombardi’s steadfast refusal to abide by any cinematic rules is admirable, and though the audience for her films may be a small as her characters’, I hope to see more of her work in the future. Finally, Isabelle Tollenaere’s Battles, which was awarded with the FIPRESCI prize, was a carefully edited, episodic piece, exposing the military in Belgium, Albania and Russia, as more useful as a source of social propaganda than a means of defence. Three talented directors that are definitely worth looking out for.

I’ll be posting each of my Daily Tiger pieces here on the site, courtesy of IFFR’s DT editors, Nick Cunningham and Lot Piscaer.

Beyond C.I : Aesthetica, Africa and more…

Posted on by harrietwarman

Cinematic Investigations may have appeared a little quiet in the last months of the year, but elsewhere this writer has been toiling for other outlets, viewing a Scottish showcase of African film, Pabst and Brooks, queer documentary and shorts galore.

Striking mine workers on koppie two days before massacre
Miners Shot Down

First up I took in seventeen films at Africa in Motion Film Festival in Edinburgh (24 October – 9 November), where the theme ‘Looking Back, Reaching Forward’ provided the opportunity for screenings of little seen older titles The Blue Eyes of Yonta and Come Back Africa. Post-apartheid South Africa was also a notable focus in three documentaries, which you can read about in my report for Sight & Sound, here.

Alluvion
Alluvion

Within the same month, I also visited York for Aesthetica Short Film Festival (6 – 9 November), which  showcased the city’s fascinating historical and contemporary venues as well as some outstanding examples of short film. Amongst the eighty-three films I saw, my highlight’s were Sasha Litvintseva’s Alluvion and Sam Firth’s Stay the Same, which you can read about, amongst other fine cinematic works, in my report for Sight & Sound, here.

For CineVue, reviewing G.W. Pabst’s 1929 Diary of a Lost Girl  was a delight, albeit a creepy one, and more satisfying still was the opportunity to view the work of Travis Mathews, perhaps best known for teaming up with James Franco for a reimagining of the lost 40 minutes of footage from William Friedkin’s Cruising (1980), titled Interior. Leather Bar. That project aside, it turns out Mathews is a very sensitive filmmaker, determined to bring the lives of gay men to the screen through his ongoing project, In Their Room. 

Micha-and-Torsten-Berlin
In Their Room: Berlin

Coming very soon will be my own annual review (avid readers will notice this was absent in 2013!) where I will select my highlights from 2014, including shorts and features, new releases, restorations and retrospectives. In the meantime, you can read my contribution to CineVue’s Top 20, which, tallying contributions from all their writers, reveals the best films receiving a UK premiere this year. Published in two parts, the second will come out on Monday 22 December but first up, you can read about one of my pick’s, Concerning Violence, which gets in at no. 20.