TIFF looks forward with Dutch RETROSPEKT
In a stunning non-linear structure Retrospekt unfolds the layered story of Mette (37) who questions where the sense of fulfillment she once felt with her husband and daughter has gone. When the care agency she works for can’t provide what she considers adequate support for Miller, a victim of domestic violence, Mette takes her into her family home, a decision that has life-changing consequences.
Esther Rots’ first feature Can Go Through Skin* world-premiered at Berlinale 2009 and won numerous prizes worldwide, including the FIPRESCI Award at Transylvania and the Ingmar Bergman International Debut Award at Gothenburg. Esther’s short films Play with Me (2002) and I Sprout (2003) both world-premiered at Cannes Shorts Competition.
Three minority Dutch co-productions are also selected for TIFF’s Contemporary World Cinema programme: the international premiere of Angel* by Koen Mortier (NL co-producer: Graniet Film), the world premiere of Stupid Young Heart* by Selma Vilhunen (NL co-producer: Windmill Film), and Cannes winner Donbass* by Sergei Loznitsa (NL co-producers: Graniet Film and Wild at Art).
Sergei Loznitsa's The Trial*, produced by Atoms & Void (NL), is presented in the Wavelengths section. The film, which world premieres in Venice Out of Competition, uses unique archive footage to present one of Stalin’s first show trials as an actor-led theatrical performance in which prosecutors, witnesses, defendants and judges lie to themselves, to the audience and to the world. The film records events in Moscow’s Pillar Hall of the State House of the Unions in 1930, when a group of top ranking economists and engineers is put on trial accused of plotting a coup d’état against the Soviet government.
Previously, the festival announced the selection of five other Dutch (co)productions:
The world premiere of minority Dutch co-production Rojo*, directed by Benjamín Naishtat (NL co-producer: Viking Film) takes place in Platform competition.
The documentaries Heartbound* by Janus Metz (NL co-producer: BALDR Film) and Freedom Fields by Naziha Arebi (supported by IDFA Bertha Fund) both world-premiere in TIFF Docs.
Short Cuts competition includes L’été et tout le reste*, directed by Sven Bresser and produced by IJswater Films (NL). The film will first have its world premiere in Venice’s Orizzonti Short Films Competition. When, at the end of the summer, the last of the ferries leave Corsica and most of Marc-Antoine’s friends have left for the mainland to study or to work, he and his friend Mickael remain behind on the dese rted island. Mickael is full of plans to leave, but Marc-Antoine seems unwilling to escape his old life…
Also in Short Cuts Competition is the Belgian/Dutch/French short This Magnificent Cake* by Marc James Roels and Emma De Swaef (NL co-producer: PEDRI animation), which world-premiered in Cannes Quinzaine.
The 43rd Toronto International Film Festival runs 6-16 September 2018.
*supported by the Netherlands Film Fund
(source: Eye International)