Wide Swoops On Breakout Angolan War Of Independence Locarno Competition Title ‘Tommy Guns’

Naman Ramachandran The BFI London Film Festival has revealed eight titles that will be in official competition. The films include Santiago Mitre’s political drama “Argentina, 1985” (Argentina); Clement Virgo’s brotherly love tale “Brother” (Canada); Marie Kreutzer’s irreverent period drama “Corsage” (Austria-Luxembourg-Germany-France); Fyzal Boulifa’s atmospheric domestic drama “The Damned Don’t Cry” (France-Belgium-Morocco); Mark Jenkin’s folk horror tale “Enys Men” (U.K.); Hlynur Palmason’s historical epic “Godland” (Denmark-Iceland-France-Sweden); Soudade Kaadan’s poignant family film “Nezouh” (U.K.-Syria-France); and Alice Diop’s courtroom drama “Saint Omer.”

Kalush Orchestra have marked Ukrainian Independence Day by sharing a message of hope and making a fresh appeal for donations.The rap group raised $900,000 (£739k) by auctioning off their Eurovision trophy after winning the contest in May. An additional $370,000 (£301k) was generated by raffling off the pink bucket hat that frontman Oleg Psyuk wore during their victorious performance.Speaking to NME ahead of the competition, Psyuk explained how Kalush Orchestra taking part felt like a “huge responsibility”, given their home country’s ongoing war with neighbouring Russia.Today (August 24), Psyuk posted the following statement to coincide with Ukrainian Independence Day: “Earlier this week, the entire Kalush Orchestra was together in Kyiv and witnessed a ‘parade’ of Russian equipment on the Maidan, Kyiv’s main square, which our Armed Forces turned into a pile of scrap metal.“It shows our strength, power and invincibility.

John Hopewell Chief International Correspondent Danish international sales and aggregation outfit LevelK has boarded the thought-provoking drama “Great Yarmouth: Provisional Figures” by award-winning Portuguese director Marco Martins, which world premieres in main competition at next month’s San Sebastian Film Festival.  Hailed by Variety as “a powerful study of intense grief,” Martin’s debut feature, “Alice,” won the Prix Regards Jeune at Cannes in 2005. The story unravels three months before Brexit, as hundreds of migrants descend on the UK village of Great Yarmouth seeking work in the region’s turkey processing plants. Once there, Tânia greets them with matronly authority, taking charge as innkeeper, accountant, and fixer. As she’s forced to deceive them, her conscience grows heavy and she dreams of a brighter, seemingly unattainable, future transforming derelict hotels into modern retreats for elderly tourists.

The Dnipro Kids charity chairman has successfully got the backing of his fellow Perth and Kinross councillors to mark Ukraine Independence Day.

Naman Ramachandran “Mariupol. Unlost Hope,” one of two Ukrainian documentaries recently acquired by Beta Film’s Autentic Distribution, will be released in 40 cities across the world, which are similar to Mariupol either by population or as a port and/or industrial center, or cities that are twinned with Mariupol, on Aug. 24, Ukraine independence day.The film shows the Ukraine war through the eyes of ordinary people who lived through the first month of the invasion in Mariupol.

Bolton Wanderers summer signing Jack Iredale has loved life at his new club so far and is feeling settled following his summer move from Cambridge United as he discussed in depth the squad rotation that will take place this season.

TIFF announced its Short Cuts section today comprised of 39 live-action narrative, documentary, and animated short films from directors repping 18 countries.

Angelina Jolie was joined by her youngest son as she shopped in Los Angeles. Jolie and Knox were spotted at Los Feliz dressed casually, as they carried some groceries to their car. Salma Hayek praises Angelina Jolie and describes her as the ‘best director’ she has ever workedAngelina Jolie drops off Zahara at college, shares that she’s ecxited in emotional videoJolie was photographed wearing a white dress that she paired with some sandals and a beige purse.Knox, who’s 14 years old, was photographed carrying the groceries and wearing a white T-shirt and black pants.

Portuguese filmmaker Carlos Conceição’s Angolan War of Independence drama Tommy Guns has won the Europa Cinemas Label as Best European film at the 75th Locarno Film Festival, running August 3 to 13.

Doing what he felt was right. Mike “The Situation” Sorrentino opened up about why he chose to get involved in the Angelina Pivarnick drama during season 5 of Jersey Shore Family Vacation.

Christopher Vourlias Paul Negoescu’s fourth feature, “Men of Deeds,” which world premieres in competition Sunday at the Sarajevo Film Festival, is at first glance a departure from the Romanian director’s previous work. Set in the rural region of Bucovina, it’s a world removed from the swanky bars and bistros of his last film, the Bucharest-set “The Story of a Summer Lover.”The film follows llie (Iulian Postelnicu), a small-town police chief who hopes to settle into a modest, comfortable life. A man of low expectations and dubious morals, he sets his sights on a small plot of land that’s up for sale — an orchard in the countryside where he imagines he can make a fresh start.Nothing, however, goes according to plan.

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.

Guy Lodge Film CriticPortugal’s colonial past in Africa continues to haunt some of the country’s most vital and subversive filmmakers. With his remarkable second feature “Tommy Guns,” Angolan-Portuguese director Carlos Conceição’s steps into the same precarious territory sometimes occupied by Pedro Costa and Miguel Gomes — borrowing, perhaps, a measure of the former’s visceral austerity and the latter’s shape-shifting playfulness, but mostly proving his own sly, supple talent.

Naman Ramachandran Acclaimed filmmaker Mahesh Narayanan and popular actor-producer Kunchacko Boban are re-teaming for “Ariyippu” (“Declaration”), the first Indian film in Locarno’s international competition in 17 years.The Malayalam-language film follows Hareesh (Boban) and Reshmi (Divya Prabha), an immigrant couple from Kerala working in a medical gloves factory near Delhi, who aspire to go abroad for a better life. During the COVID-19 lockdowns, when an old video resurfaces among the factory workers, it opens up a Pandora’s box that threatens the couple’s jobs and marriage.Narayanan got the germ of the film’s idea from a newspaper article about a female bank employee who had approached the Mumbai high court demanding a “declaration” clarifying that a video which had been circulated in her bank was a look alike and not her.