07/07/2015 - The independent section of the Venice Film Festival is celebrating its 30th anniversary by rescreening the debut film by the Scottish director, Orphans, as the opening title

Having reached its 30th anniversary edition, the International Critics’ Week, an independent section of the Venice Film Festival (2-12 September 2015), will celebrate this year with a guest of honour, actor and director Peter Mullan, and the screening of his feature debut, Orphans, as the inaugural event. The Scottish filmmaker (who won the Palme d’Or for My Name Is Joe by Ken Loach and the Golden Lion for Magdalene) will receive the SIC 30 Special Award – as the Best Feature Debut in the History of the Critics’ Week, as voted for by the members of the National Union of Italian Film Critics.

Mullan presented Orphans at the Critics’ Week in 1998, when he astonished both audiences and the critics with this cruel family chronicle in which four adult brothers who are anything but close-knit are brought back together in Glasgow to mourn the loss of their mother. Now, more than 15 years since it was released, Orphans will be shown in Venice once again, on Thursday 3 September. The director will be on the Lido to accompany the movie and meet members of the public and the press.

“We are proud to celebrate a truly special anniversary for the International Critics’ Week with Peter Mullan and his magnificent debut film, Orphans,” declared Francesco Di Pace, General Delegate of the Week. “Thirty years of hard work, passion and real pleasures, during which our section has been a godfather to auteurs who have then gone on to establish themselves on the international stage.” 

Featuring among the five most highly voted films by the critics, besides the winner Orphans, are Disorder by Olivier Assayas (1986), Crane World by Pablo Trapero (1999), Blame It on Voltaire by Abdellatif Kechiche (2000) and The Girl by the Lake [+see also:
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(Translated from Italian)