– Forastera by Lucía Aleñar Iglesias will open the gathering, which will unspool from 24 July-2 August, while Rodrigo Sorogoyen’s The Beloved will bring it to a close
Forastera by Lucía Aleñar Iglesias
The 16th edition of the Atlàntida Mallorca Film Fest (a project run by the Filmin platform) will take place from 24 July-2 August on the Balearic Island of the same name. Forastera, a movie directed by Lucía Aleñar Iglesias and rewarded by FIPRESCI at Toronto, will open the festival, while The Beloved by Rodrigo Sorogoyen, which competed at the most recent Cannes Film Festival, will bring it to a close. Plus, over the course of the gathering, tribute will be paid to French musician Alexandre Desplat, Mexican actor-director Gael García Bernal and Danish thesp Trine Dyrholm via the Masters of Cinema Award.
The Official Section will present 14 titles in competition. Standing out among the names behind them are singer Charli XCX in her first lead role, starring in the Polish-US comedy-drama Erupcja, helmed by Pete Ohs; actress Sian Clifford (best known for the series Fleabag), who plays a lady from British high society in Lady by Samuel Abrahams; and Ireland’s Fiona Shaw, who tops the bill of the historical film The Education of Jane Cumming by Sophie Heldman, which adapts the novel that previously provided the inspiration for the anti-lesbophobia masterpiece The Children’s Hour by William Wyler.
Added to these works are two coming-of-age tales: Truly Naked by Muriel d’Ansembourg, a Dutch movie about a boy who shoots porn films online together with his father, which garnered much acclaim at the Berlinale; and the UK flick Extra Geography, the debut feature by Molly Manners after she won a BAFTA for the series In My Skin, which was widely lauded following its Sundance premiere.
Spanish cinema will be represented by three feature debuts: the world premiere of A fuego by Estel Díaz, a drama laced with urban music starring Zoe Bonafonte, Ruslana and Omar Banana (see the news); Bad Beast by Bàrbara Farré; and the recent winner of the Transilvania Film Festival, Lionel, a family road movie by Carlos Saiz that also got an airing at Seminci.
Also taking part are the most recent winner of the Göteborg Film Festival, Denmark’s The Last Resort by Maria Sødahl, which calls into question the relationship between tourism and migration, and Miss Mermaid by France’s Pauline Brunner and Marion Verlé, a fable about a thirty-something woman working as a cleaning lady, who sees an opportunity to escape from her monotonous routine by immersing herself in the world of mermaids. And lastly, we have the Slovak production Father by Tereza Nvotová, a tense drama based on real events and shot in one sequence shot; Nina Roza by Geneviève Dulude-De Celles, the winner of the Silver Bear for Best Screenplay at the most recent Berlinale; Paradise, a thriller set in Ghana and directed by Canada’s Jérémy Comte; and 17 by Macedonian filmmaker Kosara Mitic, a feature debut that first bowed at the Berlinale.
Besides the Premiere (with 13 Spanish premieres), Arts and brand-new Trends (with offerings whose aesthetics or narratives embrace the new trends defining the digital era) sections, among others, one of the centrepieces of this edition has a Greek flavour: Theo Angelopoulos. Indeed, for the first time on Palma de Mallorca, audiences will get to see five masterpieces helmed by one of the best European directors of the 20th century: The Travelling Players, Landscape in the Mist, Ulysses’ Gaze, Eternity and a Day and The Dust of Time.
(Translated from Spanish)
