We present four more films from different corners of the world – co-productions between France and Korea, between Spain and Poland, as well as works from Belgium and the USA.
Twelve films are competing in the International Competition of the 29th Sofia Film Festival. These are the first and second works by directors from around the globe, competing for the Grand Prize “Sofia – City of Film,” provided by Sofia Municipality. So far, eight films have been presented, and further down the list you will find details about the remaining four participants in the competition.
* “Windless” – Bulgaria-Italy, directed by Pavel G. Vesnakov
* “Cat’s Cry” – Serbia-Canada-Croatia, directed by Sanja Zivkovic
* “Honeymoon” – Ukraine, directed by Zhanna Ozirna
* “Hallway to Nowhere” – Croatia, directed by Zvonimir Munivrana
* “Eternity Package” – Bulgaria-Italy, directed by Magdelena Ilieva
* “Flesh” – Bulgaria, directed by Dimitar Stoyanovich
* “Under the Grey Sky” – Poland, directed by Mara Tamkovich
* “Die Like a Man” – USA, directed by Eric Nazarian
Koya Kamura’s directorial debut “Winter in Sokcho” is an adaptation of the debut novel of the same name by Elisa Shua Dusapin, which became a hit after its publication in her homeland France and in the USA. This choice was almost serendipitous for the director, who has French and Japanese heritage. “As soon as I came across the book, I felt an intuitive connection with the story and the characters. While reading, I already envisioned the setting: the small town of Sokcho in the northern part of South Korea, right next to the demilitarized zone between the two Koreas. The book describes it as a place full of emptiness, as if everyone had left, and the setting of my previous short film, Homesick, took place in the restricted zone of Fukushima. I also had the opportunity to speak with the author of the novel—it turned out that many details of her life and mine are similar,” shares Kamura.
The film introduces the audience to a young woman whose life in the small town changes after the unexpected arrival of a successful comic artist from France at the hotel where she works. This encounter provokes her to realize her own desire to learn more about her French father, who disappeared from her life before she was born. Kamura’s adaptation emphasizes the relationships between the characters, and the use of animation as a personification of their inner world infuses the action with life and warmth.
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Belgian directors Sophie Muselle and Guérin van de Vorst join forces for the first time – and the result is their film “On the Edge”. Muselle has a rich theatrical background, including work with a company composed of people with various degrees of mental disabilities. Van de Vorst is known to audiences and film professionals for his short films and his feature debut The Faithful Son (2017). Their new joint work tells a touching story, rendered with delicate psychological details. A young idealist is sent to intern as a nurse in a specialized department of a psychiatric hospital. Ignoring the warnings of an experienced senior nurse, she grows close to a 20-year-old patient and decides to devote all her energy to trying to get her out, trusting the girl’s claim that the doctors have no grounds to keep her there.
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Keri Ann Enright is an actress, producer, and director with experience in short and documentary filmmaking, and her feature directorial debut Nobody Wants to Shoot a Woman will be presented in the International Competition at the 29th SIFF. She is also the screenwriter and producer. Enright’s approach to the story demonstrates a remarkable creative vision – she creates an intimate portrait of a woman trying to survive in a world where love and loyalty are put to the test. Unable to ignore societal contempt and her own personal moral conflict, she chooses a rather dangerous path in deciding to protect her child from the surrounding chaos. “I hope that viewers are left with the feeling that this is a powerful story about a woman who is unlucky, yet despite everything, finds her way in the world of men without compromising or submitting to the status quo,” shares the film’s author. The associate producer of Nobody Wants to Shoot a Woman is Jim Stark, who for decades has supported independent American and European cinema.
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The inspiration for the animated film Rock Bottom is the music from the album of the same name by British vocalist and drummer Robert Wyatt, inextricably linked with the Canterbury scene where progressive rock, jazz, and psychedelia combine the artists’ ability to improvise with the spirit of the hippie movement from the 1960s and 1970s. The screenwriter and director of the work, nominated for Best Film at the Annecy Festival, is the Spanish animator Maria Trenor. The story is a true “visual poem,” a unique immersion into the passionate, self-destructive love story of Bob and Alif – two young artists searching for their path amid the captivating vortex of cultural currents in the early 1970s. “I wrote the script for Rock Bottom more than 10 years ago, after meeting Robert Wyatt and after he approved my idea to make a musical inspired by his album. Many twists and turns followed until I encountered producer Alba Sotorra, who supports various original projects created by women. Once we started working with her, it took exactly two years to complete the film,” shares Maria Trenor.
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