Festival programmer Alexander Gusev about the official film selection for this year's Euregion Film Festival 2019.
Geplaatst op 5 maart 2019Alexander Gusev has already programmed last year’s SHIFT Film Festival 2018. Now, for Euregion Film Festival 2019 he is back on board. In this edition of CineSud Magazine he shares insights into the selection process and reveals what the audience can expect from the selected films which all stand under the motto “Stories That Matter”.
“We believe that, in accordance with our slogan, in each of the selected films an original story is told, a hero is presented, whose interaction with the outside world shows a certain important facet of being, a certain significant feature of modernity.”
“In our compilation we tried to keep a balance of formal searches and a sharp plot, festival hits and the desire to discover new names, current issues and eternal themes. However, we believe that, in accordance with our slogan, in each of the selected films an original story is told, a hero is presented, whose interaction with the outside world shows a certain important facet of being, a certain significant feature of modernity.”
“In the selection, we did not want to expose our viewers to the vicissitudes of particularly bold experiments, or to the literal truths of social and political sermons. Primarily, we selected films that corresponded to our aesthetic tastes, but at the same time touched us emotionally and also said something important and new about the world and about human nature.”
“The theme of the Friday block is the existence of the youngest inhabitants of the modern city, the adaptation of spiritual impulses and moral quest of young people to the requirements of the surrounding world. The characters of Never Ever Without by Laurens Zautsen and Stephen Kearney simply cannot find a pastime to their liking in their hometown due to the conservative mores of their fellow countrymen. Pistol by Andreas Thaulow, whose dynamism is especially felt after the relaxed rhythm of Never Ever Without , shows the infantile nature of violence. In 2nd Class by Jimmy Olsson,infantilism becomes a battlefield: the teacher fights for the soul of the child with his parents. The fight of the hero in Bouba & Kiki by Jack Goessens consists of desperate attempts to preserve his identity while at the same time escaping from loneliness. Die Freundin by Iván Sáinz-Pardo also tells of loneliness and more precisely about the semi-finished product of communication, which provides a consumer society. The loneliness in Infill & Full Set by Hai Duc Dao is about the forced and inescapable state of an illegal immigrant who lives in a foreign environment, in a foreign culture, and is in constant danger. We Were Three by Caroline Ingvarsson testifies how easily, owing to a mischievous trick, each of us can be on the other side of the law.”
“The Saturday block is about the universality of our hopes and fears, our ability to cope with difficulties, despite the most unfavorable socio-political situation, and the sympathy that even the most resilient of us need. Sick for a Lifetime by Yorn Heijnen tells the real story of a man whose whole life turned out to be a fight against a deadly disease. Cadoul de Craciun by Bogdan Muresanu, set in an extremely realistically reproduced household scenery of Romania of the 80s, reveals the eternal theme of the invasion of the dictatorship in the private family space. In Dima by Remi Itani, personal distress, universal intimate hardships and failures intertwine with the social atmosphere of ill will, the willingness of others to condemn everything that goes beyond the well-defined framework of what is considered decent. The documentary Tribe of Ghosts by Almicheal Fraay allows us to touch the origins of our xenophobia- the oppression faced by albinos from Tanzania is presented as a metaphor for the readiness of any society in any era to discriminate members of a certain minority, appointing them to be the culprits of all ills. The character in Patision Avenue by Thanasis Neofotistos represents the personification of the modern woman, her struggle for her personal realization, her readiness for self-sacrifice and the threats of social and political cataclysms that fit into the existence of ordinary people regardless of their gender or social status.”
“Perhaps, my favourite film is Patision Avenue with its brilliant technical prowess, impeccable conformity of form and content and the problem that is understandable to everyone who had to take care of loved ones, who tried to realize their talents and who was a citizen of a country who had sunk into the twilight of street confrontation.”
“With an abundance of film festivals, it is difficult for me to proclaim with due courage that the program has a certain innovation and originality, but, for my taste, for the two screenings we managed to collect a few pearls of short films and observe a high average level. Also, as it seems to me, our program shows that the mixing of fiction and documentary films in one competition is not at all something inappropriate.”
“I sincerely believe that there are several films in our program that can satisfy even the most demanding cinephile. It is also quite representative from the point of view of modern short films. At the same time, it seems to me that the friendly atmosphere of the dialogue, which always reigns in the Euregion, is no less an advantage of the festival than the films themselves.”