The Europe Film Festival will be hosted by Cinema Nouveau theatres across the country from May 6 to 15, and includes many award-winning films of note, writes Katlego Mkhwanazi.
The European Film Festival kicks off in South Africa on May 6 with 11 films from Austria, Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Sweden and the United Kingdom.
The Goethe-Institut is responsible for co-ordinating the festival. The regional director of the institute, Norbert Spitz, says the films attempt to “show new facets of what it means to arrive in Europe and to live in Europe”.
The films will be shown at Cinema Nouveau theatres in Johannesburg, Pretoria, Durban and Cape Town until May 15. The themes covered include racial discrimination, homosexuality, solitude, conflict, eating disorders, coming of age and immigration.
Among the festival highlights is Macondo (2014), an Austrian drama, directed by Sudabeh Mortezai. The film follows 11-year-old Ramasan, a Chechen refugee living in a settlement outside Vienna, who assumes the head-of-the-house role after his father’s death. He has to take care of his two sisters and help his mother with the day-to-day running of the household.
The film was part of the Berlin International Film Festival in 2014 and the director won the award for best emerging filmmaker at the Hong Kong International Film Festival.
The Drama Body represents Poland in the festival. The film, directed by Malgorzata Szumowska, tells the story of three characters with differing approaches to the human body. The body is also used to show how we handle situations such as grief with acts of self-harm.
True-life drama
The festival features three documentaries: Fire at Sea, directed by Gianfranco Rosi, A Family Affair, directed by Tom Fassaert and Amy, directed by Asif Kapadia.
Amy is a must-see film that follows English singer Amy Winehouse’s musical journey and offers an insight into the troubled star’s personal relationships. Winehouse was found dead at her home in London in 2011 from alcohol poisoning.
The film takes audiences back to Winehouse’s childhood, and to when she was an unsigned artist singing in bars. This Oscar-winning documentary will, to some extent, provide an understanding of Winehouse’s behaviour and her struggles through interviews with her parents, friends, managers and her former husband, Blake Fielder-Civil, as well as archive footage.
Amy also won the British Academy Film Award for best documentary.
The Mail & Guardian spoke to European Film Festival director Katarina Hedrén about the programme.
For interview see Mail & Guardian
