Boreal by Federico Adorno
The Locarno Film Festival announced this morning the lineup for its 76th annual edition, which includes a couple of Latin American titles in its official competition, as well as a special sidebar dedicated to South American cinema.
Seven years after Eduardo ‘Teddy’ Williams won the top prize in the Filmmakers of the Present competition at Locarno with his debut feature The Human Surge, the Argentine director returns to the Swiss film festival with The Human Surge 3 / El auge del humano, which is the only Latin American entry in this year’s Pardo d’Oro international competition. Shot in Taiwan, Sri Lanka, and Peru and almost entirely with a 360° camera, the film capture the private daily lives and thoughts of a group of young people who are trying to change their realities through fantasy and imagination.
The Mexican film All the Fires / Todos los incendios, the debut feature by Mauricio Calderón Rico, will have its world premiere in the Filmmakers of the Present competition. The film follows Bruno, who is an arsonist teenager. Ian is in love with him. Perhaps the feeling is mutual, but Bruno doesn't accept it and runs away from home the day his mother formalizes a new relationship. He tries to reaffirm his masculinity with an arsonist girl like him that he met online and lives in another city. Bruno returns home, but not before leaving a trail of all his fires and the consequences of it.
Additionally, the Open Doors section of Locarno will continue its special focus on Latin American and Caribbean cinema, which started last year and will end in 2024. This year’s sidebar will screen seven feature films and eleven shorts from seven South American countries: Bolivia, Ecuador, Guyana, Paraguay, Peru, Suriname, and Venezuela.
The Open Doors selection is comprised by the feature films 98 segundos sin sombra by Juan Pablo Richter (Bolivia), Autoerótica by Andrea Fernanda Hoyos Valderrama (Peru), Boreal by Federico Adorno (Paraguay), El rezador by Tito Jara H. (Ecuador), Tiempos futuros by Víctor Checa (Peru), Me & The Beasts / Yo y las bestias by Nico Manzano (Venezuela), and the documentary film Once Upon a Time in Venezuela / Érase una vez en Venezuela by Anabel Rodríguez Ríos.
The selected South American shorts are Angelo by Alex Plumb (Bolivia), Eating Papaw on the Seashore by Rae Wiltshire and Nickose Layne (Guyana), Hidden World by Kenrich Cairo (Suriname), Je kan toch lezen by Ananta Khemradj (Suriname), La distancia del tiempo by Carlos Ormeño Palma (Peru), La espiral roja by Lorena Colmenares (Venezuela), Plástico by Vero Kompalic (Venezuela), Rimana Wasi: hogar de historias by Ximena Málaga Sabogal and Piotr Turlej (Peru), Veo, veo by Tania Cattebeke Laconich (Paraguay), Volivia by Leandro Grillo (Bolivia), and Willkawiwa (El sagrado fuego de los muertos) by Pável Quevedo Ullauri (Ecuador).
The 76th edition of the Locarno Film Festival will take place August 2-12 in Switzerland.
