Chile will have a strong showing at the 30th edition of the Biarritz Latin America Festival, one of the most important festivals of Latin American cinema in Europe, which starts this September 27 and runs until October 3.
Competing in the Official Selection of the festival are two feature film dramas (Date una vuelta en el aire by Cristián Sánchez and Piedra Noche by Iván Fund)), three documentaries (Cartas de una fanática de Whistler a un fanatico de Conrad by Claudia Carreño, Nidal by Josefina Pérez-García and Felipe Sigala, and Cantos de represión by Marianne Hougen-Moraga and Estephan Wagner) and a short film (Herbarium by Francisca Lila).
A retrospective for the documentary filmmaker Ignacio Agüero will consist of 13 of his works, which cover the 50 years of his career, starting with one of his first short films, Hoy es jueves cinematográfico (1976), until its last premiere, Nunca subí el provincia (Grand Prix Fidmarseille, 2019).
FICTION COMPETITION
Date una vuelta en el aire, Cristián Sanchez's new film, will have its European premiere at Biarritz, after its appearance at the last edition BAFICI (American Competition, 2021) and FicValdivia (Closing Film, 2020).
Sánchez is a prolific director and screenwriter who has made more than 15 films, including some touchstones in the history of Chilean cinema, such as El Zapato Chino(Nantes Festival, 1979), and El Cumplimiento del Deseo (Havana, 1994). His poetic cinematography shares similarities with that of Raúl Ruiz and Luis Buñuel, sprinkled with absurd humor, the traces of the political realm, and the surrealism of everyday life.
The premiere in Biarritz of Date una vuelta en el aire, exploring the crisis in cultural institutions, is the perfect time for his cinema to gain a greater following in France and the rest of the world. Cinema Chile paid homage to this director in the 2017 edition of our International Film Catalogue.
Also in the Fiction Competition is the Chilean-Argentine co-production Piedra Noche by Iván Fund, which will be shown in Biarritz after its appearances at Venice Days and San Sebastian. It is co-produced by Catalina Vergara of Globo Rojo Films.
DOCUMENTARY COMPETITION
With an essay documentary that dialogues between the plastic arts, philosophy, and literature, Claudia Carreño lands in Biarritz with her debut film, Cartas de una fanática de Whistler a un fanatico de Conrad. The film is the product of an investigation on Crepuscule in Fresh Colour and Green: Valparaíso, painted by the artist James McNeill Whistler in 1866.
"This will be the first time that the film will be shown in a movie theater where we are present. I don't know what the reaction of the audience will be, but I hope we have the opportunity to dialogue with the public, listen to their comments, and provide background on the film,” Carreño told us.
The director is currently developing her second feature film, La Voz Sentimental, a creative documentary with a collage format, produced by Elisa Sepúlveda and selected in the Biarritz Lab, FBAL.
Also in the Documentary Competition is Nidal by Josefina Pérez-García and Felipe Sigala, examining how the real estate industry has destabilized the natural environment of the city of Concón, along the coast of Chile, forcing the inhabitants of the region to find new ways to adapt and survive.
”We wanted the lack of verbal speech to leave a space for each viewer to have a unique sensory experience, because although we portray a very specific geographical place on the planet, the phenomenon of the disappearance of natural spaces is global," Pérez-García told us.
It is the debut work of the duo of directors, which will have its French premiere in Biarritz after being shown in Greece at the Thessaloniki Documentary Festival (Film Forward Competition, 2021).
The third documentary in competition is a co-production between Chile, Denmark, and the Netherlands, Cantos de represión, by Marianne Hougen-Moraga and Estephan Wagner. The film explores the horrors of Colonia Dignidad, a center for torture and sexual abuse, through the testimony of the victims and notable figures.
SHORT FILM COMPETITION
The documentary-essay Herbarium directed by Francisca Lila, will compete in the short film section alongside works from Argentina, Colombia, Venezuela, Peru, Mexico, and Brazil.
"The idea of making Herbarium came as I was reading the April 2019 edition of Cahiers du Cinéma, in which they made a cinematic herbarium. I had just presented another video essay at the Filmadrid festival in Spain, and I set out to build an herbarium using images and sounds taken from films, just as Cahiers had done on paper,” Lila told us.
The director spent a year collecting material during the quarantine of 2020, a perfect time for her to immerse herself in images. "In a way, films and plants were a wonderful refuge and escape from the lockdown."
Currently, Lila continues to explore works that intersect film criticism and documentaries, while she is also writing a fiction project to film next year in Santiago, combining her work as an advertising and fashion director.
IGNACIO AGÜERO RETROSPECTIVE
“The documentary work of Ignacio Agüero, still little known in France, is one of the most exciting of the last few decades, because it is not content to simply portray reality, but instead seeks to fix it, overturning the conventional wisdom that holds that it would have to bring a definitive reality to us, and that we would only have to recognize it,” writes the developer Nicolas Azalbert, in his introduction for the tribute to Agüero in Biarritz.
This tribute is composed of 13 works, including short films and feature films, which cover his filmography from 1976 to 2019. His most emblematic films, such as Cien niños esperando un tren (1998), Como me da la gente (1985) and Aquí se Construye (1977) will be exhibited along with other gems such as Sueños de hielo (1993) and La Mamá de mi abuela le contó a mi abuela (2004).
Agüero is one of the most important documentary filmmakers in Latin America, and one of the most prolific Chilean filmmakers of all time. His last two films,Como me da la gana II (2016) and Nunca subí el Provincia (2019), won the Grand Prix in FIDMarseille. Retrospectives of his films have been made in Argentina, Peru, Bolivia, Brazil, Spain, Mexico, Chile, and now in France. Currently, the director is filming his next documentary, Notas para una película. His project in development, Carta a mis padres muertos, is selected in the Biarritz Lab, FBAL.
