What is the pick of this year’s Liffe festival?

The established team, director Abel Ferrare and actor Willem Dafoe staged the last day of life of Pasolini with constant transitions between reality and imagination, and between facts and speculation. Foto: Liffe

Foxcatcher: struggle with insanity, a true story speaking of the relationship between an eccentric multimillionaire and his two wrestling protégés; playing Channing, Mark Ruffalo and Steve Carell.

»He was a giant among artists, absolutely unbending, and focused on his mission, extremely prolific, with a revolutionary approach, masterful in his means of expression, with a clear vision,« Mike Leigh describes the character he portrayed. »But Turner as a person was eccentric, anarchic, vulnerable, imperfect, obstinate, and occasionally rude. At times he was selfish and insincere, miserly yet generous – he encompassed great passion and poetics.«

Popek reminded that although a number of the films from this year's programme already have a distributor, that does not necessarily mean we will be able to see them on the big screen; they might have been bought only for TV broadcasting, or DVD issue. Foto: MMC RTV SLO / Miloš Ojdanić

Mamica — »If there is only one topic I know better than any other, it inspires me unconditionally, and it is above all my favourite – and that is my mother. And when I say 'my mother' I mean mother in general, as a character she represents,« Xavier Dolan, well known to Liffe audience says about his new film. »While making the film Mommy I had the impression I wanted to punish her. Only five years have passed, but now I believe that Mommy is an effort to revenge her.« Foto: Liffe

We mere mortals usually focus on the most attention grabbing sections of Avantpremiers and "sacrosant" directors, Kings and queens, while the programme director Simon Popek is allowed the most choice at compiling author, and themed retrospectives. The opening film of the festival belongs to that category. This 'retro contribution ' comes as a surprise when the previous years are considered: the comedy Playtime by the French director Jacques Tati from 1967. "Play Playtime on your TV or computer, and it is almost certain that you will fail to see the reason for this French comedy’s classic status; see it in a cinema and you will be able to identify all the nuances and subtle details that represent the essence of Tati’s minimalistic and infinitely enchanting humour," Popek wrote in his introduction. Among the films "you will want to see on the big screen" a wide selection of film experts chose among others also such titles as The Wizard of Oz (directed by Victor Fleming), Lawrence of Arabia (directed by David Lean), The French Connection (directed by William Friedkin), The Red Shoes (directed by Michael Powell, Emeric Pressburger) and La region centrale (directed by Michael Snow). But besides this short selection to be shown at the festival, a wider list can be found in the Festival Catalogue.

Avantpremiers packed with illustrious names
Let's talk about Avantpremiers, also this year crammed with illustrious names: 20,000 Days on Earth (directed by Iain Forsyth, Jane Pollard) speaks about a day in the life of the Australian music star Nick Cave, but it is much more than an ordinary music documentary – it should be rather described as a meditation on the nature of stardom, memory, and creativity. Then there is the victorious film from the Venice Festival, described as a string of sketches for Monty Python, written by a Scandinavian existentialist ", the Swedish film A Pigeon sat on a Branch Reflecting on Existence (directed by Roy Andersson), and the opening film of the festival: a funny, almost meta-film comedy on transience of fame Birdman (directed by. Alejandro González Iñárritu).

The Wonders by Alice Rohrwacher most certainly deserved the Grand Jury prize according to Popek, and the praise of Mister Turner, a biography of the famous painter directed by Mike Leigh was just as well deserved. Foxcatcher (directed by Bennet Miller) is another real life story on an eccentric millionaire, while Leviathan (directed by Andrey Zvyagincev) is an unforgiving condemnation of the Russian state and the Church; the fact that it was created with the financial help of the Russian Ministry of Culture remains an unexplained mystery. Pasolini (directed by Abel Ferrara) is anything but a typical biographical film; it describes the last day of life of a notorious director, while the Canadian wunderkind Xavier Dolan with his newest and best film Mommy turns from the world of his own love traumas towards a new protagonist, an uncontrollable hyperactive kid whose single mother can't keep him under control. Another film should be mentioned, the only feature film directed by a Slovenian director, the Austrian-Slovenian war drama The Forests are Still Green (directed by Marko Naberšnik), Clouds of Sils Maria (directed by Olivier Assayas), Kidnapping of Michel Houellebecq (directed by Guillaume Nicloux) and of course Winter sleep (directed by Nuri Bilge Ceylan).

A good pick of fresh creativity in the main competitive section
The first prize of the festival, the Kingfisher award, has been traditionally intended for a debut or a second film by a (usually young) director. The jury will chose among ten films, and most certainly the action war film on war in Croatia Number 55 by Kristijan Milić will attract a lot of attention; the director has already won the Kingfisher award for his debut film The Blacks. The same can be expected for "the sensation of the Sundance film festival", Whiplash (directed by Damien Chazelle). Ukrainian The Tribe (directed by Miroslav Slaboshpitsky) is a film with no spoken dialogue, without subtitles (only in sign language); Eat Your Bones is a French thriller with somewhat documentary approach, as the issue of the Roma is addressed with the help of non-professional actors in leading roles. The family drama Goodnight, Mommy was directed by Veronika Franz (the wife, and a regular collaborator of Ulrich Seidl), and the tragicomic "ode to laziness" A Proletarian Winter Tale by the German director Julian Radlmaier.

The novelty of the section Kings and Queens is this year's first guest appearance of a TV series at Liffe; Li'l Quinquin by Bruno Dumont, a " wicked and funny" a four-part detective miniseries opening with the discovery of a dead cow stuffed with human remains. A Most Wanted Man (Anton Corbijn) is an adaptation of the political thriller by John Le Carre, by which we are almost definitely saying goodbye to Philip Seymour Hoffman. Hard to be a God, the last film by the Russian director Aleksei German who died last year and to whom the entire retrospective of the festival has been dedicated, is according to Popek "the very essence of the film" and "something wackiest you will ever see".

The Extravaganza brings choice films; these have their own faithful audience as well. Popek mentioned the Israeli film Big Bad Wolves directed by Aharon Keshales and Navot Papushado.

The film education starts early
The youngest spectators are also invited to Liffe. This year the programme of Kinobalon will offer to them six films, two of those synchronized into Slovenian, and the Swedish film Emil from Löneberge will be even synchronized live.

A prize for the best video spot
The festival will offer a rich accompanying programme as well. The novelty this year will be the competition of the music video spots. The spectators will be able to vote for their favourite online. A four-day workshop for the young, Crazy about European Film, and a screenwriting workshop of the Creative Europe Centre with Mary Kate O Flanagan will be organized.

This year's festival will be closed on Saturday, November 22, with the film Alfa Papa directed by Alan Partridge.

Ana Jurc
Translated by G. K.