Open-air Cinema Isola is constructed during the festival in Izola’s main square by the Dutch professionals of Openlucht Bioscoop. This year’s open-air will host five films of the Harvest section, competing for the audience award and distribution across Slovenian cinemas. Among the selected films are once again those from Iran and Argentina, Tunisia will represent the colours of Northern Africa, Burkina Faso those of black Africa, and for the first time Brazil is joining the circle of visitors to the Island.
Full or Empty is the thirteenth film of one of Iran’s most prominent directors, Abolfazl Jalili. Although a seemingly innocent comedy about a young man in search of a teaching position and a wife in the midst of a backward Iranian village, this film - as all Jalili’s previous work - is once again banned in its homeland. Live-in Maid conveys Argentina’s economic crisis through a story about an impoverished mistress and her live-in maid, whose relationship starts to change in the light of a new financial situation. Bab’Aziz is a journey through a magical desert and the wisdom of classical sufi poetry of Rumi, Attar and Ibn Arabi. Tasuma depicts a war veteran’s struggle against bureaucratic windmills in the fight to obtain his well-deserved pension and his village’s much needed flour mill. There is no sign of the pension and the creditors are breathing down his neck, but in the end all is resolved the African way. The Don Quixote of Burkina Faso. Delicate Crime ponders whether a man is in fact helpless when committing a crime of passion, the criminal indeed a victim of his own desires.
Once again Bosnia offers a precious jewel (the favorite of last year’s audience was Days and Hours by Sarajevo-born Pjer Žalica) - Grbavica by Jasmila Žbanić, winner of the Golden Bear Award at the 2006 Berlin Film Festival. The film is bound to capture the audience, however, since it has already been bought for distribution in Slovenia (by Cinemania group), it will be screened out of competition. Nevertheless, the Harvest is its rightful place and since it will embark on the voyage through Slovenian cinemas on the 1st of June, its Slovenian prepremiere will be held on the closing night of the festival.
This year the open-air cinema will screen no less than eleven films. As part of additional program we are proud to announce Werner Herzog’s marvelous underwater science-fiction adventure The Wild Blue Yonder, the Japanese teen Rock’n’Roll comedy Linda Linda Linda, Valeska Grisebach’s Longing – another exceptional film by a female director from this year’s competition section of Berlinale, and for the big finale along with Grbavica, the most beautiful revelation of last year’s cinematic harvest, Short Film about the Indio Nacional by the Philippine wonder boy Raya Martin, coming to our Island directly from Cannes. Returning to the silent film aesthetics, a live music score will accompany the screening of this film. Pop star Björk and her life partner and extravagant filmmaker Matthew Barney will see to it that Saturday night’s open-air screening becomes an extraordinary experience. Together they have created one of the most widely noticed and unusual films of last year – Drawing Restraint 9 – an exceptionally shot environmentalist love story.
Silvan’s Cine School: Go where the film takes you
The festival’s most important novelty this year is the introduction of a new educational program, named after the godfather of Isola Cinema, a central figure in Slovenian film culture and cinematic art, and a true film lover, the late Silvan Furlan.
Silvan’s Cine School is first of all the name of a new film workshop intended to teach the students how to reflect, discuss and most of all write about film. In view of the complete absence of an integral film education program in Slovenia, this segment is particularly critical. The workshop has a very practical outline: lectures on writing about film will be given by distinguished and mostly foreign film publicists, film screening will be attended with the presence of their authors, the directors, and followed by discussions, which will in turn be followed by daily writing assignments (under mentor guidance), published each day in festival newspaper and web site. Its aim is to educate interested film lovers towards a lucid and open reflection on film, hence the motto - Go where the film takes you.
Silvan’s Cine School is also the name of a new festival section introducing the most original filmmakers and their films, revealing the infinite aspects of cinematic landscapes and the countless paths that traverse it. It will celebrate the film artist, the free cinematic spirit, the contemporary Don Quixote de la Cinema, who is not burdened by ticket sales income or mainstream audience. This year’s selection includes the tried and tested lone riders such as Werner Herzog, Želimir Žilnik, the Japanese veteran Koji Wakamatsu, and the Armenian poet Harutjun Hačatrjan, along with a young guard of the unconventional, who are already conquering the most prominent arenas of film art: our good friend from Thailand Apichatpong Weerasethakul, the Philippine prodigies Lav Diaz and Raya Martin, film nomads Bill Daniel and Peter Mettler, and last but not least Argentina’s Luis Ortega.
