08/11/2024 - New artistic director Giulio Base has revealed the films gracing this year’s edition, which is unspooling 22 – 30 November boasting a stripped-back line-up, world premieres and international stars

With its stripped-back yet “crisp” line-up, respecting its traditional auteur vocation whilst also playing to wider audiences, the upcoming 42nd edition of the Torino Film Festival will be something to savour, according to its neo-Artistic Director Giulio Base. And audiences will get to discover these “memorable” selected films, as described by the director and his new team of young selectors, between 22 and 30 November, when the Piedmont capital is set to celebrate the seventh art, hosting international stars, world premieres and special events.

120 titles have been selected this year (versus upwards of 200 in past years), divided into three competitive sections (feature films, documentaries and shorts) and three non-competitive sections (Out of Competition, Zibaldone and a Marlon Brando Retrospective). Each of them will be introduced by their directors or actors, or by representatives from the world of film culture and criticism. “Every film will be a special event”, Base assured those present, while presenting the festival’s rich programme today in Rome, a programme for all tastes which boasts a strong presence of women filmmakers, starting with the three jury presidents of the event’s competitive sections: Margaret Mazzantini, Roberta Torre and Michela Cescon.

Kicking things off and wrapping things up are two American movies: firstly, Ron Howard’s new film, Eden, which is a drama thriller starring Jude Law and Ana de Armas, and, lastly, Waltzing with Brando by Bill Fishman, starring Billy Zane as the iconic Marlon Brando, to whom the TFF is dedicating a major retrospective (as well as the poster for this year’s festival) on the centenary of his birth. This year will see the honorary Stelle della Mole prizes going to Rosario Dawson, Giancarlo Giannini, Ron Howard, Matthew Broderick, Emmanuelle Béart, Alec Baldwin, Michele Placido, Ornella Muti, Julia Ormond, Sharon Stone and Vince Vaughn, who will all be travelling to Turin.

Jostling among the 16 feature films (first or second works) in competition are Dissident by Stanislav Gurenko and Andrii Al’ferov, following a former soldier in the Ukrainian army who fought for Ukraine’s independence during the Second World War; Europa centrale by Gianluca Minucci, depicting a train journey taken by a couple of Communists entrusted with an important mission by the Comintern in April 1940, and N-ego [+see also:
film review
film profile] by Eleonora Danco, which sees the director-actress dressing up as a “Dechirichian” mannequin and meeting a variety of characters who reflect her fears and desires. There’s also Nina [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Andrea Jaurrieta
film profile], a revenge story directed by Spain’s Andrea Jaurrieta; Polish movie Under the Grey Sky [+see also:
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trailer
interview: Mara Tamkovich
film profile] by Mara Tamkovich, examining the protests in Belarus following the rigged elections in 2020, and Vena by Germany’s Chiara Fleischhacker, which tells the story of a complicated mother-child relationship. Equally worthy of a mention is the Danish title Madame Ida [+see also:
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film profile] by Jacob Møller, homing in on a 15-year-old orphan who becomes pregnant in the ‘50s, and another film about motherhood, Holy Rosita [+see also:
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film profile] by Belgium’s Wannes Destoop.

Gracing the documentary competition are Controluce by Tony Saccucci, centring on “Mussolini’s photographer”; Il mestiere di vivere by Giovanna Gagliardo, which revolves around the last, frenetic day in the life of writer Cesare Pavese; Norwegian Democrazy [+see also:
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film profile] by Fabien Greenberg and Bård Kjøge Rønning, which investigates the line between freedom of speech and inciting hatred; Soldier Monika by Paul Poet, focusing on an elite transgender soldier who’s also a symbol of the fight for gender rights, and Mark Cousins’ new work, A Sudden Glimpse To Deeper Things [+see also:
film review
interview: Mark Cousins
film profile], which presents an anti-conventional portrait of painter Wilhelmina Barns-Graham and which won the Crystal Globe in Karlovy Vary.

Showcasing Out of Competition, among other works, are Meet the Barbarians [+see also:
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film profile] by Julie Delpy, Il corpo [+see also:
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trailer
film profile] by Vincenzo Alfieri, Ho visto un re by Giorgia Farina, Un Natale a casa Croce by Pupi Avati, Paradis Paris [+see also:
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film profile] by Marjane Satrapi and The Summer Book [+see also:
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film profile] by Charlie McDowell, starring Glenn Close. Last but not least, the new Zibaldone section, dedicated to films old and new, will include Maurizio Nichetti’s comeback film following a twenty-year absence, Amichemai, starring Angela Finocchiaro and Serra Yilmaz, Eight Postcards From Utopia [+see also:
film review
interview: Radu Jude, Christian Ferenc…
film profile] by Radu Jude and Christian Ferencz-Flatz, Lumière! The Adventure Continues by Thierry Frémaux and Such A Resounding Silence [+see also:
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film profile] by Emmanuelle Béart and Anastasia Mikova.

(Translated from Italian)