FESTIVAL DO RIO, Rio de Janeiro Film Festival
September 26th to October 10th, 2013
The biggest annual Latin American movie marathon is about to start, with Festival do Rio, Rio de Janeiro’s international film festival, now in its 15th year, today announcing highlights of the more than 350 films it will spool in the two weeks, September 26 – October 10th.
It also revealed early details of some special sections this year, with a Focus on German cinema and a series of screenings and debates looking at the hot topic of internet intrusion and misuse in our daily lives.
As well as a platform for new world and Latin America cinema, the festival also plays host to high profile international industry representatives in RioMarket, to promote debate and exchange of professional crafts through a parallel series of workshops, lectures and seminars.
Festival gala opener, Thursday September 26, is to be the Franco-Brazilian co-production, Thierry Ragobert’s Amazonia 3D pic, which awed its audience when premiered as closing film at the recent Venice Film Festival.
The festival is book-ended with another local subject matter movie for closing night, October 9, with the world premiere of director Heitor Dhalia’s Serra Pelada, a recent times historical epic set around true tales from the exploration of Brazil’s biggest gold mine during the 1980’s. Top name cast includes Wagner Moura (who doubles also as co-producer), Juliano Cazarré, Julio Andrade, Matheus Nachtergaele, and Sophie Charlotte. Film is coproduction between Brazilian media giant Globo and Warner Bros. Pictures, who will open the picture nationally October 18th.
Main festival programming sees a rich mix of already seen festival crowd pleasers and new and recent work by top-line helmers: Alfonso Cuarón’s Venice hit, Gravity, Woody Allen’s Blue Jasmine, Lee Daniels’ The Butler, Gus Van Sant’s Promised Land , Spring Breakers from Harmony Korine, Pussy Riot by Mike Lerner and Maxim Pozdorovkin; Diana by Oliver Hirschbiegel, top Korean director Hong Sang-soo’s Nobody´s Daughter Haewon, Longwave (A Oeste) by Lionel Baier, Good Ol’ Freda by Ryan White, La Danza de laRealidad by Alejandro Jodorowsky, Jeune & Jolie by François Ozon, the Iranian sci-fi Taboor by Vahid Vakilifar; La Grande Bellezza (The Great Beauty) by Paolo Sorrentino, are among the internationally drawn highlights.
Singled out for a special lifetime achievement is US director Paul Schrader, who will attend the festival to receive his honour. Films on show in this tribute section include his most recent Venice entry, The Canyons, along with classics and career highlights including Cat People, American Gigolo, and Mishima: A Life in Four Chapters, among them.
French director Claire Simon, due in Rio to present her recent feature Gare du Nord will also be the subject of a festival retrospective.
Upping the French contingent due in Rio, fellow French filmmaker Alain Guiraudie, will attend to present his film Stranger by the Lake (L’Inconnu du Lac) for which be received the best director award in the Un Certain Regard section at Cannes as well as screen a selection of his previous work. Also due is well revered director Claire Denis, bringing her Cannes screened Bastards.
Outside the dozen traditional Rio Festival sections - Panorama, Expectations, Première Brazil, Latin Première, Midnight, Midnight Horror, Midnight Music, Gay, Boundaries, Dox, Film Doc, Generation, Unique Itineraries and Environment, this year’s festival sees the ushering in of three new theme-related sidebars:
· Tec Section: Before the Virtual World Was Privacy: focusing on 7 documentaries which address the impact of internet and new technology on privacy issues. Selected screening will be supported with open debates involving authorities on the subject.
· Vanguard Expectation Section: 6 films that challenge the conventional narrative rules to explore, discover and empower new mediums of film making.
· Big Documentarians Panorama Section: spotlighting recent productions from documentary masters such as Frederick Wiseman, Nicolas Philibert, Errol Morris, Rithy Panh and Claude Lanzmann as well as well recognized fiction and documentary filmmakers including Marcel Ophuls, Ken Loach and Werner Herzog.
For the celebration of the year of Germany in Brazil, the country will be honored in the Festival with the sections Focus Germany and Berlin School Section.
Focus Germany highlights include Gold by Thomas Arslan, screened in the competition of the Berlin Festival, Exit Marrakech the recent film by director Caroline Link, Oscar winner for Nowhere in Africa, plus Home From Home by Edgar Reitz, the quasi prequel to his cine-series Heimat, as well as Barbara Albert’s Die Lebenden, a reflection of the birth of Nazism and the reality of Turks in contemporary Germany.
The Berlin School Section is focused in the cinematographic movement that caught attention in the last decade and was born with directors such as Christian Petzold (Yella, Barbara), Thomas Arslan (A Fine Day, Vacations) and Angela Schanelec (Marselha, Orly).
The vanguard filmmaker Ulrike Ottinger will be also honored with screenings of Under Snow and Freak Orlando.
Lectures and roundtables, technology seminars, script workshops and other topics will be covered in RioMarket, with the presence of numerous leaders in audiovisual from around the world. The RioMarket full programme is shortly to be announced.
For the third year, the Festival headquarters, the RioMarket, the Cine Meetings and public encontres will be housed at the Armazém Utopia (Armazém 6), in the downtown Rio port area ‘Porto Maravilha’.
Festival do Rio 2013
From September 26th to October 10th