Venice parallel sidebar Settimana Internazionale della Critica (International Critics’ Week) has unveiled the lineup for its 41st edition.
The section, organised by the Union of Italian Film Critics (SNCCI) and focused on works by emerging filmmakers, will showcase seven features in competition and two films out of competition.
Colombia has a strong presence this year with two works tapping into the country’s turbulent history. Bibiana Rojas Gómez and Juan David Cárdena will compete with The End of Times, a radical essay film using archive footage and artificial intelligence to reflect on memory and colonialism. They are joined by countryman Sebastián Múnera’s Meteorite, which is described as an intense female-centred story set in a land still haunted by the ghosts of violence.
Further competition titles include Tunisian director Kamel Laaridhi’s dystopian drama The H@llow Man, imagining a future in which emotions and memory are controlled by technology, and London, the debut feature of Brazilian directors Victor Di Marco and Márcio Picoli, a queer story that places physicality, desire and the freedom of self-determination at its centre.
Chilean-Indian London-based director Shalini Adnani is also in the mix with Our Share of Sand, a timely family drama reflecting on inequality and environmental crisis. It was showcased in Cannes this year at the project stage as part of the British Film Institute’s Great 8 initiative.
Italy is represented in the competition with Tommaso Usberti’s Prima della Guerra, described as an intense coming-of-age story set in the Po Valley addressing contemporary masculinity with extraordinary maturity.
Completing the lineup is Zoom In, Zoom Out by Chinese filmmaker Dong Jie, a work that weaves together mystery, online gaming and urban alienation to capture the anxieties of Generation Z.
Screening Out-of-Competition, Marco Santi’s existential noir Il grande Giaffa, starring Edoardo Pesce, will open the section, while Rider, the latest work from award-winning filmmaking and musical duo Roan Johnson and Davide Pavanello, aka Dade, is the closing film.
The latter work is described as an urban musical using the language of rap “to explore precarious work, the desire for emancipation and the conflicts shaping a new Italy”.
The selection for the 41st edition is curated by General Delegate Beatrice Fiorentino together with committee members Matteo Berardini, Marianna Cappi, Francesco Grieco and Marco Romagna.
The 41st Venice International Critics’ Week will take place on the Venice Lido from September 2 to 12 alongside the 83rd Venice International Film Festival.
Founded in 1984 by Lino Micciché, has previously showcased the early works of Kevin Reynolds, Mike Leigh, Olivier Assayas, Harmony Korine, Pedro Costa and Pablo Trapero, as well as major names in Italian cinema including Carlo Mazzacurati, Sergio Rubini, Antonio Capuano, Roberta Torre and Gianni Di Gregorio.
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