The Locarno Academy Confronts the Future of Criticism

Brazilian filmmaker Julia Murat clinched the Golden Leopard prize in the main international competition of the 75th Locarno Film Festival with her latest feature Rule 34.

Guy Lodge Film Critic“Rule 34,” a challenging and sexually explicit film from Brazilian director Julia Murat, has emerged as the surprise winner of the Golden Leopard award at this year’s Locarno Film Festival — an edition where typically audacious and formally ambitious work dominated the program.

John Hopewell Chief International CorrespondentFollowing a vibrant 2022 edition in a three-year cycle dedicated to Latin America and the Caribbean which she oversaw in an interim capacity, Zsuzsi Bánkuti has been appointed the new head of Locarno’s Open Doors. She replaces long-time Open Doors chief Sophie Bourdon, who stepped down earlier this year. The key to this year’s Open Doors was its inspired choice of a focus on smaller territories in Latin America which are often home to first-class directors – one director this year, Dominican Yanillys Pérez scooped a Discovery Award at the Toronto Festival with her doc-feature “Jeffrey,” for example – but, apart from the Dominican Republic and Costa Rica, lack robust state subsidy systems enabling producers to produce movies easily out of their own countries.  The obvious solution is international co-production.

Welcome back to another edition of International Insider. This week, you’ve got me, Jesse Whittock, taking you through the big stories from beyond the U.S. shores.

EXCLUSIVE: UK-French film company Alief has secured international sales rights to Australian filmmaker Alena Lodkina’s second feature Petrol, following its buzzy world premiere in Locarno’s Filmmakers Of The Present competition.

Latest DealsA score or more of new deals announced since Sunday in exclusivity to Variety:*Germany’s Pluto Film has been in negotiations with several theatrical distributors on Locarno Piazza Grande title “Semret,” ahead of its world premiere on Aug. 10.

John Hopewell Chief International CorrespondentTo the exuberant tones of Christophe’s “Aline,” lamenting the loss of his love, two shirtless men rejoice orgiastically as water tumbling down a rock face drenching their bodies. Meanwhile, at a country house, maids and a gardener, dressed in period costume, proudly pour what looks like a mixture of water and milk onto plants.The scenes, it seems, are from a libertine costume drama, being shot in the wooded French countryside. Then suddenly Valentin, the director, disappears.

Holly Jones Paris-based sales company Alief has swooped on international sales rights to horror-political thriller “Matadero” (“Slaughterhouse”), the awaited fiction feature debut of Argentina’s Santiago Fillol, co-scribe on Oliver Laxe’s Cannes winners “Mimosa” and “Fire Will Come.”Co-written by Fillol, “Matadero” world premieres this week in Locarno’s main International Competition.The film takes a stark look at a historic tale through the maniacal lens of U.S. filmmaker Jared (Julio Perillán), as he shoots a big-screen version of a 19th-century text by Argentine writer Estaban Echeverría, exploiting the times and their trappings to create a piece of cinema meant to dig itself into the collective consciousness.

Leo Barraclough International Features EditorIn the mesmerizing and strangely beautiful documentary “Matter Out of Place,” which world premieres in International Competition at the Locarno Film Festival on Wednesday, Austrian director Nikolaus Geyrhalter looks at how we dispose of our trash. But, taking a broader view, he is trying to gain a better understanding of mankind, and the impact it is having on the planet, he tells Variety.The locations for the film are wide ranging: it moves from the mountains of Switzerland to the coasts of Greece and Albania, to an Austrian refuse incinerator, and then to Nepal and the Maldives, and finally to the deserts of Nevada for the Burning Man event.When choosing locations, sound was as much of a consideration as the images.

John Hopewell Chief International CorrespondentInspired by director Marcel Beltrán’s walking on a dry, polluted lake in his hometown, Moa, in Cuba, “Moa” won the biggest prize on offer at this year’s Open Doors, a Locarno Fest co-production and talent hub dedicated, in an inspired choice, to smaller territories in Latin American and countries in the Caribbean. The focus lasts three-years, over 2022-24.The territories boast world class filmmakers with urgent stories to tell.

JD Linville Zurich native Caterina Mona will bring her directorial debut “Semret” to the 75th Locarno Film Festival where it screens at the city’s Piazza Grande, an outdoor venue traditionally reserved for more popular plays. The film, which is being sold by German sales outfit Pluto Film, follows the difficult path to healing for the titular character of Semret: a reclusive immigrant mother from Eritrea, now living and working in Zurich.

EXCLUSIVE: Paris-based company Indie Sales has sold Angry Annie, French director Blandine Lenoir’s latest feature, to a host of key territories ahead of the film’s world premiere at the Locarno Film Festival on Thursday.

Nick Vivarelli International CorrespondentAmazon Prime Video’s Italian original series “Prisma,” which launches on Aug. 10 from the Locarno Film Festival, sees the streamer revisit the theme of gender identity fluidity after “Transparent” while catering to a young adult audience and also connecting with Italy’s neorealist roots.The eight-episode show (watch exclusive clip) – which marks the first TV series to premiere at the prominent Swiss fest dedicated to indie cinema – is centered around identical adolescent twins Marco and Andrea, who challenge gender norms in different ways, along with their group of friends who are also going through a similar journey.“Prisma” is set in the city of Latina, just south of Rome, and its surrounding area, which used to be a swamp until the land was drained under Fascist rule.

Lukas Nathrath’s One Last Evening Wins Locarno Pro’s First Look Prize

John Hopewell Chief International CorrespondentLukas Nathrath’s “One Last Evening,” an often excruciating tragedy-laced dramedy set around a couple’s farewell dinner for friends, won big at Locarno’s First Look on Sunday, scooping the Cinegrell First Look Award.The award consists in €50,000 ($51,000) in post-production services from Cinegrell, a Switzerland and Germany based services house.The biggest prize at this year’s Locarno Pro First Look, a pix-in-post showcase dedicated six new movies from Germany, went to a first feature which delivers a scathing portrait of a success-obsessed society whose members mostly don’t live up to their promise, especially in their own estimation. Sebastian Jakob Doppelbauer plays Clemens, a once budding singer-songwriter but now pitied depressive whose girlfriend is now shaping up as the partner with a future as an on-the-rise doctor. Clemens in contrast doesn’t do shit.  Starting off afresh, moving from Hanover to Berlin, the couple stage a farewell dinner that spirals out of control, uncovering hidden fears, secret longings and life-lies.After the pandemic, our feeling was ‘Let’s shoot something this summer,’” Nasrath told Variety. Nasrath, Doppelbauer and fellow producer Linus Günther at Klinkerfilm reached out to film funds, to no avail, but weren’t too unhappy about making the film on a shoestring since that way “no one would interfere,” they said after Sunday night’s awards ceremony. “We were hugely impressed by ‘One Last Evening,’ finding its storytelling rich and nuanced. The film took us on a real emotional journey and the strong ensemble cast contributed to wonderfully detailed characterisations,” said the First Look jury.

Marta Balaga Tom Hardiman’s feature debut “Medusa Deluxe,” which premiered at Locarno on Saturday, has already seduced multiple international distributors with its mixture of humor, grief and competitive hairdressing.Now Warsaw-based New Europe Film Sales has sealed further deals for the unusual murder mystery in Spain (Elastica Films), Benelux (Filmfreak), Scandinavia and the Baltics (NonStop Entertainment), Variety has learnt in exclusivity.As previously reported, A24 has acquired North American rights to the film, produced by Emu Films with the support of BFI, BBC Films, and Time Based Arts.MUBI holds the rights to U.K./Ireland, France, Latin America, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Italy, Turkey, India and Southeast Asia. “The buyers are excited about ‘Medusa Deluxe’ because it’s a quirky, original piece of cinema which can appeal to younger audiences, especially since A24 and MUBI will lead the way on global marketing,” said New Europe Film Sales CEO, Jan Naszewski.Hardiman, a self-confessed hairdressing aficionado, has joined forces with celebrity hairstylist Eugene Souleiman in order to show a community struggling with tragic loss yet still striving for perfection.“There is this cathartic moment at one point, two people genuinely caring about each other, and you have this hairstyle with a boat on the top.

Nick Vivarelli International Correspondent10 Swiss film festivals with international standing are joining forces on a symbolically significant screening series to be held in Locarno’s PalaCinema multipurpose venue which is also known as the Swiss lakeside town’s house of cinema.The innovative initiative – which is being launched with a press conference on Saturday at the Locarno Film Festival – is the brainchild of Nadia Dresti, the Locarno fest’s grand dame, who recently joined the PalaCinema board.The PalaCinema (pictured) houses the Locarno film festival offices, its film academy, the CISA film school, the Ticino Film Commission, Swiss pubcaster RSI, as well as several commercial cinemas and other screening venues.

Daisy Edgar-Jones adds some chic fringe to her look while being honored at the 2022 Locarno Film Festival on Friday (August 5) in Locarno, Switzerland.

Marta Balaga It was all about Aaron Taylor-Johnson at Locarno’s opening ceremony, as the actor received the 2022 Excellence Award Davide Campari and introduced “Bullet Train.”“Sometimes, people ask me what I do. I say: ‘I am a dad and I do acting on the side, part time,” he told the crowd gathered at Piazza Grande before the screening.“Recently though, I have been feeling a subtle shift.

Marta Balaga Tom Hardiman becomes a director to track with “Medusa Deluxe,” a deliciously dark murder mystery set in the competitive hairdressing competition which is about to bow at Locarno.MUBI holds the rights to U.K./Ireland, France,Latin America, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Italy, Turkey, India and Southeast Asia. The film was developed and financed by the BFI and BBC Film.“I really care about hairdressing, it’s something I am really passionate about,” admits Hardiman, who “picked up their language” over time.“When they talk about Russian weaves [in the film], that came from a hairdresser in Peckham.