Locarno Film Festival Awards: ‘Critical Zone,’ the Film the Iranian Government Doesn’t Want to Be Seen, Wins Big at Swiss Fest

Ali Asgari, whose latest film “Terrestrial Verses” (co-directed by Alireza Khatami) world premiered at the Cannes Film Festival, has been banned by the Iranian authorities from leaving the country and directing movies until further notice. The sole Iranian movie to play in Cannes Official Selection this year, “Terrestrial Verses” earned a warm critical response at the festival, where it played in Un Certain Regard, and was sold by Films Boutique around the world.

Elsa Keslassy International Correspondent New York-based sales company Visit Films has boarded “Achilles,” the Iran-set feature debut of Farhad Delaram, a promising filmmaker whose short “Tattoo” won the Crystal Bear in the Generation 14plus at Berlin in 2019. “Achilles” is set to world premiere at the Toronto Film Festival, followed by a European premiere at San Sebastian. The film follows Farid –nicknamed Achilles– a former filmmaker turned orthotic doctor, who works nights in Iran’s capital.

Nick Vivarelli International Correspondent The upcoming Venice Film Festival has announced it will hold a flash mob on the red carpet in solidarity with the women and men of Iran “who are fighting for their freedom and against the ongoing repression” and also “the filmmakers and artists who have been arrested or imprisoned,” the fest said in a statement on Friday. Festival organizers specified that the flash mob is partly in reaction to the conviction earlier this month in Iran of director Saeed Roustaee (pictured), who was sentenced to six months in prison for showing his latest film “Leila’s Brothers” at last year’s Cannes Film Festival and banned from making movies. Roustaee had been in the Venice Horizons section in 2019 with the film “Just 6.5.” Venice also held a red carpet flash mob last year in solidarity with then incarcerated auteur Jafar Panahi.

Naman Ramachandran The European premiere of Kristoffer Borgli‘s satire “Dream Scenario,” starring Nicolas Cage, will open the 19th Zurich Film Festival (Sept. 28-Oct. 8).

Ahead of its world premiere in competition at the 80th Venice Film Festival, Sofia Coppola’s Priscilla, which follows the Presleys from the perspective of the King’s young bride, has secured a SAG-AFTRA Interim Agreement.

The UK spends a lower percentage of its GDP on financial support for disabled people and sick workers than any other country in north-west Europe, the SNP has claimed.

CMU’s sister media ThreeWeeks is currently covering the Edinburgh Festival, the world’s biggest cultural event, which takes over the Scottish capital for three weeks with a packed programme of comedy, theatre, music, musicals, dance, cabaret, spoken word and a whole lot more.Here in the CMU Daily we are picking out some of the highlights of this year’s coverage.

Spain has emerged victorious!

An Iranian filmmaker and his producer reportedly face prison time and being barred from filmmaking after they showcased a movie at the Cannes Film Festival without government approval, drawing immediate criticism internationally from leading American director Martin Scorsese and others.

Saeed Roustayi and Javad Noruzbegi, the director-producer duo behind family drama Leila’s Brothers, will see jail time in Iran after premiering the film at last year’s Cannes Film Festival without government approval, according to local media reports.

Elsa Keslassy International Correspondent Iranian director Saeed Roustaee has been sentenced to six months to prison for showing his latest film, “Leila’s Brothers,” at last year’s Cannes Film Festival, according to an Iranian report. The Islamic Revolutionary Court convicted both Roustaee and Javad Noruzbegi for “contributing to the propaganda of the opposition against the Islamic system,” according to the Iranian daily Etemad.

Katharina Huber’s “A Good Place” (“Ein schöner Ort”) which won on Saturday Locarno’s best emerging director award and best performance (Clara Schwinning) in the Swiss fest’s Filmmakers of the Present, a remote and untimely village sets the scene for an imminent apocalypse but also for an otherworldly fairytale. Or are these two one and the same? Huber’s first feature opens with an image of a forest fire, foreshadowing the dystopian tone of an elusive audiovisual journey where emotions prevail over rational explanations. Set to the rhythm of a countdown, this chaptered story sees Margarita (Céline De Gennaro) and Güte (Schwinning) – two women with contrasting personalities, juggle mundane tasks of daily life with disruptive acts of sabotage.

Iranian filmmaker Ali Ahmadzadeh clinched the Golden Leopard in the main international competition of the 76th Locarno Film Festival with his latest feature Critical Zone (Mantagheye Bohrani).

Arthouse Crunch Over the last decade, theatrical arthouse markets have imploded soufflé-like. “We used to make 5,000 admissions per title, now the target audience is 500,” Peter Bognar, at Hungary’s CinefilCo, told Variety at Locarno. So, to close the gap and move hopefully into a little upside, having tapped subsidies and local TV pre-buys, producers are looking ever more to overseas public-sector coin, channelled via international co-producer partners.

Edinburgh International Film Festival (EIFF) head Kate Taylor has put together what she describes as an “eclectic and lively” mix of titles for her first year at the helm. 

Marta Balaga You can approach old classics just like new films, argued participants during Locarno’s Heritage Monday panel. “I talked to an exhibitor in Paris and they don’t consider repertory cinema to be different from contemporary cinema. They are collapsing both models into one and it’s very interesting,” said K.J.

Robbie Williams and Ayda Field look to be just as in love as ever as they shared an adorable clip celebrating 13 years of marriage.The couple danced to Harry Connick Jr’s song It Had To Be You while they enjoyed a hike in the mountains. Lush green hills can be seen behind the pair as they swayed along to the music.

Climate change activists briefly halted the Locarno Film Festival’s honorary awards ceremony for environmentalist and documentarian Luc Jacquet on Monday evening.Jacquet, who won the Best Documentary Oscar in 2006 for The March Of The Penguins, was being feted with the Locarno Kids Award, followed by a screening of his new film Magnetic Continent in front of a 7,000-strong crowd on the festival’s landmark Piazza Grande.

John Bleasdale Guest Contributor “The Vanishing Soldier” is a coming of age story, as breathless as its protagonist: the kind of film that will make cinephiles of seventeen-year-olds. Which is one of the reasons that Dani Rosenberg, the film’s 43-year-old director, is delighted to be in Locarno, where the film, sold by Intramovies, is screening in main competition, and has just got a trailer, and poster, shared in exclusivity with Variety. “We had options for other festivals,” Rosenberg told Variety at the Swiss fest.

Marta Balaga It was a good day for female filmmakers – and documentaries – at Locarno Pro, with “Mother Vera” by Cécile Embleton and Alys Tomlinson winning the Creativity Media First Look Award on Sunday at Locarno’s pix-in-post competition, dedicated this year to the U.K. Dedicated to a young Orthodox nun, “Mother Vera” shows her turbulent past and fragile future as she faces inner conflict after 20 years as a monastic.