Teona Strugar Mitevska‘s Mother, the Macedonian’s sixth feature film (which promises to shake up the mythical figure of Mother Teresa played by Noomi Rapace) is the opening film in Orizzonti Competition. Venice Film Festival topper Alberto Barbera made several return invites this year. Mitevska was previously in the section with The Happiest Man in the World. Interesting side note – the filmmaker and her subject were both born in Skopje in North Macedonia. The drama is said to focus on a few weeks after the end of World War II, before the nun founded her own congregation, the Missionaries of Charity.
Carolina Cavalli (Amanda) will have her homecoming to the section which launched her career with Il Rapimento di Arabella which sees her reteam with actress Benedetta Porcaroli plus Chris Pine in the story of a 28-year-old woman who has always felt uncomfortable in her own skin and disappointed in her life’s trajectory until she meets a little girl named Arabella. Convinced the child is her younger self, she sets out to change her fate. Cavalli is joined by Laura Samani (also with her sophomore feature) in Un anno di scuola which is set in 2007 in Trieste. Fred, an exuberant and courageous seventeen-year-old Swedish girl, arrives in town and enrolls in her final year at the technical high school. The only girl in an all-male class, she immediately finds herself the center of attention of an inseparable trio and will severely test their long-standing friendship. The screenplay is loosely based on the eponymous book by Gianni Stuparich (1929).
Argentinian filmmaker Gastón Solnicki (Kékszakállú) makes a third trip to Venice the with The Souffleur – the dark comedy sees Willem Dafoe playing the tenured hotelier of Vienna’s InterContinental Hotel. Upon learning that his cherished hotel is about to be sold to an Argentine developer who plans to demolish and reconstruct the landmark completely, he wages a personal vendetta against the new owner. Dafoe will also be front and center in Kent Jones‘ Late Fame – which is based on Arthur Schnitzler’s posthumously published novella of the same name and explores the impact of newfound fame on Ed Saxberger (Dafoe), the author of a poetry collection that received little notice upon release but gained appreciation years later among a group of artists including Gloria (Greta Lee), an actress eager to gain his attention.
A film selected for TIFF, Mark Jenkin‘s Rose of Nevada (featuring George MacKay, Callum Turner, Francis Magee, Edward Rowe, Rosalind Eleazar, Mary Woodvine) is about a mysterious boat returns to a village 30 years after vanishing. Two men join its crew hoping for better fortune. After one voyage, they find themselves transported back in time, mistaken for the original crew. From Ecuador, Ana Cristina Barragán (Octopus Skin – which premiered at the San Sebastián Film Festival) explores the bond between mother and child, which tackles the relationship between bodies and nature with Hiedra. A debut feature is also part of the comp – Catalan filmmaker Jaume Claret Muxart‘s Strange River is a queer coming-of-ager tells the journey of a teenager on a family cycling holiday along the banks of the Danube River. Romanian filmmaker Mihai Mincan brings Milk Teeth (2023 TorinoFilmLab FeatureLab) to the section – this is about what happens after having her sister kidnapped, a young girl, encounters a strange world, threatening to take control of her, and the only way to fight against it is to rely on her friends and her imagination. Here are the nineteen projects in the Horizons section:
“Mother,” Teona Strugar Mitevska (opener)
“Komedie Elahi” (“Divine Comedy”), Ali Asgari
“Hiedra,” Ana Cristina Barragan
“Il Rapimento di Arabella,” Carolina Cavalli
“Estrany Riu” (“Strange River”), Jaume Claret Muxart
“Hara Watan” (“Lost Land”), Akio Fujimoto
“Grand Ciel,” Akihiro Hata
“Rose of Nevada,” Mark Jenkin
“Late Fame,” Kent Jones
“Milk Teeth,” Mihai Mincan
“Pin de Fartie,” Alejo Moguillansky
“Otec” (“Father”), Tereza Nvotova
“En El Camino,” David Pablos
“Songs of Forgotten Trees,” Anuparna Roy
“Un Anno di Scuola,” Laura Samani
“The Souffleur,” Gastón Solnicki
“Barrio Triste,” Stillz
“Human Resource,” Nawapol Thamrongrattanarit
“Funeral Casino Blues,” Roderick Warich
