9 European and 4 world stories will be presented out of competition.
A significant part of the Krakow Film Festival programme is devoted to the thematic non-competition section. Among the ten categories prepared for this year, two: Somewhere in Europe and World Stories, have a common denominator – their geographical etymology.
‘A festival cannot live on competitions alone,’ says Krzysztof Gierat, the director of Krakow Film Festival. ‘The thematic sections perfectly complement the official part of the programme. A freer, non-competition form permitted us to create interesting combinations around the chosen themes or central motives.’
From the nine titles presented in Somewhere in Europe, to the foreground come films whose subject-matter oscillates around the problems of the contemporary world: Islanders accustomed to prosperity suddenly have to face the economic crisis („Iceland, Year Zero”); the only source of income of a Belorussian village is an illegal sale of plush toys to passengers of the passing trains („Igrushki”); in the East of Poland the planned extraction of shale gas causes violent reactions among the local people („Drill Baby, Drill!”); whereas in Ukraine people try to draw conclusions from a lesson titled “Euro 2012” („Demonstration Lesson”).
The second evident path are intimate stories about human life: based on a similar idea as Tomasz Wolski’s “The Lucky Ones”, a documentary about the Belfast register office, where both happy and dramatic moments take place; a story of the first woman rabbi („Regina – The Story of the World’s First Female Rabbi”); a documentary based on a 16-year observation of the protagonist, a Romani musician and journalist, directed by last year’s Dragon of Dragons award recipient, Helena Třeštíkova („Vojta Lavička: Ups and Downs”) as well as a short story about a Ukrainian scrap metal collector who “has everything” („Junk”).
The section is concluded by an energetic music film standing out among the above mentioned. The picture talks about a French percussion band playing spectacular industrial music and celebrating the 25th anniversary of their activity („A Barrel of Laughs, 25 Years of Tambours Du Bronx”).
Moving away from Europe, the Word Stories section will take us to places more exotic but suffering from similar problems. In the borderland between India and Bangladesh, children undertake the dangerous work of smugglers to support their families („Char… The No-Man’s Island”); in Nepal, young boys choose the military path to escape poverty („Who Will Be a Gurkha?”).
The “intimate” side of the Word Stories section is represented by the Mexican „Parts of a Family”, in which a son scrutinizes his parents’ long-standing marriage. „Israel: Home Movie” seems to be a combination of both trends – intimate and social; it’s a personal film created by joining the family archives with childhood memories as well as an attempt to deal with Holocaust and the struggle for the independence of the Promised Land.
Films from the Somewhere in Europe and World Stories sections will be presented in Krakow cinemas: Agrafka and Kino Pod Baranami from 27th May to 1st June.
Kategoria: News.