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TRIESTE 2017

“War films” from Central and Eastern Europe return to Trieste

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- European conflicts are among the themes tackled by the documentaries and films in competition at the 28th edition of the Trieste Film Festival, which will be held from 20-29 January

“War films” from Central and Eastern Europe return to Trieste
Amerika Square by Yannis Sakaridis

The Trieste Film Festival, which has this year reached its 28th edition, will take place from 20-29 January: the film granted the honour of opening this, the most important Italian rendezvous with Central and Eastern European film, is The Teacher [+see also:
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interview: Jan Hřebejk
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by Jan Hřebejk, which won an award at the Karlovy Vary Film Festival for Zuzana Mauréry's performance, and is out now in Italian theatres, distributed by Satine Film. The closing film will be On the Milky Road [+see also:
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by Emir Kusturica, starring the director himself, alongside Monica Bellucci (in competition at Venice).

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Ten movies, all having their Italian premieres, will take part in the international feature competition at the event directed by Fabrizio Grosoli and Nicoletta Romeo. Two of the productions hail from the former Yugoslavia: A Good Wife [+see also:
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, the directorial debut by Serbian actress Mirjana Karanović, and On the Other Side [+see also:
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interview: Tihana Lazovic
interview: Zrinko Ogresta
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by Croatia's Zrinko Ogresta, which will go on general release in Italy courtesy of Cineclub Internazionale Distribuzione. Greek title Amerika Square [+see also:
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interview: Yannis Sakaridis
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by Yannis Sakaridis and Romania's By the Rails [+see also:
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interview: Cătălin Mitulescu
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by Cătălin Mitulescu both focus on the topic of emigration. The Hungarian film It’s Not the Time of My Life [+see also:
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interview: Szabolcs Hajdu
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, starring and directed by Szabolcs Hajdu and made with a crew of students from the University of Budapest, received the Crystal Globe for Best Film and the Best Actor Award at Karlovy Vary. Another movie, Slovenia's Nightlife [+see also:
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interview: Damjan Kozole
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by Damjan Kozole, snagged the Best Director Award at the same festival.

Bulgaria is present with Glory [+see also:
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interview: Petar Valchanov
interview: Petar Valchanov, Kristina G…
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by Kristina Grozeva and Petar Valchanov, the brains behind international hit The Lesson [+see also:
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interview: Kristina Grozeva, Petar Val…
interview: Margita Gosheva
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. Their new film will hit Italian screens in April this year, distributed by I Wonder Pictures. The Czech Republic takes a look back at its own ordeals from the past in I, Olga Hepnarová [+see also:
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interview: Tomáš Weinreb, Petr Kazda
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by Tomáš Weinreb and Petr Kazda, while an episode of brutal teenage violence lies at the heart of the Polish film Playground [+see also:
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interview: Bartosz M. Kowalski
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by Bartosz M Kowalski. Lastly, Italy and Austria join forces on the co-production Mister Universo [+see also:
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by Tizza Covi and Rainer Frimmel (the people behind La Pivellina [+see also:
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), which is set to grace national screens, courtesy of Tycoon Distribuzione.

Besides The Teacher and On the Milky Road, five additional features screening out of competition have been selected as Special Events, including a posthumous tribute to Andrzej Wajda, with his Afterimage [+see also:
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interview: Zofia Wichlacz
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, and Sweet Dreams [+see also:
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Q&A: Marco Bellocchio
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by Marco Bellocchio (who will take part in a meeting with the audience on 28 January), which the National Union of Italian Film Critics branded as “the best Italian film of the year”.

The international documentary competition has 11 titles on offer, all of which are having their Italian premieres. “European conflicts run through so many films from countries that have very little in common with one another,” remarked festival director Nicoletta Romeo – she is referring to films like My Own Private War by Lidija Zelović, who was born in Sarajevo and fled to the Netherlands in 1993. And then we have the Ukrainian theatre of war depicted by Peter Entell in Like Dew in the Sun [+see also:
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. In Controindicazione, Tamara von Steiner, a Serbian filmmaker who has been living in Sicily for years, portrays the forensic psychiatric hospital in Barcellona Pozzo di Gotto, while Aleksandr Kuznecov whisks us away to a neuropsychiatric unit in Siberia in We'll Be Alright [+see also:
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. A diametrically opposite approach to the topic of mental disorders is taken by Czech director Miroslav Janek in his Normal Autistic Film [+see also:
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. Other films invited to the gathering include Polish title Communion [+see also:
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by Anna Zamecka, Bulgaria's The Good Postman [+see also:
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by Tonislav Hristov, Lithuania's Woman and the Glacier [+see also:
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by Audrius Stonys (about climate change) and Houston, We Have a Problem! [+see also:
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interview: Žiga Virc
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by Žiga Virc. Joseph Goebbels' secretary is the main focus of A German Life by Christian Krönes, Olaf S Müller, Roland Schrotthofer and Florian Weigensamer, which comes out in Italian theatres on 27 January via Wanted Cinema, while the Romany and Sinti victims of Nazism are the main subject matter of A Hole in the Head [+see also:
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interview: Robert Kirchhoff
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by Robert Kirchhoff.

There are three documentaries showing out of competition: Trieste, Yugoslavia by Alessio Bozzer, Beyond Boundaries by Austria's Peter Zach and the Polish movie All These Sleepless Nights [+see also:
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by Michał Marczak, which won the Best Director Award at Sundance last year and is due to be released in Italy by I Wonder Pictures in May 2017.

Last of all, the event has a Focus on the Baltic states up its sleeve, while the in-depth analysis of “New Romanian Cinema” continues for the second year running with a master class led by Cristi Puiu and the screening of Sieranevada [+see also:
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Q&A: Cristi Puiu
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, which was selected at Cannes 2016 and will soon be making its way to Italian theatres, distributed by Parthénos.

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(Translated from Italian)

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