ons stival . - California Film Institute

108
MVFF T u r n i n g 3 0
world cinema
us cinema
world cinema
world cinema
Uranya GReece 2006 95 MINS
Saturday, October 6 11:45 am URAN06R Rafael
Saturday, October 13 2:45 pm URAN13S Sequoia
Director/Screenwriter Costas Kapakas Producers Haris Padouvas, Despoina Mouzaki Cinematographer Stefano Kapakas
Editor Giorgos Mavropsaridis Print Source Cinegram S.A.
In Greek with English subtitles • In this charming coming-of-age story from Greece, a boy, Achilles, longs to
escape his village, his bickering parents and the unbearable destiny of being a blacksmith’s son. It’s 1969, and the
town, you see, doesn’t have a television. The problem distresses everyone, but particularly Achilles, who dreams
of being an astronaut and wants to watch the Apollo 11 lunar landing. The genre’s amusing tropes provide good
slapstick comedy—gossiping wives, bumbling authority figures and the eternal adolescent quest to lose one’s
virginity—while the film evokes its historical moment so distinctly, and Achilles exudes such a poignant lightness of
being, that we are transported with him above the fray. Getting a television means cutting through a Gordian knot
of challenges political, familial, financial, and Achilles’ only tool is his determination. But, desire can work miracles,
the film proposes, perhaps none more astonishing than putting a man on the moon itself. North American Premiere
—Jeff Campbell
• • •Sponsored by Raymond Vineyards
Used US 2007 84 MINS
Saturday, October 13 7:15 pm USED13R Rafael
Director/Producer/Screenwriter Rob Nilsson Cinematographer Chikara Motomura Editor Rob Lee Cast Robert Viharo,
Paige Olson, Edwin Johnson, Johnny Tidwell, Kieron McCartney, Rob Nilsson Print Source Citizen Cinema
Rob Nilsson (Opening, Pan, MVFF 2006) returns with the second chapter in the 9@Night series. 9@Night resident
antihero, Malafide, departs his part-time lover Tracey’s restful digs for the streets. After a mental breakdown, he
develops a strong bond with a homeless man as they embark on a journey to bring a “mystical man,” named People,
“to his spiritual place.” Tracey enlists the help of her underworld, coke-addicted nephew to help pay off a debt
to “Uncle Kenny.” Nilsson explores his signature themes with gritty, dynamic characters, portraying the socially
marginalized as honorable, dignified, even spiritually gifted, and illuminating indefinable connections between human
beings. Used distinguishes itself among the 9@Night films with its stark landscape photography, in which the
desolate beauty of the Nevada desert mirrors the characters’ own. The series draws to a close at MVFF with the
final installment, Go Together (see page 92). World Premiere
Warchild (Stille Sehnsucht- warchild) GeRMANy/SLOveNIA 2006 103 MINS
Saturday, October 6 3:00 pm WARC06S Sequoia
Sunday, October 7 9:15 pm WARC07R Rafael
Director Christian Wagner Producers Christian Wagner, Dunja Klemenc Screenwriters Edin Hadzimahivic, Stefan Daehnert
Cinematographer Thomas Mauch Editor Jens Klüber Cast Labina Mitevska, Katrin Sass, Senad Basic, Otto Kukla, Crescentia
Dünesser, Miranda Leonhardt Print Source Christian Wagner Film
FOCUS: GERMANY • In German, Serbian, Bosnian and Croatian with English subtitles • The frantic ache of
a displaced loved one carried off to safety elsewhere during wartime haunts the striking heroine of the second
installment in Christian Wagner’s Balkan Blues Trilogy. Labina Mitevska (Before the Rain) stars as Senada, a young
mother whose only daughter Aida was removed from Bosnia-Herzegovina during the worst years of the war and
presumably adopted into a Western European family. Searching for her after the war, Senada follows her intuition;
eventually she enters illegally into Germany, where she discovers through a UNICEF worker (played by Katrin Sass,
so memorable as the frazzled mother in Wolfgang Becker’s Good Bye, Lenin!) the harsh truth of postwar adoption:
Aida is alive and well and living happily with a German family. Dark secrets then emerge, leaving no one unscathed
in this expertly crafted, superbly performed drama. —Andy Bailey
• • • Presented in association with the Goethe Institute San Francisco
• • •Sponsored by Blithedale Terrace
The Way I Spent the End of the World (Cum mi-am petrecut sfarsitul lumii) ROMANIA 2006 110 MINS
Tuesday, October 9 4:30 pm WAY09S Sequoia
Sunday, October 14 11:30 am WAY14R Rafael
Director Catalin Mitulescu Producers Catalin Mitulescu, Daniel Mitulescu and David Thion Screenwriters Catalin Mitulescu,
Andreea Valean Cinematographer Marius Panduru Editor Cristina Ionescu Cast Dorteea Petre, Timotei Duma, Cristian Vararu,
Ionut Becheru Print Source Film Movement
FOCUS: ROMANIA • In Romanian with English subtitles • Most recent exports from Romania’s extraordinary new
wave have focused on the aftermath of former president Nicolae Ceausescu’s reign of terror, but Catalin Mitulescu’s
drama unflinchingly looks at life under the stranglehold of communist rule. The country’s “Christmas revolution”
is still several months away, and the teenage Eva (Doroteea Petre, winner of the 2006 Un Certain Regard best
actress award at Cannes) is struggling under the yoke of frustrated parents and suffocating under her high school’s
stifling rules. After her boyfriend accidentally breaks a bust of their Beloved Leader and lets her take the rap, Eva is
transferred to an even stricter reformatory school. And what’s with their rebellious new neighbor and his mysterious
scheme? Filled with tenderness and tart with humor, this coming-of-age story filters a nation’s turbulent history
through an adolescent’s awakening. —David Fear
• • • Presented in association with the Romanian Cultural Institute New York
2007 MVFF TICKETS | 877.874.MVFF (6833)