FRED Film Radio - English Channel

PODCAST | Chiara Nicoletti interviews Annemarie Jacir, director of the film Wajib.

After Locarno Film Festival, Annemarie Jacir is back on FRED on the occasion of the italian release of her latest film Wajib with actors and father and son in real life, Mohammad Bakri e Saleh Bakri. As it depicts a father-son relationship in the background of Palestinian society in Nazareth, the film shows the contradictions and differences in the way younger generations and older ones deal with the political problems of their country. In a more universal way, as it also shows the conflicting and typical father-son dynamics the film leaves us with many questions and no solutions. Annemarie Jacir talks about deciding to portray her country through these two men’s point of view and the importance of making films like Wajib nowadays.

Wajib: Abu Shadi is a divorced father and a school teacher in his mid-60s living in Nazareth. After his daughter’s wedding in one month he will be living alone. Shadi, his architect son, arrives from Rome after years abroad to help his father in hand-delivering the wedding invitations to each guest as per local Palestinian custom. As the estranged pair spend the day together, the tense details of their relationship come to a head challenging their fragile and very different lives.

For the official website of the film, click here.

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PODCAST | Chiara Nicoletti interviews Saleh Bakri, actor of the film Wajib.

In Wajib,  the third feature film directed by Annemarie Jacir, Saleh Bakri plays the role of a young Palestinian  architect from Nazareth who lives in Italy and comes back to Palestine for his sister’s wedding. In real life, Saleh Bakri fell in love with Italy a long time ago and this love was definitely sealed with his participation to Fabio Grassadonia and Antonio Piazza’s first feature film Salvo. Bakri describes the difficulties and perks of working with his father on the set of a film which sees them fighting not only through the usual father-son dynamics but especially because of the different ways they deal with the Palestinian condition, the Israeli–Palestinian conflict and organizations such as the PLO (The Palestine Liberation Organization).

Wajib: Abu Shadi is a divorced father and a school teacher in his mid-60s living in Nazareth. After his daughter’s wedding in one month he will be living alone. Shadi, his architect son, arrives from Rome after years abroad to help his father in hand-delivering the wedding invitations to each guest as per local Palestinian custom. As the estranged pair spend the day together, the tense details of their relationship come to a head challenging their fragile and very different lives.

For the official website of the film, click here.

The post Saleh Bakri – Wajib appeared first on Fred Film Radio.

PODCAST| Matt Micucci interviews Andrés Goteira, director of the film Dhogs.

Director Andrés Goteira talks to us about his feature debut, Dhogs, featured in the program of the 2018 Istanbul Film Festival. Dhogs is an uneasy film to summarize; at the same time, from this interview, we understand that the intentions of its director to get inside the skin of the viewers and that this film is a critique on passive spectatorship. He also mentions games, and we ask him whether or not he plays games with the actors as well as the audience.

Dhogs, which is compared to the works of David Lynch and Michael Haneke as well as to Straw Dogs and even Holy Motors, is a horror film that toys with notions of destiny and fortune. The lines between victim, perpetrator, and witness intersect through a gas station in the middle of the desert, a desolate hotel, and ghastly events that stem from the deepest and darkest abysses of human nature. The first feature by Andrés Goteira, who hails from Galicia, Spain, is a master and slave film that mercilessly toys with viewers’ minds as it critics the insensitive society and features breath-taking panoramas and a unique atmosphere.

The post Andrés Goteira – Dhogs #istfilmfest appeared first on Fred Film Radio.

PODCAST| Matt Micucci interviews Isabél Zuaa, actress of the film Good Manners.

An interview with Isabél Zuaa, one of the lead actresses of Good Manners, which screened at the 2018 Istanbul Film Festival. Having met the directors of the film, Juliana Rojas and Marco Dutra, last year in Locarno Film Festival, we meet Zuaa in the midst of Good Manners‘ festival run, during which it has captured the hearts of viewers all over the world. “Love is a universal feeling,” she tells us, and love is a driving force in the film. The actress, who plays the role of Clara, tells us that it was a challenging movie for her and explains how she landed the part, as well as how she worked with the directors during the project. she also tells us about what she feels the film represents and why it is important, as well as the role of the music in the film, and having to use her imagination in the parts of the movie that required CGI.

Good Manners: The directing duo Juliana Rojas and Marco Dutra’s multi-award-winning new film is a contemporary tale that marries social thriller and fantasy genres. Good Manners follows Nurse Clara who lives alone in São Paulo. A pregnant woman hires Clara as a nanny, and with time, the two get closer to each other, but an unexpected event forces them to reevaluate their dynamic. Starring the impressive Angola-born Portuguese dancer-actress Isabél Zuaa, the film scrutinises bodily transformation and sexual desire as it comments on the concepts of motherhood, social class, and family.

The post Isabél Zuaa – Good Manners #istfilmfest appeared first on Fred Film Radio.

PODCAST| Matt Micucci interviews György Kristóf, director of the film Out.

An interview with György Kristóf, director of Out, featured in the program of the 2018 Istanbul Film Festival. The film is about a 50-year-old man travelling East from Slovakia to find work, and his encounter with extravagant characters and situations as he pushed on. The director tells us about many aspects of the film, including the significance of the age of the film’s protagonist, sense of humour, the link between countries of the former Eastern Bloc that remains to this day, the reactions that the film has received internationally, and more. He also tells us more about Sándor Terhes, the lead actor of the movie, who makes his debut as lead actor in a film in Out.

Out: Feeling lonely, useless, and aimless, and now jobless, 50-year-old Slovak power-plant engineer Ágoston heads to Latvia in the hopes of fishing or maybe finding a job. On the way, he encounters many strange things ranging from a congenial woman and a grim Russian man to a stuffed rabbit. Taking its name from its hero’s gradual casting “out” of society, Out is a road film with an absurdist point of view that blends gorgeous scenery with xenophobia in Europe. Inspired by real events from the life of Hungarian director György Kristóf, who was born in Slovakia like his protagonist Ágoston, this feature debut premiered at A Certain Look section of Cannes.

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PODCAST| Matt Micucci interviews Andrzej Jakimowski, director of the film Once Upon a Time in November.

An interview with Andrzej Jakimowski, director of Once Upon a Time in November, screened at the 2018 Istanbul Film Festival. The director talks about the unusual mixture of reality on fiction employed in the making of the film, which originated when he found himself in the caught in the midst of the annual nationalist march in Warsaw in 2013, where he saw innocent people become victims of violence. Yet, Once Upon a Time in November is also the story of the people who find themselves evicted from their homes and vulnerable to this violence; it is not a war movie, Jakimowski explains. In this interview, we discuss at length this interesting approach and the influence of the narrative within it. Jakimowski also elaborates on some of the key themes and cultural backgrounds of his film, talks about actors in the film – leads Grzegorz Palkowski and Agata Kulesza, and a bit part by Edward Hogg – and praises the work of his own wife, Ewa Jakimowska, which he describes as quite challenging.

Once Upon a Time in November: Agata, a laid-off teacher, is evicted from her house which she lived in with her law student son Mareczek. They desperately wander from one hostel to another, and from homeless shelters to abandoned plots all over Warsaw. Over time they are joined by a stray dog they named “Buddy.” In a social system where nobody cares about the poor and rules are more important than empathy, these two educated people have to face new indignities every day. Polish director Jakimowski employs a journalistic approach as he confronts us with the harrowing fact that the middle class is just a few missteps away from being homeless in his film that follows in the footsteps of Ken Loach, Oliver Stone, and Michael Moore. Premiering at the Warsaw Film Festival, Once Upon A Time In November stars Agata Kulesza, the aunt in Ida as Agata.

The post Andrzej Jakimowski – Once Upon a Time in November #istfilmfest appeared first on Fred Film Radio.

PODCAST| Matt Micucci interviews Blerta Zeqiri, director of the film The Marriage.

Director Blerta Zeqiri talks about her film, The Marriage, which was screened during the 2018 Istanbul Film Festival. Given the challenging situation experienced by LGBT communities in Kosovo, it is remarkable to see a film from the country that directly tackles the issue in the way that The Marriage does. Zeqiri, in this interview, highlights her wish to make a film that would promote love. However, she also shares with us that she feared the film would not be warmly received, and she prepared for the worst while working on it. The director also discusses the role of memory and flashbacks in the film, talks about its lengthy production time, the work by the actors, and more.

The Marriage: Anita is a young woman who is still scarred by the Kosovo War. She has a loving relationship with her fiancée Bekim, until however, one day Bekim’s musician friend Nol, returns home from Paris to prompt a change in their relationship Anita can’t quite put her finger on. Directed by Blerta Zeqiri, this absorbing first film impresses with the performances of all three principals and questions a society that can’t confront its past as it relates the pains of building a new life on top of secrets.

To discover more about the film, click here.

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PODCAST| Matt Micucci interviews Yves Hinant, director of the film So Help Me God.

Director Yves Hinant talks about So Help Me God, which he co-directed with Jean Libon, and was screened at the 2018 Istanbul Film Festival. The film follows Judge Anne Gruwez, who is described in the festival program as a woman with a “common touch and uncompromising stance.” Hinant talks about making the film and whether he keeps his distance from his protagonists while filming them. He emphasizes the aim of shooting reality through a good story and the need to find good characters, as well as why he thinks documentaries most documentaries are boring and he hates doing interviews.

So Help Me God : Judge Anne Gruwez of Brussels is an outspoken woman full of surprises. With her unusual approach to defendants and cases, she surprises people while gaining their admiration with her common touch and uncompromising stance. Directed by Yves Hinant and Jean Libon, the creators of cult docu-show Strip-Tease, which has been on the air in France and Belgium for 20 years, this documentary paints a tragicomical portrait of the Belgium judicial system as it observes Judge Gruwez on the bench. Using an unfiltered language and bordering fiction with its potent black humor, the politically incorrect So Help Me God premiered at San Sebastian Film Festival.

The post Yves Hinant – So Help Me God #istfilmfest appeared first on Fred Film Radio.

PODCAST| Matt Micucci interviews Matan Yair, director of the film Scaffolding.

An interview with Matan Yair, director of Scaffolding, which was presented at the 2018 Istanbul Film Festival. Yair explains to us that he likes to make documentary like fiction and fiction like documentary, and his feature debut blends the line between the two. The film is also constructed with personal influences that, as Yair explains, come from his own life and from his own artistic interests. He also talks about Asher Lax, who is the protagonist of the film, a non-actor from a very similar background to that of the character he portrays, and more.

Scaffolding : In Scaffolding, director Matan Yair, who used to be a high school history and literature teacher to academically challenged kids, casts one of his students to play himself and takes an engrossing look at the institutions of education, masculinity, and family. 17 year-old Asher is preparing for his matriculation exams, but he is struggling with lack of concentration, and anger management issues. He works for his father’s scaffolding business and the only other father figure in his life is his teacher Rami, who is the only person who appreciates his dedicated efforts. However, this delicate arrangement cannot last forever. Premiered at the ACID section of Cannes, Scaffolding is the feature-length debut of Matan Yair. Asher still works with his father erecting scaffolding in real life.

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PODCAST| Nicolò Comotti interviews director Ildikó Enyedi.

We have the honour to meet Ildikó Enyedi, the highly acclaimed Hungarian director who through the years has spoken a unique and emotive cinematic language, able to warm even the coldest of hearts – film critics beware!

The European Cinema Festival in Lecce will dedicate the section “The Protagonists of European Cinema” to the director and writer Ildikó Enyedi, awarding her with the Olive Tree for her career achievements. The festival will screen the complete retrospective of her films, including the 4k restored copy of My XX century, which had its world premiere at the 68th Berlinale.

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