FRED Film Radio - English Channel

“The Summer Book” by Charles McDowell was presented, out of competition, at the 42° Torino Film Festival. 

The film, starring Glenn Close, is the big screen adaptation of Tove Jansson’s novel and sees the actress in the role of a very affectionate grandmother to Sophia, a nine-year-old girl played by newcomer Emily Matthews. 

As the book it was based on, the film is full of silences, looks, gestures more than words. McDowell describes his directing process according to these elements: “a big part of making this film was to slow people down and remind them of a simpler time with meditative shots”. 

“The Summer Book” is McDowell’s 4th feature film. He previously directed Windfall (2022), distributed by Netflix, starring his wife Lily Collins, with whom he founded the production company Case Study Film, also with the participation of Alex Orlovsky.

Charles McDowell also comments on the film being an ode to nature and embracing themes like getting old, processing grief. The director talks about a specific comment Glenn Close’s character makes in the film, looking back at her life: “The things I did when I was young that were fun ad meant something they don’t seem to mean anything anymore”

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“Under The Grey Sky” by Mara Tamkovic is an intense and compelling drama about a couple of journalists in Belarus that try to document the demonstrations against Lukashenko’s rigged election in 2020. The film is based on a real story where the political issues intertwine with the personal consequences on the couple for their choices.

Director Mara Tamkovic, in her film “Under The Grey Sky“, wanted to point out, through the tale of a politically committed couple under the regime of terror of an authoritarian government, that people necessarily find ways to survive and continue to live, and this is the strongest and braver message that can be sent out, in such dark times.

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“Ponyboi” has been presented in competition at the 42nd Torino Film Festival. The film is directed by Esteban Arango, based on a screenplay written by River Gallo, who stars in the film. the actor   has been awarded  for Best Performance. We met director and actor before the festival screening to talk about this nocturnal and fascinating thriller drama.

As River Gallo, lead actor of “Ponyboi“, says the film is strongly about a journey of self affirmation and recognition, in a seedy and dark world. The redemption trip the lead character unconsciously makes is fundamentally linked with the gender recognition path that walks parallel to the main plot. This is the strength of the film.

Esteban Arango, director of “Ponyboi” tells us that when he read the final script he had clear in mind the atmosphere and the kind of visuals he wanted to pull. The evolution of “Ponyboi” and their dreams in the film needed some aesthetics to function in connection with it, and which had to be believable for a genre film

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“From Ground Zero“, an anthology of 22 short films created by talented filmmakers from Gaza is at the 42°Torino Film Festival

The film project, launched by Palestinian director Rachid Masharawi and artistically advised by Layali Badr, aims to tell the apparently invisible stories of people living in Gaza. 

Paolo Maria Spina with Revolver, embarked on the mission of distributing the film all over Italy. The film was presented at the Medfilm Festival in Rome, at the presence of Masharawi. 

It has been presented in Torino in the out of competition section and it will travel more in the following weeks. 

The 80% of the revenues from the italian distribution will be assigned to the families in Gaza and to the young film students in Ramallah. 

The post “From Ground Zero”, interview with artistic advisor Layali Badr and italian distributor Paolo Maria Spina appeared first on Fred Film Radio.

Crystal Moselle brings her latest feature “The Black Sea“,  co-directed by the film’s star Derrick B. Harden, in competition at the 42° Torino Film Festival.

After the documentary “Wolfpack” which won the Grand Jury Prize for Documentary at Sundance in 2015 and her coming-of-age “Skate Kitchen“, Moselle joined forces with actor, director and rapper Derrick B. Harden for this film. 

In this unscripted feature, Harden plays Khalid, a barista who leaves Brooklyn for this dream woman he plans to meet and start a new life only to find out, once landed in Sozopol and with his passport and luggage stolen, that he was a cat-fishing victim. 

With the help of Ina, played by Bulgarian actress Irmena Chichikova, Khalid slowly finds his place in that little world  and maybe his “Bulgarian dream”. 

Harden and Moselle describe the genesis of the film, their work together on a film they developed while shooting, without a script. 

When talking about the film being about the right for everybody to dream, Derrick B. Harden agrees and adds: “This film is about dreaming and the whole project is a dream for everybody involved”. 

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“Holy Rosita” is a comedy drama presented in competition at the 42nd Torino Film Festival. Telling the story of Rosita, a good-hearted woman loved by all the neighbourhood but considered not fit to be a mother, the film dwells into the concept of acceptance and the social conventions that our society builds and the burden that these conventions are for those who are considered outsiders. We met with the director Wannes Destoop and the actress Daphne Agten to talk about it.

Wannes Destoop, director of “Holy Rosita” has always been fascinated by outsiders, by the outcast of society. Rosita, played by Daphne Agten, is the definite one, as she is nice and loving but still kept outside society and underestimated. For the director we as society are not in a position of telling anyone like Rosita if she can be a mother or not. This is the central message of the movie.

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