Contrary to expectations, German cinema did not receive any of the important jury prizes at the Locarno Film Festival. After all, there were honors for German films in the experimental film competition and in the critics’ week.
Locarno – At the finale of the 75th Locarno International Film Festival, the feature film “Regra 34” (“Rule 34”) by Brazilian director Júlia Murat won the Golden Leopard.
The title of the Brazilian-French co-production refers to the so-called Rule 34, according to which pornographic material can be found on the Internet for everything that exists there. At the center of the feature film is a law student. She lives out various, sometimes bizarre, sexual fantasies on the Internet, and not only there.
The juries surprised everyone by awarding the main prize and making a number of other decisions. The two German contributions “Human Flowers of Flesh” and “Piaffe” as well as other films that were also widely favored unexpectedly went empty-handed.
Germany can book one success: In the experimental film competition “Pardi di domani” (“Leopards of tomorrow”), the short film “Madar tamame rooz doa mikhanad” (“Mothers pray all day”) by the Iranian Berlin filmmaker and Graphic designer Hoda Taheri an honorable mention.
Germany also achieved success in the “Semaine de la critique” (“Week of Criticism”): the main prize in the festival section organized by the Swiss Association of Film Journalists went to the Polish-German co-production “The Hamlet Syndrome”. (“The Hamlet Syndrome”). Based on Shakespeare’s drama “Hamlet”, the directing duo Elwira Niewiera and Piotr Rosołowski paint a stylistically original and haunting portrait of a young generation of Ukrainians who want to change their country for the better, no matter how difficult the conditions.
Surprise also with the special price
The jury of the main competition for the Golden Leopard also amazed by awarding the second most important award, the special prize. It went to the comedy “Gigi la legge” (“Gigi, the Law”) by Italian director Alessandro Comodin. In it, the rural everyday life of the traffic policeman Gigi is observed in a flood of scenes full of dialogue. This jury decision is hardly understandable from the audience’s point of view.
The three prizes for “Tengo sueños eléctricos” (“I have electric dreams”) by Costa Rican director Valentina Maurel met with broad approval. She observes with great sensitivity the difficult growing up of sixteen-year-old Eva. The story is told with anger and poetry, hope and fear. The Best Director award and the Best Actress and Best Actor honors to Daniela Marín Navarro and Reinaldo Amien Gutiérrez as daughter and father are perfectly justified.
17 films from all over the world were screened in the international competition. A total of 226 short, experimental, documentary and feature films were shown in 471 screenings over the eleven days of the festival. The jubilee edition of the most important European film festival alongside Berlin, Cannes and Venice has shown with enormous enthusiasm from the audience: cinema is alive. Despite all prophecies of doom, it is powerful and creative. dpa
