Memorimage 09/4
The festival in Reus ended last night. The jury chose ”Of Time and the City” by Terence Davies as the best film, honouring the personal courage of the director not to forget his personal commentary and creative use of archive material to describe Liverpool, his home town. For the best production Peter Kerekes was chosen for ”Cooking History”, an ambitious, structurally original and controversial treatment of War. Both films have been reviewed on this site.
For the research the jury gave the prize to ”Shanty Town – The Forgotten City” (PHOTO) for its excellent work to find and convey a part of Barcelona unknown to most people. Here is the catalogue description of the film:
During the post-war period, hundreds of thousands of people came to Barcelona, fleeing from poverty and political persecution. Given the lack of housing on their arrival, many of them spent years living in caves and shacks. They were workers looking to improve their quality of life, forced to live in a shantytown. When flats were finally built, they were constructed in substandard buildings and remote areas, a phenomenon known as “vertical shantytowns”. Modern Barcelona has chosen to forget a part of its history, a history that is now told through the mouths of those who endured it. Images shot by amateur filmmakers contrast with the official testimony, offering a glimpse of what that city of forgotten residents was really like.
