River Silence
Rogério Soares
Canada.  2019.  90 min

A poetic journey alongside four women, River Silence is witness to the human and environmental cost of a large-scale development in Brazil’s Amazon basin.  The Belo Monte hydroelectric dam is but one of many scheduled to be built in Brazil—and the characters we meet represent thousands of similarly displaced women, men and children.

We follow Francinette as she lovingly raises her children and grandchildren, moving to a new house in Altamira as compensation for the destruction of the modest home she had lived in for 18 years. Her resilient spirit and new surroundings are little comfort, however, when faced with her daughter’s unplanned pregnancy and ongoing substance abuse. Tamakwera, of the Parakanã nation, is also a new resident of Altamira, forced to move when life along the Xingu River became unsustainable. We see this Indigenous mother of four girls struggle to adapt to city life as she attempts to preserve her culture, language, and rituals.

ROGERIO SOARES

For Montreal-based filmmaker Rogério Soares, the Amazon is his soul home: “it is a kind of spiritual home to me, a place that never stops feeding my imagination and shaping my values.”  He first moved to the Amazon at the age of 18 after hearing his father’s many tales of endless rivers as big as the sea.  Rogério’s deep love and understanding of the Amazon’s fragility and complexity, as well as its people, is at the heart of River Silence and the family stories he followed over three years.

He has previously directed documentaries in the region for Al-Jazeera (USA) and TV Cultura (Brazil). River Silence is Rogério’s first feature documentary.

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Camille Jacques :    distribution@eyesteelfilm.com

Sisters of The Trees
Camila Menéndez / Lucas Peñafort
Argentine.  2019.  82 min

In the desert of Rajasthan (India) the birth of a girl is no longer a curse.  The families that previously got rid of their daughters for not being able to pay the dowry, today celebrate their lives by planting 111 trees.  It is the story of those women like Kala who managed to work outside the home and organize others.  Or Bhavari that barely knows how to write and she is educating her daughter Nikita to follow her dreams of becoming a doctor.

CAMILA MENÉNDEZ

Camila Menéndez graduated as a director from ERCCyV.   Since 2010 she has been a mountaineer in Mendoza and Buenos Aires, on TV channels, production companies, fiction and documentary series for TV, and feature films (La passion de Verónica Videla, 2010 – Madame Baterflai, 2012 – Los ojos llorosos, 2016.).

LUCAS PEÑAFORT

Lucas Peñafort obtained the Diploma in Creative Documentary Studies at the Barcelona Film Observatory.  He graduated in Cinematography at the Universidad del Cine in Buenos Aires.

Films: La familia chechena 2015, Caja Cerrada 2009, Hamdan 2013, El gran canto del shamanismo 2015,  El manifesto del shamanismo 2019.

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Lucas Peñafort :  lpenyafort@gmail.com

The Witness
Peter Vacso
Hungary. 1969. 103 min

The film features József Pelikán as a single father who previously participated in the WW2 communist movement of Hungary,  but is now working as a dike-reeve.  He meets an old friend from the underground communist movement, Zoltán Dániel, now a government official who fishes at the Danube, near the dike.  Dániel falls in the river, and Pelikán rescues him and invites him to his home. While the two reminisce old times at Pelikán’s home, the ÁVH suddenly appears. They received a “serious anonymous report” stating Pelikán committed an illegal act of slaughtering a pig for food.  Dániel tries to save him by demonstrating to the ÁVH thugs how the loyal Pelikán hid him during the purgings years before, but he unknowingly reveals the basement, where all the pork had been hidden.

Pelikán is taken to prison though later released, on “higher command”.  Comrade Virág, being unnecessarily benevolent, gives various assignments to Pelikán such as being the CEO of a swimming pool, an amusement park, and an orange research institute. Pelikán, being “ideologically under-educated”, fails magnificently in all his assignments, visiting the prison regularly, until they ultimately succeed with the orange research institute and are awarded.  As it turns out, all this was arranged to force Pelikán to be the witness in a show trial against his old friend, Zoltán Dániel, who fell out of the favour of the communist regime.  Pelikán is meticulously reshaped to fit the expected image of the archetypical “Hungarian worker, 1950” to be the perfect witness.

PÉTER  BACSÓ

Péter Bacsó (6 January 1928 – 11 March 2009)  was a Hungarian film director and screenwriter.

After high school graduation Bacsó wanted to become an actor and later a theatre director, but ultimately decided to try filmmaking.  His first job in a film was as an assistant in Géza Radványi’s Valahol Európában (Somewhere in Europe) at the age of 19.  He continued as a script editor and screenwriter. He graduated at the Hungarian School of Theatrical- and Film Arts in 1950.  At the time he was already a familiar face in studios.

He was a successful screenwriter during the 1950s before beginning to direct films a decade later.  He made his first feature film, Nyáron egyszerű in 1963.  He made his most famous film, A tanú (The Witness) in 1969,  but it was banned at the time and wasn’t released until 1979. The film became a cult classic in Hungary; it is a political satire about the early-1950s Communist regime.

Bacsó later continued to make mostly political and satirical films, for a wider audience.  He made various genre films, trying his hand in musicals, comedies, etc. He continued filmmaking up to his later years, however his last two films were generally dismissed by critics and the public alike as badly written and low quality works.  His 2001 film Hamvadó cigarettavég (Smouldering Cigarette) was a biopic of Hungarian actress and singer Katalin Karády. His 2008 film Virtually a Virgin was entered into the 30th Moscow International Film Festival.

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Film Archive :  nagy.tamara@filmarchiv.hu

The Music Room
Satyajit Ray
India.  1958.  100 min

The Music Room is a 1958 Indian Bengali drama film written and directed by Satyajit Ray,  based on a popular short story by Bengali writer Tarasankar Bandyopadhyay, and starring Chhabi Biswas. It was the fourth feature film directed by Ray.  The shooting was done at Nimtita Raajbari, in Nimtita village, 10 kilometres from Murshidabad.

The Music Room depicts the end days of a decadent zamindar (landlord) in Bengal, and his efforts to uphold his family prestige even when faced with economic adversity.  The landlord, Biswambhar Roy (Chhabi Biswas), is a just but other-worldly man who loves to spend time listening to music and putting up spectacles rather than managing his properties ravaged by floods and the abolition of the zamindari system by the Indian government.  He is challenged by a commoner who has attained riches through business dealings, in putting up spectacles and organising music fests.  This is the tale of a zamindar who has nothing left but respect and sacrifices his family and wealth trying to retain it.

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Aurora Films :    aurorafilm@bharatmail.co.in

The Unvanquished
Satyajit Ray
India. 1956. 113 min

The Unvanquished is a 1956 Indian Bengali drama film written and directed by Satyajit Ray (1921–1992),  and is the second part of The Apu Trilogy. It is adapted from the last one-fifth of Bibhutibhushan Bannerjee‘s novel Pather Panchali (1929) and the first one-third of its sequel Aparajito (1932).  It starts off where the previous film Pather Panchali (1955) ended, with Apu’s family moving to Varanasi, and chronicles Apu’s life from childhood to adolescence in college, right up to his mother’s death, when he is left all alone.

In 1920, Apu (Pinaki Sen Gupta) and his parents, who have left their home in rural Bengal,  have settled into an apartment in Varanasi where his father Harihar (Kanu Banerjee) works as a priest. Harihar is making headway in his new pursuits: praying, singing, and officiating among the ghats on the sacred river Ganges. Harihar catches a fever and soon dies, however, and his wife Sarbajaya (Karuna Banerjee) is forced to begin work as a maid.  With the assistance of a great-uncle, Apu and his mother return to Bengal and settle in the village Mansapota. There Apu apprentices as a priest, but pines to attend the local school which his mother is persuaded to allow. He excels at his studies, impressing a visiting dignitary, and the headmaster takes special interest in him.

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My Life With Satyajit Ray
Bo Van Der Werf
Belgium.  2006.  52 min

Photographer Nemai Gosh has spent 25 years of his life having as main subject world-renowned Indian director Satyajit Ray, and his film sets, his castings and surrounding magic and glamour. Today, he confronts for the film the peculiar fascination which still inhabits him for this artist and exceptional man,  recalling memories of Ray’s genius at work, of his capacity to conceive and decide all about every step of the film creation and production, of his temperament of perfectionism and passion, which led him to international recognition way over Bollywood standards.

Through 90,000 pictures made by the unique witness, so as while his meeting again with the director’s usual movie team, or his return on famous films shooting locations and meeting the locals who then met the master, we embrace Satyajit Ray’s personality and oeuvre, picturing as well how a page of Indian cinema’s history was written by this man.

BO VAN DER WERF

Saxophonist and composer Bo van der Werf is graduated from the Amsterdams conservatory, he leads and writes for Octurn, a contemporary jazz ensemble based in Brussels. He also plays with the Brussels jazz orchestra, leads his own smaller ensembles and plays free-lance with different groups in Europe, besides writing for Octurn, Bo also composes music for films, for dance and for contemporary classical ensembles, teaches at Antwerp’s and Leuven’s conservatories. He currently works on a doctorate research at Leuven University. ‘ My life with Satyajit Ray’ is his first film, and it was shown at many major film festivals ( Teheran film festival, Buenos Aires film festival, Bombay international film festival, festival du documentaire de Paris, Tiburon film festival California, mediawave Budapest , Kolkata film festival, … ).

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Bo Van Der Werf :    bofilipa@hotmail.com

Khutsiev. Action Starts!
Peter Shepotinnik
Russia. 2015. 84 min

In October 2015, Marlen Khutsiev turned ninety. With no intention of retiring, he has been working on Not Yet Evening—about the relationship between Leo Tolstoy and Anton Chekhov—on and off for over ten years due to lack of funding.  Allowing the documentary crew exclusive access to his shooting process over this extended period, Khutsiev also candidly reflects on his filmmaking and the nature of creative work with Peter Shepotinnik, film critic, Kulturträger, longtime programmer for the Moscow International Film Festival and author of the TV show Kinescope. As an accomplished documentarian, Shepotinnik enjoys a close relationship with Khutsiev, whose sets are otherwise inaccessible.

PETER  SHEPOTINNIK

Shepotinnik Peter(Pyotr), 1956, Moscow.

In 1978 graduated from VGIK. From 1979 to 1998 – in the magazine “Art of cinema”. Author and host of the TV program “Kinescope” (from 1994 to the present day, first “TV 6 Moscow”, then – TV Channel “Russia”, TV Channel “Russia-Culture”). Author of numerous documentaries about people of art.  Member of the TEFI and NIKA academies. Winner of international and domestic TV and film festivals. Nominee for the Russian cinematographic Award “Nika” for the best documentary film. TV Channel” Russia-Culture “(2012, 2015) and the International Film festival in Honfleur (France, 2014) held retrospectives of documentary works under the general title “Collection of Peter Shepotinnik”. Among the most famous films – “Balabanov at War“, “After Tarkovsky”, “Hamdamov on Video“, ” Yuri Lyubimov. Chronicles”, ” Andrey Voznesensky. Lyrica”, “German Today is 122 to 85”, “Another Wife of Vysotsky“, ” Khutsiev. Action Starts!” Author of the novel “Stereo” (2012, preparing for publication) and the collection of articles and interviews “Allegro video”(preparing for publication).

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Peter Shepotinnik :    ptrshepotinnik77@gmail.com

It was in May
Marlen Khutsiev
Russia.  1970.  115 min

A preamble of horror: airplanes fly over cities dropping bombs, soldiers shoot from windows of ruined buildings or run with guns through debris-filled streets, explosions pulverize the public space. After the ominous introduction comes its opposite. A group of Red Army soldiers take a break and relax at a German farm. War is over and the soldiers laugh, relieved and cheerful. However, one night the whole platoon goes out patrolling and they find the architectonic aftermath of fear. A concentration camp stands empty, abandoned. A few country dwellers appear who still hope to find their arrested relatives.

The lucid and solidary dialectic established between archival material and fiction reinforces the gravitas of each image, dismissing indifference and equanimity. War films, when they are good, reject any trace of satisfaction in relation to the war enterprise; they do not worship militarism. One of the greatest films within the war genre,  It Was in May warns—in a surprising ending in which stock material is used, once more, to alarming effect—about the relation between war and the economic system, and states the greatest risk for historical memory: to transform hideousness into a museum piece.

MARLEN  KHUTSIEV

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Imagineindia International Film Festival

Success is the Best Revenge
Jerzy Skolimowski
Poland.  1984.  90 min

Success Is the Best Revenge is Skolimowski’s second film about martial law in Poland, in 1981. It is also his most personal film. Its protagonist, the famous Polish theatre director, Alex Rodak, bears many similarities to Skolimowski and in the roles of Rodak’s wife and children he cast his own wife and sons, Michal and Jerzy. The film was shot in Skolimowski’s London house, which was re-mortgaged in order to secure funds for Success.
The film begins with Alex Rodak receiving the Légion d’honneur in Paris, where he meets his wife and sons for the first time in two years. Their separation was caused by martial law in Poland: Rodak could not leave the country, while his family waited for him in London. The award allows Rodak to reunite with them and embark on a theatre project about martial law in Poland. However, the project turns into a series of problems and mishaps.
De-centred, incoherent and even incomprehensible at times, Success is nevertheless one of the most interesting films in Skolimowski’s career, excellently revealing the director’s obsessions and originality, such as his affinity to romanticism, expressionism and self-irony. In a sense, it is also a sequel to Identification Marks: None (1964), because Michal’s peregrinations through London bear a striking similarity to Leszczyc’s walks through an unknown town in Skolimowski’s feature debut.

JERZY  SKOLIMOWSKI

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Walkover
Jerzy Skolimowski
Poland.  1965.  77 min

One of the most radical and refreshing films of post-war Poland, the second feature-length directorial attempt of the great Skolimowski (“The Shout”) is a melancholic farewell to the carefree feeling of youth and at the same time captures the portrait of a whole generation through the story of an amateur young boxer having to face the world around him as well as himself.

Even though he had just began making feature films (this one was actually screened at Cannes along with «Identification Marks: None»), Jerzy Skolimowski’s «Walkover» showed admirable self-confidence, bold directorial perception and at the same time a willingness to combine personal experiences with youthful anxieties, which led to a modern and groundbreaking cinema, unprecedented in Polish film history.

Through the existential and emotional dilemmas of a young amateur boxer, who moves from one fight to the other in order to make a living, he draws not only the picture of an uncertain antihero but also that of a whole generation which struggled to find meaning and destination in a melancholic postwar reality.

JERZY  SKOLIMOWSKY

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Imagineindia International Film Festival