JP/09/FABIO

JP/09/FABIO

European Film Festival draws to a successful close

EU film festival close to a successful

Fabio Scarpello
Contributor
Jakarta

After an 8-day cinematographic, feast the European Film Festival
drew to a close on Dec. 17, and no sooner had the final applause
in the Goethe Haus and Erasmus Huis subsided than the time for a
critical evaluation started.

Based on the artistic value of the films and the attendance
registered at the three venues, the organizers can rightly be
satisfied, but small hiccups always happen and this festival was
not an exception.

However, a printing error in the pamphlet timetable (promptly
amended) and problems with the English subtitles in a couple of
the movies are minor blunders when set against the amount of work
involved in having 25 movies and short features shipped over from
Europe and shown twice in different venues on different dates.

A short-lived disappointment was the absence of Respiro, the
eagerly awaited film by Crialese, "due to the film's delayed
departure from Damascus where it closed another European Film
Festival" as stated by Prof Ostelio Remi, director of the Italian
Cultural Center who -- to make it up to the audience and
supported by his colleagues -- will show it on Jan. 5 at the
Goethe Haus and Jan. 8 at the Erasmus Huis.

But Respiro substitutes Cento passi (Hundred steps) by Marco
Tullio Giordana (Best European Film and Best Screenplay at the
Brussels International Film Festival 2001), which was shown at
the Erasmus Huis, and La stanza del figlio (The son's room) by
Nanni Moretti (winner of the Palm D'or at Cannes in 2001), which
was shown at the Goethe Haus, turned out to be two memorable
movies in their own right and appeased the audience.

In the midst of a critical evaluation, the writer cannot claim
to be free of mistakes either: the protagonist of Il Mestiere
delle armi is (of course) Giovanni De Medici and not Lorenzo as
wrongly reported and kindly pointed out by Mr. Francesco Alzeni.

On a lighter note, on the whole the films lived up to
expectations and proved that art and entertainment can go hand in
hand.

Still, cinema remains a subjective medium open to various
readings where no one can claim to hold the keys of absolute
truth. But since I am paid for my opinion, among the last films
Chopin-Desire for love and Samia walk away with the honors. I
cannot fail to mention the eight short films presented by
Germany, that with one each from Germany, Poland, Finland,
England, Holland, France and two from Austria, represent a
European Festival of Short Movies within a European Film
Festival.

Chopin-Desire for Love by Jerzy Antczak (Poland, winner of the
Gold Award for Best Cinematography and the Platinum Award for
Best Drama at the Houston Film Festival 2003) is a film about
love and misunderstandings, but is not only a love story.

It tells of the eight-year-long love affair between Frederick
Chopin and George Sage, and in the process it underlines the need
for love of Sage's dysfunctional family.

At the end no one feels really loved and no one is really
understood. Not Chopin, forced to leave Nohant, Sage's country
estate; nor Sage herself, who slowly withdraws, nor Sage's
daughter and son Solange and Maurycy. Both feel neglected by
their mother and react differently: Solange grows to love Chopin
herself and enters into open competition with her mother, while
Maurycy channels his artistic frustrations in open hostility for
the composer and his genius.

Antczak spent 25 years writing the screenplay and six years
raising the budget. With all this work behind him, it is not
coincidence that nothing is rushed in this 134 minute movie.
Frames are painstakingly created and juxtaposed to create a
visual representation of the period and of the incomprehension of
two volatile lovers and their close associates. Fifty four pieces
of music by Chopin - personally selected by the director -
complement the story and dictate the moods of what is a truly
beautiful composition.

Samia by Philippe Faucon (France, winner of the Amiens
International Film Festival 2000), is neither a cinematographic
masterpiece nor an untold story, but just a story told with a
realism that involves the viewer. It is a neutral, passive
representation of the world where there is minimal interference
by the director with the object-subject represented. The film's
faithfulness to natural reality is the dominant aesthetic
criterion, and it is in this authenticity that it has its
strength and depth.

Following Samia and her family, the director talks about
racism. Racism against this Algerian family in Marseille and the
racism within the family against the French.

Still, it is all done (almost) in a documentary style, with a
hand-held camera, without close ups, without dramatizations and
without taking subjective positions. Faucon tells it the way it
is without offering a solution, and then he leaves it to the
audience to draw conclusions.

The enigmatic end is the last and most important "touch" of
impartiality. Will Samia return from Algeria? Will her mother
side with her against her abusive brother? Will everything just
carry on the way it was?

The cultural differences, the drama of being caught within "a
clash of civilizations", and the family conflict between an older
and a younger generation that cannot understand each other any
longer are very effectively portrayed by a cast of non-
professional actors, themselves immigrants and (in the case of
the brother) unemployed.