Europe abounds in Venice Critics' Week
Nine films (seven in competition and two out-of-competition), all debut works receiving their world premieres, make up the selection of the 26th Critics Week (Sic), the section organised by the National Syndicate of Italian Film Critics (Sncci) which will take place on the margins of the Venice Film Festival (31 August-10 September).
Among these are two Italian films: Là-bas by Guido Lombardi (in competition) and Missione di pace by Francesco Lagi (closing film, out-of-competition - photo). The first takes a look at the African community living on Campania’s coast and is based on real events that took place a few years ago, when some immigrants were killed by the Casalesi clan. "It’s a very harsh and tense film which uses a documentary style but also has a noir influence", explained Francesco Di Pace, an executive at Critics Week, "it's one of this year’s best debuts." Missione di pace, starring among others Silvio Orlando, Alba Rohrwacher, Francesco Brandi and Filippo Timi, meanwhile, is a "grotesque satire which takes an ironic stance on militarism and anti-militarism".
A little bit of Italy can also be found in the Argentinian thriller that's in competition, El Campo di Hernan Belon, co-produced by Cinecittà Luce S.p.A (which will manage distribution), about a family that faces darkness in the Argentinian countryside.
Other competing titles are mostly European films: Franco-Ukrainian La terre outragée by Michale Boganim, about the Chernobyl disaster; French film Louise Wimmer by Cyril Mennegun; German film Totem by Jessica Krummacher, about a family and its perverse dynamics and the opening out-of-competition film Stockholm Ostra by Sweden’s Simon Kaijser da Silva, about two couples devastated by the death of a little girl who is killed in a car accident.
Finally, the rest of the world is represented by Marécages, by Canada’s Guy Edoin, about a mother who has to face up to serious economical difficulties following the work-related death of her husband, and by the Mexican film El lenguaje de los machetes by Kyzza Terrazas, about a couple in their thirties who decides to carry out an attempt by stuffing themselves with explosives.
(Translated from Italian)
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