The Four Times wins over audience at Wrocław
After a Tiger at Rotterdam earlier this year and the Trophy at Transylvania Mundane Story has impressed once again, with the title by Thai helmer Anocha Suwichakornpong picking up the top award at Wrocław’s 10th Era New Horizons International Film Festival, which drew to a close last night. More than a simple tale of a relationship between a nurse and a disabled person, Mundane Story also portrays the contemporary social and political reality in Thailand.
The first FIPRESCI prize to be awarded in the history of the Wrocław Festival went to Russia’s Nikolay and Yelena Renard for their directorial debut Mama. The film is an intimate portrait of the sad and silent daily life of a mother and her overweight adult son living in a cramped, modest flat.
The title to win over the audience’s heart however was The Four Times, an Italian/German/Swiss co-production directed by Michelangelo Frammartino triumphing in the Best Film category. Like Mama, it is minimalist in terms of narration yet teeming with emotion and thought and may best be described as a sort of philosophical mediation between man and nature, the frailty of life and the cruelty of death (for more, see our Film Focus).
The jury of the international competition reserved for films on art rewarded two productions at the festival. Its first prize went to We Don’t Care about Music Anyway by French helmers Cédric Dupire and Gaspard Kuentz for their documentary on the independent music scene in Japan, while Sophie Fiennes received a special mention for the English/French/Dutch co-production Over Your Cities Grass Will Grow, a portrait of German artist Anselm Kiefer and his life work.
Among the Polish films competing in the New Polish Cinema category, the jury awarded the President of the City of Wrocław Prize to Przemysław Wojcieszek’s Made in Poland, adapted from a play about a rebellious teenager. Meanwhile, Ewa, jointly directed by Adam Sikora and Ingmar Villquist (see news), walked away with second prize from the President of the Lower Silesia region.
(Translated from French)
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