ROSSO: THE TALE OF THE FISHERMEN CLEMENTE AS A PARABLE ON MIGRATION IN ITALY
FOCUS ON THE YOUNG INDIAN DIRECTOR MAARIA SAYED
ON SCREEN THE SHORT FILMS FROM THE FILMUNIVERSITY BABELSBERG ‘KONRAD WOLF’ AND THE CA’ FOSCARI MASTER’S DEGREE COURSE IN FINE ARTS IN FILMMAKING
The ninth edition of the Ca’ Foscari Short Film Festival took off immediately with the special program Young Filmmakers at Ca’ Foscari, dedicated to films made by students of the university. In particular, the students of the Master in Fine Arts in Filmmaking this year presented an excerpt from the feature film The Unreliables, the story of a long night that sees three screenwriters struggling to elaborate the subject of a film, and the short film Venice Lagoon and the Island of Jeju: Two Realities Compared, created in collaboration with the Municipality of Venice to promote sustainable tourism. This year’s new addition is the unusual “BAUM creative challenge” which saw the Masters students shoot four different shorts in a single location, the Humanistic Library of Ca’ Foscari University. A short film was also dedicated to the Ca’ Foscari Alumni Association with The Alley of Memories, an emotional journey through the memoirs of a former student and of his years at Ca’ Foscari. Finally the music video Hold me, made for the Italian country group Silverado Country Band with the help of the Japanese film director Hiroki Hayashi, already a dear friend of the Festival.
The following special program was dedicated to the productions of the students of the Filmuniversity Babelsberg “Konrad Wolf”, the oldest German film academy widely renowned for its long and prosperous history and the close connections with the oldest film studios of the world, built in the same city and active since the time of the silent cinema of Fritz Lang. The division of the school dedicated to animation is of great prestige, and it to five animated shorts that this special program was dedicated. These works touch varied themes, from the introspective and sweet journey of the protagonist of A Sweet Story, to the psychological depths of Flickern, to the universal reflection on the compromises we are all called to make to feel a little love in Love Me, Fear Me, following to the most adventurous Mascarpone, the story of an ordinary man who will gain the curious knowledge of a dangerous gangster, and Nosis, as a sort of Pinocchio in an evil and unpublished version.
To close this first afternoon of the Festival, before the official opening ceremony, the special program focusing on the Indian director Maaria Sayed and curated by Cecilia Cossio. Surely one of the leading guests of this year’s edition of the Short, Sayed was selected among the 24 best Asian filmmakers to be part of the Asian Film Academy in 2016, and today presented her most successful shorts on the stage of the Auditorium: Aabida, the director’s first work (2013) and Chudala (2016). Both short films have female figures at the center: their deepest side is told focusing on their hopes and strengths, on their conscience and their subjectivity, and of course their position in the problematic Indian reality.
At 5:30 PM was held the opening ceremony of the Festival. The Deputy Dean for Cultural Activities of Ca’ Foscari University of Venice, Flavio Gregori, and the artistic and organizational Director, Roberta Novielli, welcomed the institutions and the public to the Auditorium to assist the event. In giving the official start to this ninth edition of the Ca’ Foscari Short Film Festival, they highlighted the growth of the Short Film Festival over the years and the great importance of a cultural event that focuses on young people from an artistic and professional point of view, together with the directors of the International Competition and the many volunteer students of Ca’ Foscari, who are the real lifeblood of the Festival’s organizational machine.
The first day of the festival ended with the presentation of the first six short films of the International Competition dedicated to works by students from film schools and universities around the world. Reviver, Israeli stop-motion animation by Shalev Ben Elya and Renen Adar, is the story of a little mouse and a strange machine that give life to a parable about the cycle of life. The film by the Slovak director Daniel Rihák, The Trip, tells about a romantic mountain trip that turns into a struggle for survival, while the Mexican San Miguel by Cris Gris, offers a profound reflection on faith through the story of a devoted young girl struggling with the grieving mother. Chan Teik Quan comes from Malaysia and with Weeping Birds tells of an elderly couple who plan their lives together after death with delicate irony. In Bifurcation Point, by the Russian Leonid Gardash, an innocent joke becomes the personal “bifurcation point” of the two main characters, leading to unexpected and harmful consequences. Finally, the first Italian short film in the competition – but produced in France – Rosso: A True Lie About a Fisherman by Antonio Messana, is one of the many works that this year deal with the theme of immigration, in this case through the story of an elder Sicilian fisherman who finds the lifeless body of a migrant at sea and will face difficult ethical and moral choices.
At the end of the day, one of the most anticipated moments of this edition: the meeting with the French filmmaker Patrice Leconte, protagonist of a conversation by Gabrielle Gamberini, Deputy Director of the Alliance Française of Venice.
