UPDATE: Following the announcement made by the Prime Minister at midday regarding the ban on gatherings of upwards of 100 people, all public screenings and meetings linked with the Cinéma du réel Festival are now cancelled. Badgeholders can, however, watch the competition films via the event's online videotheque at Festival Scope, Tënk, Mediapart and UniversCiné (read about the details here).

(El artículo continúa más abajo - Inf. publicitaria)

Last night saw Babette Mangolte’s French-American co-production Calamity Jane & Delphine Seyrig, A Story open (as a prologue) the 42nd Cinéma du Réel Festival (scheduled to unspool in Paris’s Pompidou Centre from 13 to 22 March) against the rather peculiar backdrop of the Coronavirus epidemic and the progressive strengthening of precautionary measures adopted by the French government (namely the closure of schools and universities as of this Monday, even though gatherings of upwards of 1,000 people are still the only events to be cancelled for now). It would seem, therefore, as the festival’s director general Catherine Bizern emphasised last night at the event, that "Cinéma du réel is withstanding reality, but it’s withstanding through adaptation".

Standing out on the agenda is an international competition section consisting of 13 feature films, including six productions or co-productions of European origin: The Year of the Discovery [+lee también:
crítica
tráiler
ficha de la película] by Spaniard Luis López Carrasco (discovered in competition in Rotterdam), Carrousel [+lee también:
crítica
tráiler
ficha de la película] by the Netherlands’ Marina Meijer, the German-American production Bring Down The Walls [+lee también:
crítica
tráiler
ficha de la película] by Phil Collins, Makongo [+lee también:
crítica
tráiler
ficha de la película] by Elvis Sabin Ngaibino (uniting the Central African Republic, Argentina and Italy), Those That, at a Distance, Resemble Another [+lee también:
crítica
tráiler
ficha de la película] by Jessica Sarah Rinland (the recipient of a Moving Ahead Special Mention in Locarno – produced by the UK, Argentina and Spain) and The Two Sights [+lee también:
crítica
tráiler
ficha de la película] by Joshua Bonnetta (UK/Canada). They’ll be up against films from Brazil, Argentina, Mexico, Azerbaijan, the Philippines, America and China.

The French selection, meanwhile, will offer up 12 feature films: There Will Be No More Night [+lee también:
crítica
tráiler
ficha de la película] by Éléonore Weber, Seekers by Aurore Vullierme, J.A by Gaëlle Boucand, Chronicle of the Stolen Land [+lee también:
crítica
ficha de la película] by Marie Dault, My Dear Spies [+lee también:
crítica
tráiler
ficha de la película] by Vladimir Léon, Golden Age [+lee también:
tráiler
ficha de la película] by Jean-Baptiste Alazard, The Missing One by Rares Ienasoaie, A Man Leaning [+lee también:
crítica
tráiler
ficha de la película] by Marie-Violaine Brincard and Olivier Dury, Ahlan Wa Sahlan by Lucas Vernier, Talking with the Dead by Taina Tervonen, Gevar's Land by Qutaiba Barhamji and the French-Swiss co-production A House [+lee también:
tráiler
ficha de la película] by Judith Auffray.

Eleven international feature films, and eight of French origin, are also in the offing, as are a number of titles which were recently well received in Berlin and are set to be treated to Special Screenings: Irradiated [+lee también:
crítica
tráiler
entrevista: Rithy Panh
ficha de la película] by Rithy Panh (crowned Best Documentary at the afore-mentioned German festival), Austrian production Notes from the Underworld [+lee también:
crítica
tráiler
entrevista: Tizza Covi y Rainer Frimmel
ficha de la película] by Tizza Covi and Rainer Frimmel (awarded a Special Mention in Berlin’s Best Documentary category), Golda Maria [+lee también:
crítica
tráiler
entrevista: Patrick Sobelman y Hugo So…
ficha de la película] by Patrick and Hugo Sobelman (which will close this year’s edition of the Cinéma du reel Festival), The Works and Days (of Tayoko Shiojiri in the Shiotani Basin) [+lee también:
tráiler
ficha de la película] by Sweden’s Anders Edström and American director C.W. Winter, and the French-Brazilian co-production Divinely Evil by Gustave Vinagre. Likewise gracing the agenda is a screening of the Italian film I Diari di Angela - Noi due cineasti. Capitolo secondo [+lee también:
crítica
tráiler
ficha de la película] by Yervant Gianikian and Angela Ricci Lucchi (discovered out of competition in Venice), as well as that of the four films shot in the slums of Fontainhas by Portuguese director Pedro Costa (not least Vitalina Varela [+lee también:
crítica
tráiler
ficha de la película], last year’s Golden Leopard winner in Locarno), a spotlight on the works of Mosco Boucault, a Focus on Fernand Deligny (including Monsieur Deligny, vagabond efficace [+lee también:
tráiler
ficha de la película] by Richard Copans) and the themed programmes "Face to Face with Power", and "Popular Front(s)" which will be opened by Tu crois que la terre est une chose de morte by Florence Lazar. And that’s not to mention the professional sidebar ParisDOC, running 19-22 March (featuring the 7th edition of the work-in-progress session, which will offer up 8 feature films, round tables, debates and explanations of various matters).