Gems of new cinema in Sodankylä 2016: From Moretti to Weerasethakul
(Chevalier by Athina Rachel Tsangari. Picture: Haos Film.)
Some of the most remarkable new international films of present day will be screened among the annual “Gems of new cinema” assemblage of Midnight Sun Film Festival. Films by directors from countries such as Italy, Greece, Russia, China and Thailand are included.
Nanni Moretti’s Mia madre, voted as the best film of 2015 by legendary French language film magazine Cahiers du Cinema, tells a story of a middle-aged female director in the middle of an existential crisis.
Lost and Beautiful, a wiry, beautiful vision of contemporary Italy in the spirit of neorealism and Pasolini, is the newest film by Pietro Marcello, another Italian film director and former Midnight Sun Film Festival guest.
An essential name of Greek new wave, Athina Rachel Tshangari – former Midnight Sun Film Festival guest as well – is represented with Chevalier, an absurdly humorous study of male gestures, habits and inclinations on a sailing trip. All of A Sudden, an elegant thriller drama by German Turkish Asli Özge, has been compared to Chabrol’s portrayals of the bourgeoisie.
Andrei Konchalovsky, one of the international guests of MSFF 2008, paints a picture of rural Russia in the midst of turmoil in The Postman’s White Nights. Belgian Guillaume Senez tells a gentle story of two teens in the wake of an unexpected pregnancy.
Greta Gerwich stars in Mistress America, the new college comedy by Noach Baumbach. Gerwich accompanies Ethan Hawke and Julianne Moore in Rebecca Miller’s cunning love triangle drama Maggie’s Plan.
Michael Fassbender takes centre stage in Slow West, a strange, surrealistic comedy western by British John Maclean. Haiti’s number one director, Raoul Peck, portrays his homeland in post-earthquake times in political film Murder in Pacot. Hedi by Tunisian Mohamed Ben Attia, winner of the Golden Bear at the 66th Berlin Film Festival, is one of the most remarkable films about Arab Spring.
A drama film Mountains May Depart by Jia Zhangke, the leading director of China, tells an ambitious story about friendship in three parts, from the dawn of Chinese capitalism until near future. Cemetery of Splendour, the most personal film by Thai director Apichatpong Weerasethakul, combines fantasy and the surreal in the experiences of hospitalized soldiers.
