Former Pardo d’Oro champs Hong Sangsoo (Right Now, Wrong Then – 2015) and Wang Bing (Mrs. Fang – 2017) will be measuring up against a large swath of Euro films in the prestigious competition section at Locarno next month. Hong Sangsoo reteams with his usual players for By the Stream, while Wang Bing continues with docu film series that begin in Cannes with Youth (Spring) (2023) and continues with Youth (Hards Times). Among the items we have been tracking for a while now that were lassoed for the Concorso Internazionale section we find Virgil Vernier returning to the fest with Cent Mille Milliards (formerly known as Century Island, 100,000 Light-Years) – a project that was filmed in Monaco with Zakaria Bouti, Victoire Kong, Mina Gajovic. Ramon Zürcher has sole directing credit on a project that closes out the Bern trilogy in the highly anticipated Der Spatz im Kamin – which stars Maren Eggert, Britta Hammelstein, Luise Heyer, Andreas Döhler and Lea Zoe Voss. His borther Silvan is the producer on the project.
From other German-speaking nations we find Kurdwin Ayub‘s highly anticipated third feature film Mond – which tells the story of Sarah, a former professional kickboxer from Vienna, accepts an offer to work as a personal trainer for three daughters of a wealthy family in the Middle East. She lands in a strange world, in a palace behind walls and without internet, where the sisters are monitored 24/7. Featuring Sophie Verbeeck, Louis-Do de Lencquesaing, Marc Limpach, Mourade Zeguendi and Hilde Van Mieghem, Christoph Hochhäusler‘s La mort viendra makes it consecutive output years for the filmmaker – Till the End of the Night won at the Berlinale in 2023. Also a favorite in Berlin, Pia Marais will premiere Transamazonia – revolves around Rebecca, who’s the daughter of missionary Lawrence Byrne and who was declared “a miracle” after surviving an aeroplane crash in the depths of the Amazon rainforest when she was a child. Helena Zengel (of System Crasher fame) toplines. Here are the seventeen world premiere official selections vying for the top prize:
Agora – Dir. Ala Eddine Slim
Tunisia, France, Saudi Arabia, Qatar
Toxic (“Akiplesa”) – Dir. Saulė Bliuvaitė
Lithuania
Bogancloch – Dir. Ben Rivers
United Kingdom, Germany, Iceland
Cent Mille Milliards – Dir. Virgil Vernier
France
The Sparrow in the Chimney (“Der Spatz im Kamin”) – Dir. Ramon Zürcher
Switzerland
Fire of Wind (“Fogo do vento”) – Dir. Marta Mateus
Portugal, Switzerland, France
Green Line – Dir. Sylvie Ballyot
France, Lebanon, Qatar
Death Will Come (“La Mort Viendra”) – Dir. Christoph Hochhäusler
Germany, Luxembourg, Belgium
Luce – Dir. Silvia Luzi, Luca Bellino
Italy
Mond – Dir. Kurdwin Ayub
Austria
Youth (Hard Times) (“Qing Chun (Ku)”) – Dir. Wang Bing
France, Luxembourg, Netherlands
By the Stream (“Suyoocheon”) – Dir. Hong Sang-soo
South Korea
Mothers Don’t (“Salve Maria”) – Dir. Mar Coll
Spain
Drowning Dry (“Seses”) – Dir. Laurynas Bareiša
Lithuania, Latvia
Sulla Terra Leggeri – Dir. Sara Fgaier
Italy
Transamazonia – Dir. Pia Marais
France, Germany, Switzerland, Taiwan, Brazil
New Dawn Fades (Yeni Safak Solarken”) – Dir. Gürcan Keltek
Turkey, Italy, Germany, Norway, Netherlands
