08/03/2022 - The festival is unspooling 11 to 19 March, boasting a programme bursting with new offerings and attended by high-calibre guests

After unfolding in extremis in 2020 and hosting its 2021 edition in the middle of the month of July, the Mons International Film Festival is returning with a rich and plentiful programme on its usual dates of 11 to 19 March. Relaunched by a new team in 2019, the festival will screen no less than 94 films in this year’s event, including 78 feature films.

Eleven of these will be battling it out in the International Competition. Belgian audiences will be treated to a European premiere of Darragh Carey and Bertrand Desrochers’ English romantic drama A Brixton Tale [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Darragh Carey, Bertrand Des…
film profile], with the competition also including Serbian movie As Far As I Can Walk [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Stefan Arsenijević
film profile] by Stefan Arsenijevic, which nabbed Karlovy Vary’s Grand Prize; German-Iraqi film The Exam [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Shawkat Amin Korki
film profile] by Shawkat Amin Gorki, likewise presented at Karlovy Vary; French actress Noémie Merlant’s debut feature film Mi iubita mon amour [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile], discovered in Cannes’ Special Screenings section; another first French feature Rose [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile], by Aurélie Saada (who’s also a musician and the founder of folk duo Brigitte); Neighbours [+see also:
film review
film profile], by Kurd-Swiss director Mano Khalil; and two Belgian first films: The Hive [+see also:
film review
interview: Christophe Hermans
film profile] by Christophe Hermans and Sans soleil [+see also:
film review
interview: Banu Akseki
film profile] by Banu Akseki. The European co-production The Gravedigger's Wife [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile] (Finland/Germany/France/Somalia) directed by Khadar Ayderus Ahmed, and the titles Drunken Birds (Canada) by Ivan Grbovic and Bantu Mama (Dominican Republic) by Iván Herrera round off the competition.

An international premiere of Singing Jailbirds [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile] by Etienne Comar, starring Alex Lutz, Veerle Baetens, Agnès Jaoui and Hafsia Herzi, is set to open the festival, while Bouli Lanners’ latest film Nobody Has to Know [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Bouli Lanners
film profile], which is being released in Belgium, will close the event with its own international premiere on 19 March.

Mons will also play host to a number of high-calibre guests, including Abel Ferrara, who’s due to deliver a masterclass on Saturday 12 March, with a restored copy of his movie King of New York set to be re-screened by the festival; Laurent Cantet, who’s likewise delivering a masterclass, on 16 March, and presenting his latest film Arthur Rambo [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Laurent Cantet
film profile]; and Belgian director of photography Benoît Debie, Gaspar Noé’s trusty sidekick (responsible for the cinematography in Noé’s most recent opus Vortex [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile]) who’s also previously teamed up with Jacques Audiard, Wim Wenders and Ryan Gosling.

(Translated from French)