Jornal da Mostra
“Khadak”, by Peter Brosens e Jéssica Woodworth
Nº 428 > 29ª Mostra > 03/09/2006
Subscribe here the 'Jornal da Mostra'
Leon Cakoff, de Veneza, para o ‘Jornal da Mostra’
Edição:
Renata de Almeida e Leon Cakoff
Edição:
Renata de Almeida e Leon Cakoff
AFGHANISTAN AND MONGOLIA WITH HUMANIST CINEMA; DENMARK WITH AN ANARCHO-THERAPY MOVIE
It is always possible to reap preciosities in the parallel sessions of the big festivals, such as Berlin, Cannes and Venice. Here in Venice there is the Giornate degli Autori – Venice Days, now under the direction of the critic Fabio Ferzetti. Giorgio Gosetti, who organized it until last year, is now in charge of the new Festa di Roma. Here are the first highlights of the ‘Giornate’:“Khadak”, by the Belgian Peter Brosens and the American Jessica Woodworth, allows us to revisit Mongolia through a mystical and again thrilling (for the ones who remember Brosens style of narrative) tale. The director is known by the São Paulo Festival audience for the thrilling “State of Dogs”. It is interesting to observe how other sciences are welcome to the threads of good cinema. Brosens graduated in Geography and Cultural Anthropology; Woodworth in Italian Literature and researches for television documentaries in France.
Displaced of his way of subsistence in the Mongolian steppes by an animal epidemic threat, Bagi, a sheep shepherd, has to live in a distant mining town. This is where he discovers his powers of sensing animals and supernatural forces, visions of new evils in the world, that nobody else wants to see or feel.
Italian filmmaker Vicenzo Marra, also present to São Paulo Film Festival with his previous “Tornando a Casa” and “Vento di Terra”, makes an incursion to documentary with the overwhelming “L’Udienza è Aperta”. We follow a trial of the Neapolitan ‘Camorra’. An appeal court judge, an assistant judge and a criminal attorney analyze the incriminating proofs against the mafia, based on telephone tapping. But what is on trial before our eyes is something else. The fact that justice and law are never the same for all.
“Offscreen”, by the Danish Christoffer Boe, profits from digital convenience to offer decadent actor Nicolas Bro the possibility of saving his marriage. Just that the woman who wants to leave him is against this privacy invasion. Cinema takes here a declared anarcho-therapeutic role.
“L’Etoile du Soldat/ The Soldier’s Star”, is a French film by Christophe de Pontilly, a co-production with Germany and Afghanistan. Maybe the best film ever made to explain the origin of the conflicts and problems of the country of amazing landscapes, still handicapped and painted as the portal of all hells. Firstly, the film follows the invading soldiers of the Soviet empire. One of these Russian soldiers, a former rocker, is abducted by Afghan combatants, the mujahedins, and the viewpoint adds to the one of a French reporter registering the tragedies of the invaded country. Pontilly humanizes for the spectators’ eyes both sides of the conflict and flings his shocking denouncements. That, as always, Americans make the worst option and start arming and investing in the creation of a new monster that not even they can eliminate anymore – the talebans. Other tragical news came along this magnificent humanist movie: the decease of its active maker. Christophe de Pontilly committed suicide last May, at 55 years of age, leaving unfinished his second fiction feature project, a satirical story of modern media. Pontilly, besides film and documentary maker, an Afghanistan specialist, was the co-founder of the press agency Interscoop.
Translation into English: Laura Rebessi (laurarebessi@gmail.com)
