Opening Films 2023
05.04.2023 // CROSSING EUROPE 2023 will once again open with four films that are a representative cross-section of this year’s festival program and, with their thematic and artistic diversity, stand for the richness of European cinema. Moreover, films from almost all program sections can be seen on opening day already from 4 p.m.
With her Berlinale competition entry 20.000 ESPECIES DE ABEJAS | 20,000 SPECIES OF BEES, Estibaliz Urresola Solaguren delivers an impressive feature film debut, for which the only eight-year-old Sofía Otero was awarded the Silver Bear for Best Leading Performance. The highly topical and evocative documentary SHIDNIY FRONT | EASTERN FRONT by Vitaly Mansky and Yevhen Titarenko shows the brutality of the war in Ukraine in gloomy footage directly from the front. Tribute guest Angeliki Papoulia shines with her impressive performance in Syllas Tzoumerkas’s drama A BLAST, which drastically reflects the effects of the Greek financial crisis of the 2010s on the population. The Night Sight program section kicks off with SVĚTLONOC | NIGHTSIREN, where director Tereza Nvotová breaks down the classical witch narrative in the context of patriarchal structures and misogyny.
An eight-year-old is suffering because people keep addressing the child in ways that cause discomfort. They insist on calling the child by the birth name Aitor. And the nickname, Cocó, even if less obviously wrong, does not feel right either. During a summer in the Basque country, the child confides these worries to relatives and friends. But how can a mother handle her child’s quest for identity when she is herself still dealing with her own ambivalent parental legacy? Basque director Estibaliz Urresola Solaguren’s debut feature is a sunny drama. By adopting more than one point of view, Urresola is respecting the incredible complexity that is gender identity, and touching on one perhaps less obvious aspect of transitioning: your mentality. (Berlinale)
Kyiv, August 24, 2022, Ukraine’s Independence Day. A burnt-out tank on a deserted street. Half a year has passed since the whole world became aware of Russia’s attack. It actually began in 2014, but many did not perceive it as such at the time. This is also explained by the voice in the commentary that belongs to Vitaly Mansky. The other director, Yevhen Titarenko, captures an insider’s images which reveal precisely what (this) war means. He has been with the “Hospitallers” volunteer medical battalion since 2014 and is now on full duty. At times disturbingly raw and direct, yet always enlightening, this film shows in close-up how a nation is fighting for its survival. (Berlinale)
Maria is on the run. Behind her, fire and a briefcase full of money. In front of her, the hopeless vastness of the motorway. Only a day before, she was a caring mother, a loving wife, a responsible daughter. Today, she has gone rogue. Set in the fervent years of the collapse of the Greek economy, A BLAST tells the story of a generation’s disillusionment and radicalization. Maria starts her adult life with the best of intentions. Ten years after, no matter where she looks, her world is cracking up. Unwilling to reconcile with a life of unreciprocated care, lost dignity, and broken-down desire to live, Maria attacks. (Crossing Europe)
All the typical trappings of witchcraft – the naked moonlit rituals, the familiar relationship with wolves and snakes, the sexual abandon, the knowledge and use of herbs, the concealed baldness, the mutated or murdered livestock, the dancing around bonfires, the missing children – are present and correct in NIGHTSIREN, but are mostly rationalised and all reconfigured as something harmless. For this is a film less about female malefactors than about the villagers’ patriarchal structures and deep-seated misogynies (some internalised by the local women themselves) which suppress difference and readily blame innocent women. (Anton Bitel, Projected Figures)
With her Berlinale competition entry 20.000 ESPECIES DE ABEJAS | 20,000 SPECIES OF BEES, Estibaliz Urresola Solaguren delivers an impressive feature film debut, for which the only eight-year-old Sofía Otero was awarded the Silver Bear for Best Leading Performance. The highly topical and evocative documentary SHIDNIY FRONT | EASTERN FRONT by Vitaly Mansky and Yevhen Titarenko shows the brutality of the war in Ukraine in gloomy footage directly from the front. Tribute guest Angeliki Papoulia shines with her impressive performance in Syllas Tzoumerkas’s drama A BLAST, which drastically reflects the effects of the Greek financial crisis of the 2010s on the population. The Night Sight program section kicks off with SVĚTLONOC | NIGHTSIREN, where director Tereza Nvotová breaks down the classical witch narrative in the context of patriarchal structures and misogyny.
- 20.000 ESPECIES DE ABEJAS | 20,000 SPECIES OF BEES
(ES 2023) – Austrian premiere
Directed by: Estibaliz Urresola Solaguren
Program section: European Panorama Fiction; length: 129 min. | feature film
Guests: Estibaliz Urresola Solaguren (director): 4/27 – 4/30, additional guest invited to the opening
Distribution in Austria: Panda Lichtspiele Filmverleih; planned theatrical release: June 2023
An eight-year-old is suffering because people keep addressing the child in ways that cause discomfort. They insist on calling the child by the birth name Aitor. And the nickname, Cocó, even if less obviously wrong, does not feel right either. During a summer in the Basque country, the child confides these worries to relatives and friends. But how can a mother handle her child’s quest for identity when she is herself still dealing with her own ambivalent parental legacy? Basque director Estibaliz Urresola Solaguren’s debut feature is a sunny drama. By adopting more than one point of view, Urresola is respecting the incredible complexity that is gender identity, and touching on one perhaps less obvious aspect of transitioning: your mentality. (Berlinale)
- SHIDNIY FRONT | EASTERN FRONT
(LV/UA/CZ/US 2023) – Austrian premiere
Directed by: Vitaly Mansky, Yevhen Titarenko
Program section: European Panorama Documentary; length: 98 min. | documentary
Guests: Vitaly Mansky (director), Yevhen Titarenko (director)
Kyiv, August 24, 2022, Ukraine’s Independence Day. A burnt-out tank on a deserted street. Half a year has passed since the whole world became aware of Russia’s attack. It actually began in 2014, but many did not perceive it as such at the time. This is also explained by the voice in the commentary that belongs to Vitaly Mansky. The other director, Yevhen Titarenko, captures an insider’s images which reveal precisely what (this) war means. He has been with the “Hospitallers” volunteer medical battalion since 2014 and is now on full duty. At times disturbingly raw and direct, yet always enlightening, this film shows in close-up how a nation is fighting for its survival. (Berlinale)
- A BLAST
(GR/DE/NL 2014)
Directed by: Syllas Tzoumerkas
Program section: Tribute Angeliki Papoulia; length: 83 min. | feature film
Guests: Angeliki Papoulia (leading actor) & Syllas Tzoumerkas (director)
Maria is on the run. Behind her, fire and a briefcase full of money. In front of her, the hopeless vastness of the motorway. Only a day before, she was a caring mother, a loving wife, a responsible daughter. Today, she has gone rogue. Set in the fervent years of the collapse of the Greek economy, A BLAST tells the story of a generation’s disillusionment and radicalization. Maria starts her adult life with the best of intentions. Ten years after, no matter where she looks, her world is cracking up. Unwilling to reconcile with a life of unreciprocated care, lost dignity, and broken-down desire to live, Maria attacks. (Crossing Europe)
- SVĚTLONOC | NIGHTSIREN
(SK/CZ 2022) – Austrian premiere
Directed by: Tereza Nvotová
Program section: Night Sight; length: 109 min. | feature film
Guests: invited
All the typical trappings of witchcraft – the naked moonlit rituals, the familiar relationship with wolves and snakes, the sexual abandon, the knowledge and use of herbs, the concealed baldness, the mutated or murdered livestock, the dancing around bonfires, the missing children – are present and correct in NIGHTSIREN, but are mostly rationalised and all reconfigured as something harmless. For this is a film less about female malefactors than about the villagers’ patriarchal structures and deep-seated misogynies (some internalised by the local women themselves) which suppress difference and readily blame innocent women. (Anton Bitel, Projected Figures)
