29/02/2024 - Between 9 and 17 March, the festival’s 42nd edition will be showcasing European fiction feature films and documentaries, and hosting two industry days on audience development strategies

The 42nd edition of the Bergamo Film Meeting (running 9 – 17 March) will consist of two competitive sections, a tribute to French actor, director, screenwriter and playwright Sacha Guitry, an animated film line-up, two days dedicated to industry professionals, and the traditional focus on new contemporary European cinema Europe, Now! (as explored in our earlier article). Following on from Angelo Signorelli’s lengthy service, this year will see the festival’s artistic direction entrusted to Fiammetta Girola and Annamaria Materazzini.

Showcasing new authors, the international competition is set to present 7 fiction feature films which will be competing for the Audience Award, as well as the Best Director prize which will be decided upon by an international jury composed of Michelangelo Frammartino (director), Vaida Kazlauskaitė (project coordinator at the European Film Forum Scanorama - Vilnius) and Paola Raiman (film critic and selector for the Belfort Film Festival). As Fiammetta Girola emphasised while presenting the festival to the press, migration is the most topical theme at the event, explored by Belgian film The Wall [+see also:
film review
interview: Philippe Van Leeuw
film profile] by Philippe Van Leeuw, which was shot on the border between Arizona and Mexico where white supremacists, illegal immigrants and native American Indians collide. Alban Zogjani’s movie Okarina [+see also:
film review
film profile] (Albania/Kosovo/Germany) tackles the subject from a different angle, homing in on a couple who have left Kosovo to join their two daughters in the UK and whose family and life plans are torn apart when their residence permit is denied. In Until the Music Is Over [+see also:
film review
film profile] (Brazil/Italy), Cristiane Oliveira follows the matriarch of a family hailing from Italy’s Veneto region and now living in Brazil (the film will be distributed in Italy at the end of March by Lo Scrittoio), while the fight for civil and personal rights during the Bolsonaro era is at the heart of Lillah Halla’s Power Alley [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Lillah Halla
film profile] (Brazil/France/Uruguay) and a friendship overcoming age barriers is the focus of Dániel Hevér’s Hungarian movie Some Birds. We’re faced with a totally different tone in She Came at Night [+see also:
film review
interview: Tomáš Pavlíček, Jan Vejnar
film profile] by Czech directors Tomáš Pavlíček and Jan Vejnar, a black comedy in which the arrival of a mother-in-law turns the tranquil life of a thirty-something couple into a chaotic disaster. Last but not least, Good Guys Go To Heaven [+see also:
film review
film profile] by Romania’s Radu Potcoavă takes a fantastical turn, revolving around protagonist Dan who dies in a road traffic accident and finds himself in Purgatory: a deserted beach, with mild weather and an endless stream of fresh beverages.

The Close Up section dedicated to documentaries consists of 14 independent productions hailing from the international landscape, which can be divided into two categories: films on current affairs (AI, the war in Ukraine, the refugee crisis) and intimate, personal stories. These include Notes from Eremocene [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Viera Čákanyová
film profile] by Viera Čákanyová (Slovakia/Czech Republic), Portugal’s Tales of Oblivion by Dulce Fernandes, Once We Were Pitmen [+see also:
film review
film profile] by Christian Johannes Koche and Jonas Matauschek (Germany/Switzerland), Denmark’s Murky Waters by Martin B Gulnov, Holland’s Glass, My Unfulfilled Life [+see also:
film review
film profile] by Rogier Kappers, Finland’s Under Construction by Markus Toivo, Belgium’s Bon voyage by Karine Birgé, Germany’s Stick Together by Felix Maria Bühler, And They Will Talk About Us by Sieva Diamantakos (Ukraine/Italy/Finland), Megaheartz by Emily Norling (Sweden/Norway) and The Golden Thread by India's Nishtha Jain.

The animated film line-up, meanwhile, will be dedicated to the new generation of Portuguese animators and directors (Laura Gonçalves, Alexandra Ramires, David Doutel e Vasco Sá, Marta Monteiro and João Gonzalez) whose complete filmographies are scheduled to be presented in world premieres.

Last but not least, the fourth edition of Europe Now! Film Industry Meetings will be dedicated for the second year to so-called audience design; in other words, audience development analysis and strategies in film festivals. Participants in the various panel discussions will include Vaida Kazlauskaitė (MIOB network coordinator, project manager at the Scanorama Film Festival – Lithuania), Carolina Stera (audience development manager at the Trieste Film Festival – Italy), Tanja Hladnik (festival director at Kino Otok – Isola Cinema International Film Festival – Italy), Silvia Pareti (artistic director of the Piccolo Grande Cinema – Italy), Marcin Pieńkowski (director of New Horizons International Film Festival, head of distribution at New Horizons Association - Poland), Miguel Valverde (festival director at IndieLisboa International Film Festival – Portugal), Jan Jílek (Program Director at the Summer Film School Festival – Czech Republic), Madeleine Probst (head of film at Watershed Bristol – UK), Deborah Shirley Cohrs (digital communication and marketing consultant – Germany), and various members of AFIC – the Association of Italian Film Festivals.

(Translated from Italian)