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VENICE 2015 Orizzonti

Orizzonti: between film and reality

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- Art is interrupted by life in the section of the Festival that is most attentive to new aesthetic and expressive trends

Orizzonti: between film and reality
Taj Mahal by Nicolas Saada

If the international competition of the Orizzonti section is dedicated “to films representing new aesthetic and expressive trends”, as was the intention of the Festival’s director Alberto Barbera, you could say that the 2015 edition of the Venice International Film Festival lives up to this aspiration superbly.

First up is the debut film of Athenian director Yorgos Zois, Interruption [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Daphné Patakia
interview: Yorgos Zois
film profile
]
(Greece, France, Croatia), which embodies the marrying together of contemporary expression with a window onto society: during the performance of a post-modern theatrical adaptation of a Greek tragedy, seven young members of the public armed with guns climb onto the stage: art is interrupted by life.

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Then there’s Madame Courage [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile
]
 (Algeria, France, United Arab Emirates – see news article) by Algerian director Merzak Allouache, who is a regular face at the Cannes Film Festival and goes back behind the camera to tell the story of Omar, a temperamental and reclusive teenager who lives in the suburbs of Mostaganem. French Samuel Collardey will be presenting his third feature film, the dramatic Tempête [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile
]
(see news article – coming to French theatres in February 2016), which is set on a fishing boat moored in the port of Les Sables d'Olonne in the Vendée department of France. 

A star-studded cast featuring Robert Pattinson, Liam Cunningham, Bérénice Bejo, Stacy Martin, and Yolande Moreau, characterises The Childhood of a Leader [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile
]
, a pan-European co-production (United Kingdom, Hungary, Belgium, France) that sees U.S. actor Brady Corbet in his directorial debut and is based on a story written by Jean-Paul Sartre in 1939 about a future fascist leader.

Danish director Tobias Lindholm, who often works with Thomas Vinterberg – for whom he wrote the screenplays for Submarino [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Thomas Vinterberg
film profile
]
and The Hunt [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Thomas Vinterberg
interview: Thomas Vinterberg
film profile
]
– will be presenting A War [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Tobias Lindholm
film profile
]
, the story of a Danish military unit in Afghanistan that is captured by the Taliban (see news article). Lindholm has already competed in the Orizzonti section of the Festival once before, in 2012 with A Hijacking [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Tobias Lindholm
film profile
]
.

After participating in Orizzonti last year, Renato De Maria is back with Italian Gangster [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile
]
, a documentary on the fifty years of violence legitimised by the tabloids and cinema, the story of the social transformations that have swept across the country. Pecore in erba [+see also:
trailer
interview: Alberto Caviglia
film profile
]
, meanwhile, the first film of the other Italian director in the Orizzonti selection, Alberto Caviglia, is a surreal and comical piece on antisemitism.

Dito Montiel and the now hugely famous Shia LaBeouf are reunited – after first working together on A Guide to Recognizing Your Saints (Venice, Critics’ Week 2006) – in Man Down, a war thriller set in a wild post-apocalyptic America. The cast also includes Kate Mara and Gary Oldman.

Meanwhile Stacy Martin, Louis-Do de Lencquesaing, Gina McKee and Alba Rohrwacher star in Taj Mahal [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Nicolas Saada
film profile
]
 (France, Belgium – see news article), a thriller by former film critic Nicolas Saada which was inspired by the November 2008 Mumbai attacks. 

Then there’s Israeli-French co-production Why Hast Thou Forsaken Me [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Hadar Morag
film profile
]
by Hadar Morag, the story of a lonely Arab teenager who is culturally and sexually confused. Morag’s short film Silence was selected for the Cannes Film Festival in 2008 by the Cinéfondation. Another Israeli film featuring in the selection is Mountain [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Yaelle Kayam
film profile
]
by Yaelle Kayam, whilst Gabriel Mascaro will be presenting Boi Neon [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile
]
, a Brazilian-Uruguayan-Dutch co-production.

A famous face on television in Iran, Vahid Jalilvand will be presenting his film Wednesday, May 9, whilst Indonesian director and box office champion of the Asian market, Joko Anwar, will be presenting his new film A Copy of My Mind.

The complete list of the films competing in the Orizzonti section of the 72nd Venice International Film Festival (2 – 12 September) is as follows:

Madame Courage [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile
]
 by Merzak Allouache (Algeria, France, United Arab Emirates, Qatar)
A Copy of My Mind by Joko Anwar (Indonesia, South Korea)
Pecore in erba [+see also:
trailer
interview: Alberto Caviglia
film profile
]
 by Alberto Caviglia (Italy)
Tempête [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile
]
 by Samuel Collardey (France)
The Childhood of a Leader [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile
]
 by Brady Corbet (UK, Hungary, Belgium, France)
Italian Gangster [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile
]
 by Renato De Maria (Italy)
Wednesday, May 9 by Vahid Jalilvand (Iran)
Mountain [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Yaelle Kayam
film profile
]
 by Yaelle Kayam (Israel, Denmark)
A War [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Tobias Lindholm
film profile
]
 by Tobias Lindholm (Denmark)
Interrogation by Vetri Maaran (India)
Free in Deed by Jake Mahaffy (United States, New Zealand)
Boi Neon [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile
]
 by Gabriel Mascaro (Brazil, Uruguay, The Netherlands)
Man Down by Dito Montiel (United States)
Why Hast Thou Forsaken Me? [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Hadar Morag
film profile
]
 by Hadar Morag (Israel, France)
Un monstruo de mil cabezas by Rodrigo Pla (Mexico)
Mate-me por favor by Anita Rocha Da Silveira (Brazil, Argentina)
Taj Mahal [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Nicolas Saada
film profile
]
 by Nicolas Saada (France, Belgium)
Interruption [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Daphné Patakia
interview: Yorgos Zois
film profile
]
 by Yorgos Zois (Greece, France, Croatia)

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