Wednesday, 08 July 2020 10:42

50 films in competition to go back to dreaming with Giffoni

Here are all the titles in competition in the first three sections of the festival scheduled August 18 - 22 and August 25 - 29

The search for one’s identity, the complex relationship between father/mother/son/daughter, the fight for one’s rights, violence, loneliness, but also homophobia, racism and diversity: These will be some of the topics tackled in the 47 International productions from Europe,  Canada, Usa, Saudi Arabia, Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay, Israel, Lebanon, Korea, Switzerland, Rwanda, Vietnam that will be competing in the 50th edition of the Giffoni Film Festival.

There are 33 movies (14 feature films and 19 short films) competing in the first part scheduled August 18 - 22  for  200 jurors of the Generator +16  section (16 – 17 year olds) and 105 youth of the Generator +18 section (from 18 years upwards) whilst . Fourteen movies (seven features and seven shorts)will be screened in the second part to be held 25 - 29 August for 305 jurors of the Generator +13 section (from 13 to 15 years old). This year, #Giffoni50 will become four, giving life to a new and creative experiment that will be spread in the course of the year. A template that was made in accordance with the anti-covid protocol and that will involve 800 youth of the local community  in the first two parts and 1000 circa giffoners who will be connected via the internet thanks to 40 hubs in Italy and 18 abroad. Think of them as little “embassies” and proof that once again Giffoni goes beyond every obstacle and brings the festival into the homes of their jurors.

After the two part event  of August, another leg is scheduled between September and November and will be dedicated to European hubs, new master classes, a tour of Italy for the fiftieth anniversary, the production of the film for Giffoni's 50th celebrations, and innovation projects in the Creative week dedicated to rectors, department heads and teachers from the main universities. December (from 26 to 30), will finally be the opportunity to meet with 900 giffoners and their families in the Elements +6 and +10 distributed in five theatres. Children aged six to nine will be offered a selection of feature and short films, both animated and fictional, focusing mainly on fantasy, while the Elements +10 e selected films will show what young people living in very different countries have in common: hardships, interests and feelings. 2020 will end with Gex Doc and Parental Experience, the first entirely dedicated to documentaries and the second, reserved for short films, has the aim of offering parents a series of screenings and in-depth meetings.

"I would like to thank - says the director of Giffoni Opportunity, Claudio Gubitosi - the production and distribution companies that, in such a complicated moment, have chosen to share with us this edition that shouts, necessarily and forcefully, to the right to life in cinema and the recovery of this important sector of the world cultural economy. Giffoni50 supports the world of creativity of which cinema is a fundamental pillar and, even more so now, it is close to the generations of all latitudes. They are the ones who suffered the most during the lockdown and now  have the right to take back their lives. I would like to dedicate this edition to all the boys and girls of the world”.

18-22 August 2020. GENERATOR +16. The contradictions of adolescence are the main theme of the seven feature films included in Generator +16. This is the case of Danny Madden's BEAST BEAST (USA). Three intertwined stories of young people in search of their identity, grappling with their first love, small crimes and the violence of a southern American town. We are transported to a Newfoundland in the 80s with Nicole Dorsey's BLACK CONFLUX (Canada). The seemingly separated lives of an anxious and disillusioned teenager and a troubled and alienated man converge fatefully in this disturbing exploration of femininity, isolation and toxic masculinity. LAST VISIT (Saudi Arabia) by Abdulmohsen Aldhabaan tells the story of young Waleed’s journey, and his sick father Nasser. The father and son relationship changes radically after a child goes missing. NAKED ANIMALS (Germany) by Melanie Waelde delves into the lives of five friends who grow up in a small town in Germany: they have to decide whether to leave or stay after finishing school. They look for each other, run away from each other while kissing and colliding they decide on what seems to be the rest of their life ... A kaleidoscope of violence, love and solitude in which intimacy and pain go by hand in hand. HERE ARE THE YOUNG MEN (Ireland) by Eoin MacKen with Dean-Charles Chapman, Game of thrones’s  Tommen Baratheon, who also appeared in the film “Blinded by the Light” the winner of the Generator +13 section of the 2019 edition. Chapman, ha salso made apperances in “1917” by Sam Mendes, and in “Fungus the Bogeyman” screened in Giffoni in 2016. Adolescents in Dublin like Matthew, free spirit Jen, nihilistic Rez and deranged Kearney, leave school and start doing drugs and alcohol. OUR LADY OF THE NILE (France, Belgium, Rwanda) by Atiq Rahimi, focuses on a story of hardships. Rwanda, 1973. The girls are sent to Our lady of the Nile school, a prestigious Catholic college on the hills where they are taught to become  the future Rwandan elite. With the degree on the horizon, the young women share the same dormitory, the same dreams and the same teenage worries. But across the country and within the school, the deep-seated antagonism between ethnic groups becomes increasingly evident. It will change the lives of the girls and the whole country forever. JUST KIDS (France, Switzerland) by Christophe Blanc includes actress Anamaria Vartolomei, also seen in the film "My Revolution" presented in 2016 in the Generator +13 section. Jack 19, Lisa 17 and Mathis 10 suddenly become orphaned. Each of them reacts in their own way to the family catastrophe.

Seven short films: SCHIAVONEA (Italia) byi Natalino Zangaro revolves around the story of Vincenzo, a young guy who lives in a small town near the sea in Calabria, Schiavonea. Ayana is a young migrant  hosted in the town’s fish market transformed into an improvised reception center. One day Vincenzo goes to the market to buy some fish. The unexpected encounter with Ayana will change their lives forever. In CUBAN HEEL SHOES (Spain) by Julio Mas Alcaraz the two lead characters Paco and Jose, live in the outskirts of Madrid where dreams rarely come true. With serious family problems - and surrounded by an aggressive, macho and homophobic environment - the two young men are forced to lead a double life to hide the beginning of their love and passion for flamenco. 90% (Germany) by Jerry Hoffmann is focused on the delicate issue of eating disorders. In Jean's life, anorexia - or as he would call it, the incredible feeling of absolute self-control - takes up more and more space. His parents don't understand him and put him under increasing pressure. Only when Lili, a cheeky and rebellious girl, enters his life, does Jean slowly start to open up. Lili will be the one to drag him on an adventure and to encourage him to face his problem. With MAMMAN (Sweden) by Farzad Farzaneh, there is talk of closure thanks to Annika, a mother who makes a desperate attempt to save her daughter who lives locked up in her room and refuses to go to school. Another Swedish title is JAMILA (Sweden) by Sophie Vuković. Jamila is focused on ballet and is rehearsing with her friends to participate in a talent show, and does not pay attention to her sister Leila’s questions on the outcome of the asylum request made by their family. But when the police suddenly appear at school, Jamila starts to worry. Will she perform and risk her freedom, or flee by losing her new friends? WILMA (Iceland) by Haukur Björgvinsson, talks about a boy who meets his father for the first time. The man lives in a caravan field and does not know that his son feels like a girl and calls himself Wilma. With ROPELESS (Italy), Andrea Carrino  tells the story of a man who is a veteran in the laundry he works for: he hangs thousands of wet clothes under a scorching sun. But strangely, he doesn't want them to dry.

GENERATOR +18. Love, family, integration, Internal conflicts, are the file rouge that connects the seven feature films and 12 short films in the jurors +18 section. AUERHOUSE (Germany/2020) by Neele Leana Vollmar. The director already took part in Giffoni with her film "The Pasta Detectives" presented as part of Elements +6 in 2014. Four young friends Höppner, Frieder, Vera and Cäcilia find a shared student apartment under the skeptical eyes of the village neighbors. The four want to help Frieder, who is contemplating suicide. When Pauline joins the group nothing will ever be the same again. CALM WITH HORSES (Great Britain, Ireland) by Nick Rowland, includes actor Barry Keoghan who previously appeared in “Dunkirk”. Deep in the Irish countryside, the former boxer Arm has become the most feared defender of the Devers family of drug dealers, while at the same time striving to be a good father to Jack, his five-year-old autistic son. Divided between his two different families, Arm finds himself faced with a difficult decision when asked to kill for the first time. His attempt to do the right thing will endanger his loved ones. GODDESS OF THE FIREFLIES (Canada) by Anaïs Barbeau-Lavalette, tells the story of Catherine who receives a portable CD player, the book Christiane F and permission to go to the mall  for her sixteenth birthday. It is also the day her father deliberately crashes hers mother's Jeep against a wall. Catherine is facing adolescence just as her parents are about to divorce but she doesn't care much. She is too busy trying to deal with Mélanie Belley, who terrifies her for no reason and climbing the social ladder of her high school, stealing Mélanie’s boyfriend. KIDS RUN (Germany) by Barbara Ott stars Andi, a laborer in economic difficulties, father of three children who he sees as the source of all his problems. He is still in love with Sonja, the mother of his younger daughter Fiou, who prefers Mike, an unpleasant man who, however, has a car and a fixed income. When a threat of eviction looms over Andi and his children, the man asks Sonja for money, who gives him Mike's savings. When the latter finds out, he goes on a rampage and Sonja, who does not want to jeopardize her future with him, gives Andi a terrible ultimatum. PACIFIED (Brazil) by Paxton Winters, produced by “Black Swan director Darren Aronofsky. Tati, an introspective 13-year-old girl finds it difficult to relate to her father, Jaca, after his release from prison in the turbulent climate that precedes the Rio Olympics. While the men of the Unidade de Polícia Pacificadora fight to maintain a weak occupation of the favelas of Rio, Tati and Jaca must manage to find a connection. ROSA PIETRA STELLA (Italy) by Marcello Sannino is a Campania production. The cast includes Ivana Lotito (Azzurra of the TV series Gomorra), Ludovica Nasti (young Lila of the TV series My brilliant friend). Carmela is a beautiful and indomitable  young woman like an Amazon who lives day by day with precarious jobs and vain ambitions, until she enters the business of illegal immigrants who populate the alleys of the old town of Naples. Mother to an eleven year old girl, Maria, who she has never really taken care of she now wants to fix it, and take on her responsibilities as a mother. She meets Tarek, a forty year old man from Algeria, and overwhelms him in her struggle to find a balance in life. THE SLEEPWALKERS (Argentina, Uruguay) by Paula Hernández focuses on Luisa and her 14-year-old daughter, a sleepwalker, in full adolescent awakening. A marriage bordering on a silent crisis. Grandmother, brothers and cousins. Summer, sweat, alcohol. A New Year's Eve party in the family's old country house is the necessary trap to shake things up. 

Shortfilms start with A DEVIL IN THE POCKET (France) by Antoine Bonnet and Mathilde Loubes. In a remote location seven children are witnesses of a murder. They become accomplices, receiving a gold nugget in exchange for their silence. One of them remains obsessed with the experience: Auguste struggles with his conscience, unable to stifle his doubts. BUBE MAISES (Israel) by Or Levy talks about Yaffa, an 80-year-old woman who lives in a nursing home. Her dementia revives her childhood. At the time, her father, a businessman, traveled and sent her postcards from all over the world, so she could imagine living a thousand adventures with him. Today it is her daughter Miri who writes new postcards to make Jaffa happy. DAUGHTER (Czech Republic) by Daria Kashcheeva, received an oscar for the best animation short film by a student. A girl who hasn't never been loved by her father in the past is unable to share her feelings with him. She can't get rid of the painful memories that bring her back to the day she arrived home with a dead bird and he didn't give her any help. DRY SEA (Belgium) by Yves Bex e Bart Bossaert tells the story of a fisherman who is left alone on the bank of a dried up sea. He will remain stuck in the past, until a sandstorm overwhelms him redefining the meaning of his existence. HOW MY GRANDMOTHER BECAME A CHAIR (Lebanon) by Nicolas Fattouh it is the singular story of a grandmother who loses her five senses one after the other until she turns into a wooden chair. During her transformation, she realizes that her housekeeper is not the wild animal she thought she was, but the real, caring and strong grandmother she sought. IRON ME (France) by Ivan Rabbiosi revolves around the story of Pedro, a young athletic man who lives together with his iron board. He is the point of reference of his village until one night when everything collapses. THE MIDNIGHT FREAK TRAIN (United Kingdom) by Joseph Derrick and Samuel Elphick, is about a young guy who is alone on the tube: He seems to have found happiness and love in a girl who is adorably different. ON THE BEACH (Slovakia) by Samuel Chovan is a 3D animation film on the D-Day that uses a new hybrid technique to obtain a painting like effect.. REFLECTION (Spain) by Juan Carlos Mostaza revolves around Clara: a nine year old girl with a distorted vision of reality. She finds herself stuck in a pit  from which she is struggling to get out. Only the assistance of the people who love her will be able to help her. SURA (Korea) by Jeong Hae-ji is the story of a high school student and her best pregnant friend. THEMES (Croatia) by Danijel Žeželj tells of a journey through the humanistic tradition of European painting that turns into the absurd tragedy of the current immigration crisis. TIES (Germany) is a film by Dina Velikovskaya who won the award for the best short film in the Generator +18 section in 2015 with “About a Mother”. A young woman leaves her parents' house to discover the world. But the world of her parents is so closely connected to her that leaving  endangers it.

25-29 August. GENERATOR +13. Part 2 of the Festival, dedicated to the Generator +13, includes several films revolving around coming of age. The feature films start with  THE CASTLE (Lithuania, Ireland) by Lina Lužytė. A 13 year old Lithuanian girl, Monika and her mother  Jolanta, live in Dublin with their very sick grandmother. Monika dremas of becoming a musician and a concert at the castle seems like the perfect opportunity to get noticed. But when her mother tries to stop her she will resort to anything to pursue her dream.  LIFE WITHOUT SARA AMAT (Spain) by Laura Jou, tells of Pep, a 13-year-old boy in love with a girl from his grandparents' village: her name is Sara Amat. One summer night, Sara disappears without a trace. A few hours later, Pep finds her hidden in his room. The girl tells him that she has run away from home and begs him  to let her stay. Even though Pep knows that everyone in town is looking for her, he agrees and becomes her accomplice. MAN UP! (France) by Benjamin Parent includes Isabelle Carré in the cast, sister  Marguerite in "Marie's Story" screened in the +13 section in 2015. Tom, a shy and sensitive teenager, is about to face the first day in a new high school. To better integrate, he can count on the advice of Leo, his older brother and mentor. Leo will endeavor to make Tom a real man, but his omnipresence will have a toxic influence. Tom will have to fight to free himself from Leo's grasp and find his own way. ROM (Vietnam) by Tran Thanh Huy is set in an old apartment complex awaiting demolition: here the residents gamble in the hope of being able to earn enough to sustain themselves. Ròm, 14, works as a bookie to put aside the money needed to find his parents in the central region of Vietnam. Ròm's rival is Phúc, an ambitious bookmaker. When Ròm accidentally discovers that Phúc has deceived the residents, causing them to become increasingly indebted, he decides to help them choose a good number. LA GUERRA DI CAM (Italia) by Laura Muscardin: the recognition of the need to bury one's parents and to take responsibility for acting against negative forces is the central theme of this story, an intimate and rooted theme in every human being with a greater dramatic weight if set in a world in which society as we know it today is lost. DANIEL '16 (Greece) by Dimitris Koutsiabasakos revolves around the story of Daniel, a German teenager sent to Greece, in a detention center for young people. There, in an abandoned village of Evros, near the Turkish borders, he confronts a natural and human foreign environment. Anne Émond's YOUNG JULIETTE (Canada) includes actress Alexane Jamieson, who played a minor role in the film "Cross My Heart" presented in the Generator +13 section in 2018, in the cast . Fourteen year old Juliette lives in the countryside with her father and brother. When Juliette was young, her mother left the family to continue her career in New York; from that moment, Juliette started to gain weight. Today she is not obese, but she is clearly the heaviest girl in her high school. But that doesn't stop her from being lively, funny and always rebellious. Juliette has big dreams, but she risks not appreciating those who really love her.

The Generator +13 shorts this year will include only Italian films: AFRAID (Italia) by Daniele Suraci, in a little village in South Calabria, Saro is busy overcoming his fears while he waits for his father to come back. KLOD (Italia) by Giuseppe Marco Albano, is about Klaudio, a 13 year old boy, who dreams of becoming a basket- ball player. On a day like any other, the roar of a car breaks into the silence of a country house where Klaudio lives with his family. Albania is no longer a safe place. LUCE & ME (Italy) by Isabella Salvetti tells the story of a 10 year old child, traveling with his Roman and Romanist father. They are late because the derby is about to begin, but first they have to attend to a commission. The boy is dressed in a fluttering blue miniskirt and a cape reminiscent of superheroines. OUR TIME (Italy) by Veronica Spedicati talks about Roberta, a nine year old girl who wants to enjoy the last days of summer on the beach playing with her friends. Her father Donato, on the other hand, forces her to stay home to help him with household chores. The distance between the two seems unbridgeable, but the discovery that Donato is much more fragile than it seems will lead them to value  their time together. SEPTEMBER (Italy) by Giulia Louise Steigerwalt is the story of Maria and Sergio, classmates who never spoke. Back from the summer holidays, Maria is noticed by Cristian, a boy she is madly infatuated with: something "unexpected" that will make her panic. ON THE POINTS (Italy) by Ulysses Leonardo investigates the universe of dance and beyond. On stage, in front of the commission of a prestigious French dance academy, something torments Camilla. She took over from Sara, her best friend, who had to retire because of a mysterious accident. But was it really an accident? Can Camilla dance despite the weight of a secret too big to keep? TIMO'S WINTER (Italy) by Giulio Mastromauro, won the David di Donatello. Timo, the youngest of a Greek carousel community, is facing the hardest winter together with his loved ones.

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