Great news for Chile in Venice! This year, the Festival will take place between September 1 and 11, and four works from the country have been chosen: two in the official competition (Spencer. by Paul Larrain; Los huesos (The Bones) from the Leon & Cociña, Orizzonti Shorts), one for Venice Days (Night Stone by Iván Fund), and a project in development at Venice Production Bridge (Los Ángeles (The Angels) from León & Cociña). Also, at the Venice Gap-Financing Market, two coproductions were selected:  The settlers (Los colonos), directed by Felipe Gálvez and produced by Quijote Films; and Pamfir, directed by Dmytro Sukholytkyy-Sobchuk (Ukraine / France / Poland / Chile), produced by Bosonfilm and coproduced by Quijote Films.

Once again, Chile is back with a wide selection at one of the most important festivals in the world.

Official Competition and Orizzonti Shorts

Spencer signals the return of Pablo Larraín to Venice after the premiere of Ema (2019) at the Official Competition of the Festival. While his last film was a cross-section of Latin American art, desire, and family, his latest work focuses on a media story with global reach: the intimate story of Princess Diana, starring Kristen Stewart.

Written by Steven Knight, creator of the series Peaky Blinders, the film focuses on a weekend in the early 1990s, when Diana decided to separate from Prince Charles amid rumors of infidelity.

Larraín's new film has generated great expectations, being named one of the most anticipated films of the year by media outlets such as Variety and Fotograma, and his first in English since Jackie (Venice, 2016).

• Orizzonti Shorts

Another of the premieres at Official Competition in the section Orizzonti Shorts is the new short film by León y Cociña, Los huesos, made by the directorial duo who achieved international success with La casa Lobo (The Wolf House (Berlinale Forum, 2018, produced by Globo Rojo Films), being named one of the best animated films of all time by IGN.

The short film pretends to be the first stop motion animation film in the world, imagining two historical figures from Chile as they are dug up. The origin of this idea, say the directors, came with the social upheavals in Chile in October 2019. Ari Aster, director of films such as Hereditary and Midsommar, joined as executive producer alongside Lucas Engel of Pista B Producciones.

“It is an honor to have been selected to premiere worldwide at a festival as emblematic as Venice. We are thrilled! Cristóbal and Joaquín (and all the talented team that work with them frequently) really deserve this kind of recognition, and I hope this is just the beginning of a nice international tour,” said Engel.

Los huesos is the only Latin American short film in the official Orizzonti Shorts competition, and marks Chile's return to the section after the premiere of Fiebre austral (Southern Fever) (Thomas Woodroffe, 2019) beginning an expansive international journey. We're sure that Venice will be the first step on a great journey for Los huesos.

Catalina Vergara: A film at Venice Days and a project at Venice Production Bridge

Taking a position behind the scenes, though no less important, Catalina Vergara is one of the most outstanding Chilean producers today. With a wide portfolio of projects premiering at prestigious festivals (Death will come and take your eyes, San Sebastián, 2019) and others in development, she is leading the participation of two works coming to Venice.

“I am very happy to have been selected with this film and this project for Venice. It means a lot to be able to go back to a film festival after so long due to the pandemic, go into a movie theater and have meetings without a screen in between,” she told us.

• Venice Days

Piedra noche (Night stone) (2020) by Iván Fund (Wip Latam Industry Award, San Sebastián 2019) is an Argentine-Chilean co-production produced by Rita Cine, Insomnia Films, and Globo Rojo Films, the last of which is represented by Vergara.

"Being involved in a film directed by Iván Fund, who won an award in Cannes with his film Lip, and co-directed with Santiago Loza; means I am participating with Globo Rojo Films in foreign productions with a director with a distinguished career, " Vergara said”

Starring Alfredo Castro, Maricel Álvarez, Marcelo Subiotto, and Mara Bestelli, Piedra noche is a film about devotion, through the character of the witness, and about living with the belief systems of the other, about the tenderness of that mutual pact to overcome pain. (Sales: Elle Driver).

This represents the continuation of Chile at Venice Days, after the world premiere of Tengo miedo Torero (Bullfighter, I'm Afraid) (Rodrigo Sepúlveda, Stranger) in 2020, also starring Castro.

• Venice Production Bridge

 The second feature in development by León and Cociña, Los Ángeles, produced by Vergara, is a science fiction thriller that appears to have been made in the 1940s and whose action takes place in a dystopian Chile of 2020. During this time, Dalia León (Antonia Giesen) is a police officer of ‘Andinia’, the name given to Chile after being annexed to the United States.

"The film will be a mixture of acting, animation, puppets, models, and other things. The story is inspired by both the tradition of science fiction cinema and the symbolic world of Miguel Serrano, a Chilean poet, ambassador, and nazi who lived during much of the twentieth century and part of the twenty-first,” Cociña told us.

Los Ángeles tells the story of Constanza Nordenflycht, a young woman who at the age of 15 began a relationship with the politician Diego Portales, with whom she had three children who were only recognized by the Chilean State after the Portales' death in 1837.

“With this new feature film, Los Ángeles, we want it to open up its own space, because it is a powerful and attractive project. Our challenge is to develop from different narratives, which mix fiction and animation in an adventure and fantasy format, a film that unites auteur cinema with traditional industrial cinema”, says Vergara.

In addition, at the Venice Gap-Financing Market -organized by Venice Production Bridge in the context of the Italian festival- two coproductions were selected in which our country appears:

The settlers (Los colonos), directed by Felipe Gálvez (Chile / Argentina / France / Denmark), and produced by Quijote Films.

Pamfir, directed by Dmytro Sukholytkyy-Sobchuk (Ukraine / France / Poland / Chile), produced by Bosonfilm and coproduced by Quijote Films.