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FESTIVALS Germany

Mannheim-Heidelberg turns 60

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The 60th edition of the Mannheim-Heidelberg International Film Festival, Germany’s second oldest film festival after Berlin, will run from November 10-20, and the film chosen as its opener is a love story: Icelandic director Reynir Lyngdal’s Our Own Oslo, screening in international avant-premiere. The family is one strand, but the dominant theme at this anniversary-edition under the direction of Michael Kötz is the father in all his forms – heroic, weak, authoritarian, selfish, abusive, or absent.

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The theme of fatherhood is omnipresent among the 15 titles in international competition, which include eight European productions and one co-production. Besides Lyngdal’s film, the line-up includes two Belgian titles, Miel van Hoogenbemt’s My Only Son and Philippe de Pierpont’s She’s Not Crying, She’s Singing [+see also:
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(both presented in European avant-premiere), as well as Lucian Georgescu’s The Phantom Father (Romania), Zaida Bergroth’s The Good Son [+see also:
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(Finland), Bartosz Konopka’s Fear of Falling (Poland), Irish productions Parked [+see also:
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by Darragh Byrne and Sensation by Tom Hall, and finally Sebastián Boresztein’s Spanish/Argentinean co-production Chinese Take-Away [+see also:
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, which triumphed last week at the Rome Film Festival (see news).

The enticing "International Discoveries" section will show 18 features directed by young talents from around the world, including seven little gems unearthed right here in Europe, including the British titles screening in world avant-premiere Up There by Zam Salim and Small Creatures by Martin Wallace, Danish helmer Birgitte Stærmose’s Room 304 [+see also:
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and Ivan Vladimirov and Valeri Yordanov’s Bulgarian film Sneakers.

The event’s third major usual section, "Special Screenings", comprises six films already seen at other festivals but selected for their outstanding quality, including Polish director Lech Majewski’s highly artistic The Mill and the Cross [+see also:
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interview: Lech Majewski
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, which brings to life the characters in a Bruegel painting, thanks to performances by Rutger Hauer, Charlotte Rampling and Michael York. The audience will also get the chance to discover, in international avant-premiere, Linda Wendel’s Danish production Miss Julie [+see also:
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interview: Linda Wendel
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, which transposes a play by Swedish playwright Strindberg to the modern-day world of professional tennis.

The programme, which also has a section for children, is marking the festival’s anniversary through two retrospective sections: "Mannheim Revisited", which includes names like Krzysztof Kieslowski, Rosa von Praunheim, Jiri Menzel, Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Werner Schroeter and Lars von Trier, and "Journey Through Time", where François Truffaut and Jim Jarmusch can be found alongside Wim Wenders and Andreas Dresen.

Dresen is this year’s winner of the festival’s Master of Cinema Award, which he will receive this evening before a screening and a press conference organised in his honour. The other prizes will be distributed at the closing ceremony.

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(Translated from French)

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