Fighting off the selection committees for Venice, Toronto and San Sebastian, artistic director Giona A. Nazzaro unveiled the line-up for the 79th edition of Locarno Film Festival — which opens with Gagarine tandem Fanny Liatard and Jérémy Trouilh’s magical realist drama Les Yeux Verts which stars Anamaria Vartolomei and Sayyid El Alami (Block Pass).
Among the seventeen films selected to compete for the Golden Leopard, after premiering A Traveler’s Needs at the Berlinale the always prolific Hong Sang-soo returns to Switzerland with Nowhere to Lay My Eyes which stars Kim Minhee, Choi Myeonggil, Kwon Haehyo, Shin Seokho and Park Miso. Portuguese filmmaker Basil Da Cunha who gave us 2019’s O Fim do Mundo (watch our interview) returns to Locarno with O Jacaré – a drama that deals with the aftermath of a robbery. Vietnamese filmmaker Lê Bảo who was triumphant at the Berlinale with 2022’s Taste (read review) put together Hearing about a mechanic measuring sound. After showcasing her breakout feature debut at the fest, Piaffe (read review) director Ann Oren returns with the highly anticipated fetish friendly Objet A (read our profile) with Georg Friedrich toplining. Romanian filmmaker Florin Șerban of 2011’s If I Want to Whistle, I Whistle fame (read review) will present You Don’t Belong Here about a complicated father and a son relationship. Canadian filmmaker Denis Côté once again profiles the talents of actress Larissa Corriveau – with Nobody’s Violence we follow Mira, who keeps meeting people with whom she forges death pacts. The Wolf House and more recently The Hyperboreans (read review) tandem of Cristóbal León and Joaquín Cociña gift us the fairy-tale kingdom where love has been forbidden stop animated film Donkey Princess. Here are the selected titles for all three major sections:
International Competition
Brave New Love — Maria Bäck
D’ici Là — Sarah Leonor
Donkey Princess — Cristóbal León, Joaquín Cociña
Far From the Trees — Meritxell Colell Aparicio
Hearing — Lê Bảo
The House on the Moon — Nelson Yeo
I Rarely Wake Up Dreaming — Isabelle Stever
Ketticè — Giovanni Tortorici
Manhunt — Wayne Wapeemukwa
Nobody’s Violence — Denis Côté (see still below)
Nowhere to Lay My Eyes — Hong Sang-soo
Objet A — Ann Oren
O Jacaré — Basil Da Cunha
Rehmat — Gurvinder Singh
The Riverbank — Matheus Farias, Enock Carvalho
Wandering Trees — Salvatore Mereu
You Don’t Belong Here — Florin Șerban
Piazza Grande
All About Corinne — Marc Fitoussi
Armony — Dario Albertini
The Chilean — Sergio Castro-San Martín
Congo Boy — Rafiki Fariala
Dances With Wolves — Kevin Costner
Down The Arm of God — Peter Brunner
Frank & Louis — Petra Volpe
The Green Eyes — Fanny Liatard, Jérémy Trouilh
I Is Another — Felix Randau
The Invite — Olivia Wilde
Love Lessons — Martin Provost
Paper Tiger — James Gray
Taxi Driver — Martin Scorsese
Wild at Heart — David Lynch
Concorso Cineasti del Presente (Filmmakers of the Present)
At Night — Beatrice Gibson
The Days Off — Lucila Mariani
Demons — Natalka Vorozhbyt
Destroy All Girls — Erin Vassilopoulos
Ego Reach We All (Our Time Will Come) — Amartei Armar
Fire Flower — Ana Vaz
The Illusion of an Everlasting Summer — Alessandra Sanguinetti
In All My Journeys I Am Returning — Manuel Ponce De León
Magic Atlas — Sun Xun
Revolutionaries Never Die — Mohanad Yaqubi
September Afternoon — Nicolaas Schmidt
Small Talk — Mateo Ybarra
Summer Meadow — Naël Khleifi
Tear Gas — Uta Beria
Tomorrow A Long Time Ago — Luise Donschen