A celebration of the power of imagination and the transformative force of cinema, the films presented at the 11th edition of the Bucharest International Experimental Film Festival (BIEFF) continue to surprise with their formal inventiveness that tests the limits of the conventional, while inviting reflection on nature and human existence. Two of the most appreciated feature films presented this year at Cannes, as well as a selection of short films recently awarded by major European festivals, included in the Golden Shorts program, will be seen for the first time on the big screen in Romania, between November 17-21, at Cinema Elvire Popesco, Eforie Cinematheque and the National Museum of Art of Romania (Auditorium Hall).
Subscriptions and access tickets to the BIEFF 2021 screenings are available online on the Eventbook platform.
Combining fiction with dreams, memories, fantasies and personal anxieties, A Night of Knowing Nothing traces the contours of an impossible love story, set against the backdrop of student protest movements in India today. “A vivid portrait of revolt and oppression, love and pain and philosophical thinking threatened by the nationalist agenda” (IndieWire), the debut of director Payal Kapadia, was awarded the L’Oeil d’or Award for best documentary at the 2021 edition of the Cannes Film Festival, and in Bucharest it will be seen for the national premiere on Thursday, November 18, at 19:00, at the Eforie Cinematheque.
Also from Cannes, from the independent section Quinzaine des Réalisateurs, arrives on the big screen BIEFF The Tsugua Diaries, one of the most comforting cinematographic works made in the pandemic era. Filmed on 16mm film on the sun-drenched background of Sintra, this playful cinematic experiment signed by Maureen Fazendeiro and Miguel Gomes is constructed as a reverse journal (as the title suggests) of the daily events of three self-isolated friends, during the month of August on a spacious farm.
The film will be screened on Friday, November 19, at 19:00, at Eforie Cinematheque, and on Sunday, the last day of the festival, at 16:30, at Cinema Elvire Popesco. Both feature films are screened in Bucharest in partnership with the independent section Quinzaine des réalisateurs.
Golden Shorts: Best Films in Major Festivals
A selection of five golden short films that celebrate the thematic and stylistic variety of contemporary cinema and the formal inventiveness of the new generation of filmmakers, the Golden Shorts program brings together this year’s outstanding productions awarded in 2021 at Berlinale, Oberhausen, Rotterdam, Locarno and Venice. The films presented in partnership with the biggest cinematographic events of the world will be able to be watched at the 11th edition of BIEFF on Sunday, November 21, at 18:30, at the National Museum of Art of Romania, in the Auditorium Hall .
In Transparent I Am, Japanese filmmaker and poet Yuri Muraoka examines the nature of her own mental illness, filtering the global pandemic situation. The film, in which the artist shares some of the darkest and most intimate thoughts she experiences, combining innovative cinematic techniques, was awarded this year with the Grand Prize of the Oberhausen International Short Film Festival. The documentary Nanu Tudor, winner of the Golden Bear for Best Short Film at the Berlinale, also talks about a traumatic personal experience. After 20 years of silence, the filmmaker Olga Lucovnicova returns to the places where she spent the first years of her life to face her uncle who abused her as a child. Extremely brave and truly remarkable, her film outlines a mirror of the sick society in which the aggressors escape unpunished.
“I would love for people to become more aware of the places where they live, looking a little more closely at the historical course of things that made it possible for them to stay in those places,” said Fox Maxy, director of Maat Means Land, awarded the Ammodo Tiger Short at the Rotterdam International Film Festival. In The Bones, the animated short film awarded in the Orizzonti section at the Venice International Film Festival, Chilean artists Cristobal León and Joaquín Cociña reimagine the creative process behind the first stop-motion animation in history – a ritual set up by a girl who seems to use human remains. A complex cine-sensory experience, The Creature accompanies us on a journey to “what hurts”, putting us face to face with this creature from the depths of our minds that is pain. The film by director Maria Silvia Esteve was awarded this year with the Golden Leopard for the best author’s short film at the Locarno International Film Festival.