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I Died (ZDECHŁAM) first came on my radar as one of my Best of Fest picks from the Berlin Music Video Awards, making it an absolute pleasure to see it land in the Directors Notes submissions list! I was taken then by its gothic atmosphere, stunning black and white images, smart use of negative space and subtle manipulation of horror tropes. And it gets better with each watch. Telling the story of a heavily pregnant unmarried woman arriving in a convent before having her baby taken away from her, its deliciously violent rebuke of Catholic mores makes it a satisfying, yet unsettling experience. At once austere in its composition, while striking and provocative in its fleet narrative development, it is an elevated music video that works as a piece of art in its own right. Joining us today Director Zuzanna Plisz talks about being affected by the current abortion debate in Poland,...

Life on the road and fantasy worlds held sway at the 29th edition of the EnergaCamerimage International Film Festival on Saturday, winning big after a week of scaled down but enthusiastic industry events, seminars and screenings celebrating cinematography.

“C’mon C’mon,” shot by Robbie Ryan and directed by Mike Mills, won this year’s Golden Frog. The film, which tells the story of a radio journalist driving between American cities with his nine-year-old nephew Jesse, enchanted jurors with its black-and-white imagery, one of several top contenders in monochrome.

Ryan, praised for his “precise and humble eye” and “cinema that touches the soul,” accepted via video from a film set in Hungary, calling “C’mon C’mon” a “small film,” made just prior to the Covid pandemic by a crew “traveling around like a circus.”

Buzz built early on during the fest for Joel Coen’s “The Tragedy of Macbeth,” shot by Bruno Delbonnel,...

Leave No Traces Venice, day nine. There’s something almost ineffably melancholic about watching a festival empty out. As I type these words, twenty-four hours or so before the awards will be announced, the press room I’ve spent an unhealthy amount of time in, is now home to a smattering of survivors. The end is nigh, people are flocking home, and the jury led by Bong Joon-ho is busy picking this year’s winners somewhere on the island. It’s been a strange, uneven ride, with a lineup so front-loaded it was perhaps only natural that the fest’s second week wouldn’t live up to the sheen of the first few days. But the last stretch was still home to some belated surprises, among them, Jan P. Matuszyński’s Leave No Traces. A follow-up to his 2016 Locarno prizewinning The Last Family, Matuszyński’s second feature is based on...

“Leave No Marks” would be a more apt translation from the Polish title of “Leave No Traces,” referring as it does to a horrifying command from one police officer to another, heard early on in this marathon fact-based drama: “Hit the stomach so you leave no marks, not on the back.” They’re in the middle of administering a merciless, unprovoked beating — a hard rain of combat boots and handheld batons — to a very soft target in 18-year-old student Grzegorz Przemyk, holding nothing back but acute physical evidence of their ire, even as the victim’s stunned best friend looks on. Those missing marks, or traces, are only the first deception in the state’s protracted, punishing efforts to disprove what they know really happened, and Jan P. Matuszyński’s film unravels the conspiracy with earnest, exhaustive fury.

It’s a true-crime story that could be dramatized with equal power as a tight,...

The haunting case of Polish student and poet Grzegorz Przemyk dominated the country’s national media throughout 1983. It divided Poland into an Us vs Them scenario as the nation was still in the grips of heavy Soviet influence and struggling to survive in a stratocracy. Jan P. Matuszynski’s Venice Film Festival competition entry, Leave No Traces , puts the entire case of Przemyk’s death and all those involved on display by showing how far military and crooked politicians will go to circumvent responsibility by using threats and intimidation to keep a witness from testifying in court.

Good lengthy movies have a purpose of existing that way. Every hour is utilized to keep the story moving forward. Leave No Traces (which clocks in at 2:45) could have been a film with a powerful statement about state-sanctioned violence. In the end, it’s just an overstuffed slog that could have benefitted...

New Europe Film Sales has closed several deals for “Leave No Traces,” from Polish director Jan P. Matuszyński (“The Last Family”), which has its world premiere in competition at the Venice Film Festival. Variety has been given exclusive access to the film’s trailer.

Produced by Aurum Film, the production house behind Jan Komasa’s Oscar-nominated “Corpus Christi,” pic has sold to Imagine Film Distribution for Benelux and Scanorama for Lithuania. As previously announced, the film was also picked up by Memento Films Distribution for France.

Set in Warsaw in the 1980s, “Leave No Traces” is based on the real-life story of a young man (Tomasz Ziętek) who witnesses the fatal beating of his friend (Mateusz Górski) by the police. Determined to testify about the killing in court, he must stand up to the full force of a communist regime that employs the secret service, the police force, the media...

Chicago – The recently completed 52nd Chicago International Film Festival offered a world perspective on cinema, and honors the films that will influence the arts culture for years to come. Their Awards Night was October 21st, 2016, and was hosted by Richard Roeper, film critic of the Chicago Sun Times. The recipient of the top prize of the fest, the Gold Hugo, was “Sieranevada” (Romania), directed by Cristi Puiu.

The 52nd Chicago International Film Festival Awards Night was Oct. 21, 2016

Photo credit: Chicago International Film Festival

The awards event took place at the AMC River East Theatre. Presenters included Programming Director Mimi Plauché, programmers Anthony Kaufman and Sam Flancher, plus various jury members – which included Geraldine Chapman (actress and daughter of Charlie Chaplin), who presided over the International Feature Film Competition Jury. Patrick McDonald of HollywoodChicago.com sat on the Animation Shorts jury. The Festival’s highest honor is the Gold Hugo, named...

Debut competition titles at cinematography festival unveiled.

Camerimage, the International Film Festival of the Art of Cinematography (Nov 15-22), has revealed the line-up of films screening in three of the festival’s competition sections including Cinematographers’ Debut, Directors’ Debut and Student Etudes.

The entries are:

Cinematographers’ Debut Competition

Duane Hopkins’ Bypass;

UK, 2014; Cinematographer: David Procter

Sidney Lexy Plaut’s Dark Samurai;

Denmark, 2014; Cinematographer: Sidney Lexy Plaut

Zeresenay Berhane Mehari’s Difret;

Ethiopia, USA, 2014; Cinematographer: Monika Lenczewska

Krzysztof Skonieczny’s Hardkor Disko;

Poland, 2014; Cinematographer: Kacper Fertacz

Arild Østin Ommundsen’s It’s Only Make Believe;

Norway, 2013; Cinematographer: Arild Østin Ommundsen

Michael Cody and Amiel Courtin-Wilson’s Ruin;

Australia, 2013; Cinematographer: Ari Wegner

Ester Martin Bergsmark’s Something Must Break;

Sweden, 2014; Cinematographers: Lisabi Fridell and Minka Jakerson

David Pablos’ The Life After;

Mexico, 2013; Cinematographer: José De- La-Torre

Saar Klein’s Things People Do;

USA, 2014; Cinematographer: Matthias Koenigswieser

Jonas Alexander Arnby’s When Animals Dream;

Denmark, 2013; Cinematographer: [link=nm...