Flying Film Festival/ 2
At the beginning of March I posted a text about a great initiative taken by young filmmakers – Francesca Scalisi and Mark Olexa – both graduated years ago from the Zelig Film School in Bolzano:
”The festival will start beginning of March and run until end of April. The 30 longhaul aircraft (A330-A340) of the SWISS are loaded (with films) within the first week of March, it serves all SWISS destinations around the world non-stop…
These are words from the website, link below: Welcome to the “Flying Film Festival, the first festival taking place entirely in the air. It will be “flying” in the months of March and April 2015 with the aim of promoting to a wider audience short documentaries with a strong cultural connotation and emerging directors.”
I have had the pleasure to watch the 9 competing short films as a member of a jury (grounded), I have given my points, not to be revealed here, and look forward to see the final result of jury AND airborn passengers votes. Nevertheless I dare – in short – to write
about some of the 9 films that overall absolutely live up to having a cultural connotation and are primarily made by young upcoming directors. There is originality and courage in the selection, some are daring in their storytelling, it’s not an easy collection of films, luckily, because if you sit 12 hours in an airplane it’s fine to have a bit of food for thought in between the bad food and the often brainless American action movies.
”Nos jours absolument doivent etre illuminés” (photo) by Jean Gabriel Périot is an intelligent and touching film where you hear inmates from behind the prison wall give a concert, while you see faces outside experience the music emotionally, close-ups of family to the onew in prison. Equally exciting is ”Modulations” by Delphine Abomigliano who invites you, for half an hour, to be close to a creative process in a record studio with an important social text conveyed by a rapper. A classic has been taken into the programme, wonderful ”Ten Minutes before the Flight of Icarus” by Lithuanian master Arunas Matelis, from 1990, an allegory of the country’s independence from USSR. A personal reflection is made by Annie Gisler with ”Le Dimanche en Famille”, charming it is, and serious and funny, on the best and worst institution ever: the Family!
We want good documentaries in airplanes, when we fly long distance. This con amore project developed and launched by young filmmakers in Switzerland is a first start that deserves a big applause! Next year again, please!
