San Sebastian Film Festival ::

Jorge Silva Melo

Portugal

97 min.

The Summer holidays of 1964. Carlos, a violin teacher at the Porto Conservatory and a determined bachelor, accepts an invitation to spend the month of August with a childhood friend whom he last saw three years ago on the occasion of his friend's wedding. Both on the beach and in their daily contacts, Carlos believes he has discovered continual signs of a marital crisis. He begins to feel an irresistible desire to see this crisis unfold and thus regain the intimacy he has lost and become even more certain of being right when he defends his celibacy. However none of these signs manifest themselves. Dario and Alda -the couple- have found a kind of peace and happiness in marriage which Carlos can neither understand nor accept. The announcement of Alda's pregnanc brings not only the holiday to an end, but also Carlos' solitary speculations.

Cartas del parque / Letters from the Park

Tomás Gutiérrez Alea

Cuba

87 min.

In this story, as in all respectable love stories, however simple they may be, there is at least one triangle: Pedro, Juand and Maria live in a world not entirely unknown to us making us sympathize with them, share their sentiments, suffer and be happy with them helping us to keep our distance from them. The story takes place in 1913 in Matanza city, a hundred kilometres to the east of Havana. Two young lovers, each on their own iniciative and without the others knowledge, contract the services of a penman in order to communicate their sentiments to one another through letters which he writes. Little by little, the penman's sentiments become stronger that his will providing the eternal truth: that you can't trick love.

Cinématon

Gérard Courant

France

180 min.

The unusual experience of a young cineast who, for years, has been filming human faces in Super 8 mm, which, no matter what is done with them, still end up being "portraits". This is a silent film with a provocative character, as much for those being filmed as for the spectators. This programme offers "interpretations" of Godard, Wenders, Arrabal, Scholondorff, Marustka, Dermers, Fuller, Terry Gilliam, El Indio Fernández, Tanner, Scola, Oshima and others.

Not in competition

Diario de invierno / Winter Diary

Francisco Regueiro

Spain

104 min.

A police commissioner has felt a loathing towards his father since he was small. A fire lit in a house by a child revives one of the memories in the chain of events which started this loathing, together with that of his father0s profession: euthanasia.

El aire de un crimen / A Crime in the Air

Antonio Isasi Isasmendi

Spain

124 min.

This film is set in Spain the 1950s. The corpse of an unknown person appears beside the village fountain in a mythical region called Bocentellas. The inhabitants of the village ask Capitain Medina, a young officer from San Mamud, the nearby military fort, to help until the judge comes. When the judge arrives, he makes his observations and orders the body to be taken away. This death completes the circle of started months before by the disertion of two soldiers from the fort. The appearance of a mysterious coronel, shady economical interests and some prostitutes, trigger off the development of a strange and complicated intrigue which will produce an unexpected and prompt ending.

Frantic

Roman Polanski

USA

120 min.

During their honeymoon 20 years ago, Dr. Rcihard Walker and his wife, Sondra, fell in love with Paris. Now, a medical conference has enabled them to renew their romance with the city and with each other. A wayward ride in a battered taxi and the noisy welcome of the Fench capital, shaking itself awake at dawn, have given way to the elegance of a Gran Hotel. As Richard Walker steps into an the shower , he sees Sondra lazing languidly on the bed. When he emerges, the suit is empty. Her damp robe is draped across the covers. Nearby is a suitcase which isn't hers.With shattering suddenness, an extraordinary man is thrust into an extraordinary adventure. He finds himself completely on his own, a stranger in a strange land, challenged to perform acts of heroism of wich he never knew himsel capable, not wanting to be a hero but having no choice. He descends into the demimonde of Paris, where he comes upon an unlikely guide a beautiful young Parisienne who holds the key to the mystery of his wife's disappearance. Their meeting in a loft where a man lies murdered leads to an alliance of suspicion and self-interest, danger and disturbing attraction.

Not in competition

Krótki film o milosci / A Short Film About Love

Krzysztof Kieslowski

Poland

85 min.

Tom, aged 19, falls in love with Magdalena, aged over 30, a neighbour across the street. Every night Tom clings to a telescope to watch Magdalena's apartment and the men, who come to her. Sometimes he gives her silent telephone rings or sends to her false notices from the post office where he works, or he delivers a milk bottle to her soor-step only to hear her voice. Finally they come together, and he tells her al about it.Magdalene is baffled because she no longer believes in love. The fact that tom is in love with her just cannot occur to her. Eventually Tom fails in what has come so easily to Magdalene's other men. Magdalene accepts tom's failure as natural, but for him this is a real tragedy. So Tom locks himself up in his apartment and cuts his wrists with a razor. Now, magdalene watches Tom's apartment through the binoculars, her intuition telling her that she may have lost something important. She jumps to her feet at dawn and the sound of milk bottles and she goes to the post office to find tom absent from work. Finally they meet again, Tom with his wrists bandaged all over and Magdalena reealizes that it is hard to reverse the course of events, even if it is only love.

La amiga / The Girlfriend

Jeannine Meerapfel

Argentina - Federal Republic of Germany

108 min.

This films is centered on the frienship of two women who were born and brought up together in a suburb south of Buenos Aires. In the mid-1940s the two young girls swear, whilst watching a romantic film, that they will become actresses. The years pass and one of the girls, Raquel, becomes a famous actress. The other one, Maria, stays in the specialized labourer and childhood friend. Maria is a traditional mother who loves her home and her children. The historically dark period of military power arrives in 1976. Repression comes knocking on Maria's door when her eldest child is kidnapped. In her desperation, Maria turns to Raquel for help. This experience not only increases the sentiments and friendship between the two friends, but also underlines the growing differences between them.Raquel is obliged to leace the country; she is exiled to Germany. Raquel lives submerged in the nostaldia of loved ones and places she has left behind whilst Maria, at home, transforms the suffering and fears she felt when her son disappeared into strength and opposition agains the dictatorship.

La boca del lobo / The Wolve's Mouth

Francisco J. Lombardi

Peru - Spain

122 min.

Forces of law and order take control of Chuspi, a small village in the "emergency zone", devastated by the revolutionary movement Sendero Luminoso. With neither strategy nor a sufficient command, Vitín Luna (the principal character of the film), and his colleagues, must confront an invisible army which appears to be stornger than them. The arrival of officer Iván Roca changes everything. He is strict in discipline and almost brutal in punishment and shows himself to be a man capable of fighting the revolutionaries until their annihialation.Vitín sees Roca as a model officer, however, his methods are becoming more and more violent and enrestrained. Exasperated by the enemy's persistance, Roca accuses the whole population of the village basing himself on unfounded suspicions and mistaken interpretations. In view of the terrible events which are becoming a habit, Vitín has to choose between blind obedience and his own conscience.The Wolve's Mouth is a feature film wich offers a view of the anti-revolutionary flight and its excesses; a study about that of which man is capable when he feels isolated in a violent climate, urged on by solitude and death.

Land der Väter, Land der Söhne / Land of Parents, Land of Children

Nico Hofmann

Federal Republic of Germany

96 min.

A son investigates his father's life. Due to the collapse of the family business Thomas Kleinert, a 25-year-old journalist and son od a deceased manufacturer, starts out on a search which will lead him to delve into the past.Thomas' father died in 1972. He was considered as a suuccessful manager who made his business prosper in the years during and after the war. Thomas finds out that his father committed suicide and that his mother has kept the fact a secret for all these years. Whilst still under the influence of the company's collaspse, Thomas begins his investigation, wanting to understand his father whom he lost when he was only twelve years old. When he is looking for the causes which pushed his father to commit suicide, he discovers more and more common points between the history of the company and his father's own destination Thomas discovers that his father took charge of a Jewish company in Poland in 1942 for his own benefit. He used the money he made from this "branch", where the workers were prisoners from concentrations camps, to build a factory in Germany. Before the end of the war he was able to save some large Polish machinery to goods trains used by the defense forces.

Malaventura / Misfortune

Manuel Gutiérrez Aragón

Spain

90 min.

This story begin son the day that Manuel becomes sad looking at a design on a plate. Nothing had happened to him and nothing worried him, buy suddenly he goes catatonic before this fine Sevillian plate. Perhaps the drawing brought him some recent memories withou his knowing it.. the image of Rocio, a girl he had gone out with three of four times before she dissapeared form homre.Manuel is eighteen yearls old, son to a good family and a good student. His mother says he has no reason to be sad. She eventually sends him to a dentist in Seville because of a wisdom tooth is coming in. While sitting in the dentist, wrapped in discomfort and pain, Manuel sees a dancing couple on the terrace opposite... but no, the man is pushing the woman towards the edge... they struggle... Manuel tries to rise and the dentist cut his gum, holds him, and takes his protestations as demonstrations of pain, telling him to be patient, that he's almost finished. Meanwhile the woman falls over the edge and the man disappears. Manuel has been a witness to murder.

Not in competition

Married to the Mob

Jonathan Demme

USA

104 min.

Angela DeMarco is fed up and wants to change her way of life. When her husband is murdered (by a paid killer), she escapes to Long Island, leaving blood-stained money behind her.On the south-east side of Manhattan she tries to start a new life, but it is not easy to get away from relatives and money, and Angela is being pursued as much by the "Family" as by the Federal Agents.A Mafia chief called Tony Rosso makes her propositions -its his way of keeping the family together- promising vengeance for his hard wife, Connie the Mafia princess.But angela has fallen in love with Mike Downey, a FBI secret agent.

Muhsin Bey / Mr. Muhsin

Yavuz Turgul

Turkey

102 min.

Mr. Muhsin, a musical impresario of classical Turkish musica stives to mantain musical standards ina city, in Istambul, where music, along with everything else, is deteriorating. His tragi-comic adventure begins when he meets Ali Nazik, newly arrived from the provinces. Ali Nazik is determined to hit the bid time wiht his countri singing marked with a heav local accent. He begs Muhsin Bey to become his manager. Muhsin Bey resists with all his might, but finally succumbs. He ends up compromising his strongly held beliefs, and lands himself in jail.

Myonichi / Tomorrow

Kazuo Kuroki

Japan

105 min.

On 8th August, 1945, foreign traders, American prisioners, some civilians of no use to the military service and many women separated from their husbands because od the war, are all living together in Nagasaki. In spite of constant bombings and the difficulty in finding provisions, the population tries its hardest to lead a normal life. They get married, love affairs flourish, children are born, old people die. All dream of the day when the wat will end and they can go home to their loved ones. However, ont eh 9th day at 11 o'clock in the morning, a curse falss from the sly which will destroy millions of dreams.

On the Black Hill

Andrew Grieve

United Kingdom

117 min.

Lewis and Benjamin Jones (Mike and Robert Gwilym), identical twin brothers now eigthy years old, wake one morning in the farmhouse where they have lived all their lives. Benjamin looks down at the green hills of England; Lewis looks back into Wales at the Black Hill. They wait for kevin, their great-nephew and only heir, to arrive and take them out in his car. It is around 1980.1885: Amos Jones (Bob Peck), a welsh farmer of about thirty, courts and weds Mar Latimer (Gemma Jones), daugther of an English vicar. In search of a home for the couple Mary uses her influence with the local English gnetry to get the permission to rent "The Vision", a vacant farm on the Welsh side of the border. Amos feels intimidated by her background and influence. Shortly afterwards, Mary becomes pregnant and gives birth to twin boys. The boys, now six years old, learn about the countryside and its history from Sam (Jack Walters), their grandfather. Meanwhile, Mary becomes pregnant once more and presents them with a baby sister, Rebeca. Amos and the neighbouring farmer Watkins (Eric Wynn) begin a bloody dispute over the boundaries of their land. After being bedredden for somre time, Sam dies.

Powaqqatsi

Godfrey Reggio

USA

99 min.

One moment, two worlds.Without a storyline, the film communicates directly through its images, developing its own rhythm, opening one's eyes to images of human manupulation and destruction. "Qatsi" is a Hopi-indian word meaning "life". Powaqqatsi follows Koyanisqatsi as the second part of a trilogy by director Godfrey Reggio. The first film contasted the untouched American landscape with images of industrial destruction, recording a frigthening ecological imbalance in America, while Powaqqatsi takes a more global approach. The Hopi word "ko yaa nis qatsi" is carged with significance and can best be translated as "a way of life that has lost its balance". "Powaqqatsi" is a concentration of the words "powaqa" meaning "a magician qho lives at the expense of others" and "qatsi", or "life". Images of the thirs world, impressions of the native cultures of Asia, India Africa and South America. Portraits and details of threatened traditions, a confrontation with the cultural achievements and legacies of individual tribes and races. Powaqqatsi is a document of human creativity and fantasy.

Not in competition

Remando al viento / Rowing With the Wind

Gonzalo Suárez

Spain

96 min.

The story starts in a desolate world of ice. a phantom boat calmy moves over the water. This boat takes Mary Shelley to an encounter with her "creature": the monster of Frankenstein.London, 1816: Mary and the poet Shelley escape and go to a meeting with Lord Byron whom they find exiled on the shore of Leman Lake Clara, Mary's stepsister and Lord Byron's lover, accompany the couple. The Shelleys, Clara, Byron and Polidori, Byron's friend and personal secretary spend their days rowing on the lake. They all maintain passsionate love/hate relationships. Plidori gets jealous over the growing fridnship between Shelley and Byron; Clara, on the other hand, feels humilliated and unappreciated by Byron. Amidst this stormy atmosphere, we see for the first time the "creature" whose fateful influence extends over all of them immediately. The death of Polidori, who is found hanging one night, puts an end to the happiness of Villa diodatti, thus provoking the return to London of the Shelleys and Clara, who is expecting Lord Byron's son. Only years later will she meet the poet again, and then in the decadent palace where he leads a dissolute life.

Sti skia toy fovou / In The Shadow of Fear

Giorgios Karypidis

Greece

92 min.

It is evident that the story of a man who, in order to succeed in composing music, must firts be initiated n anguish, is conveyed through surrealistic fiction with the dimensions of a thriller. Deucalion is harassed by the familiar ills of civilization (money, technology, individualism, isolation, lack of inspiration) and by the fear of the specific powers which control and repress (the legal authorities, the mass communications media). He escapes, panic stricken, trying to rid himself of the powers that ate after him and quite literally rejecting the elements which constitute his social identity. the charge of counterfeiting which he faces and for which he's being pursued is not only a question of money, but obviously has a wider existential nature. His flight from the city is chiefly a flight from the present and it enables him to find a lost memory and so to be led to knowledge and freedom. Because through this tortuous course he succeeds in ridding himself of the limiting "ego", as he meets and suffers with the "other". In this way from the musician he is taught the desinterested attachement to art, from the prostitute, like another Mary Magdalene, pity, from the old street cleaner-invisible hero the pain of suffering man, from the woman in the portrait the tragedy of absolute love. On the other hand, the state functions in a repressive manner, the church turns out tobe a institution incapable of provinding spiritual help (the priest does not undestand his "sin", in other words, his inability to grasp reality).

Stormy Monday

Mike Figgis

United Kingdom

92 min.

"At the age of 16, I was a part of rock'n'roll group in Newcastle. In the 1960s, Newcastle was like Liverpool, there were lots of good groups and excellent musicians. I left the group when I went to London to study music and where I found a part-time job: cleaning the Ronnie Scott Jazz Club in exchange for free entrance into the Club where I could listen to Roland Kirk, Ben Webster, Coleman Hawkins, Cecil Taylor, Art Bakley and many more of my heroes. I became an actor by accident and spent ten years travelling over the world with The People Show. Working in the United States marked an important turning point for me, and my trip through Poland really gave me a much more decisive awareness. That's where I discovered just how isolating the English culture is. When I decided to write and film Stormy Monday, all of theses elements were naturally implicated within the framework of a jazz club in Newcastle, where a Polish jazz orchestra was playing during an American festival, where the young guy cleans the club and falls in love with a beautiful American woman, exprofessor of the gangster who wants to buy the club".

Not in competition

Sunset

Blake Edwards

USA

110 min.

the only active master of North American comedy has combined various film types, from western to police films, at the same time rendering a mischievious homage to the film world. Round about the time when the first Hollywood Oscar ceremony is going to be held, two mythical characters, William Earp and Tom Mix, must discover the identity of a murderer. Eye-winking, pleasant jokes and a discreet dramatic tone are all found in this las work by the director of Breakfast at Tiffany's and Days of Wine and Roses.

Testimony

Tony Palmer

United Kingdom

157 min.

The film, based on shostakovich's memoirs, as related to and edited by his colleague, Solomon Volkov, is not just the story of a composer. In fact, the musical aspect of his life is only the sub-plot to a far greater drama, the relatioship between Shostakovich and Stalin. Testimony is about Russia during the reign of Stalin. While politicians, generals, peasants, poets, Church leades were being purged and destroyed -in all, some 31 million of them- Shostakovich somehow survived. How? Why? At what cost, personal as well as public?

Not in competition

The Fruit Machine

Philip Saville

United Kingdom

103 min.

Set in Liverpool, against the backdrop pf deprivation found in any modern coty, The Fruit Machine follows the story of two seventeen-year old boys, Eddie, innocent and on the run from home; and Michael, street-wise and a hustler who lives by his wits. Both desire, for different reasons, to escape their lives.The land of milk and honey is portrayed by Brighton on the South Coast of England. The escape is further forced on them, when they witness the gangland murder of Anabelle, the transvestite hostess of the Fruit Machine Club. Fearing for their own lives, at the hands of hired killer, they are thrown into the arms of gay opera singer and his manipulative business manager. Both of these characters shameslessly exploit and use Michael but he in return, understands the approach seeing them only as a meal ticket. Eddie, the dreamer, oblivious to the corruption around him, sees only the beauty and quality of life. He is totally unprepared for the arrival of the ominous killer, Echo.

The Last Temptation of Christ

Martin Scorsese

USA

144 min.

This film is a modern interpretation of Jesus as a man suffering from anguish and doubts about fate and his mission in life. The prologue of Kazantzakis' novel clearly states that it "tries to affectionately explore the eternal spiritual conflict: the fight between flesh and soul". In his agony Jesus, who is suffering from headaches, is hesitant, undecided, and lacks the security necessary to be sure that the voice which he hears comes from God and not from Satan. He has been accused by his best friend, Judas, of collaborating with the Romans for using his skills as a carpinter in the construction of crosses, the same ones which are used for crucifixions. After having saved Mary from a stoning, Jesus tries out a new stage of his mission as religious leader, preaching the gospel and to love thy neighbour. But he is still crucified and, in the last moments before death, pass as if in a dream where Jesus wonders what his life could have been like if it had been "normal". He imagines that he gets married to Mary Magdalene, and makes love to her; here there are a couple of scenes which have created controversy. Sorrounded by his family and friends, Jesus gets old and accuses Paul the Evangelist of being a liar for declaring that Jesus died on the cross and that, three days later, he rose from the dead.

Not in competition

Wherever You Are

Krzysztof Zanussi

Poland - Federal Republic of Germany

105 min.

1938, Julian, a businessman/diplomat, arrives in Poland with his beautiful wife, Nina, to take carge of a number of German factories. Newly-married, the couple share similar cosmopolitan backgrounds, but begin to discover that their approaches to life are quite different. Julian is pragmatic and logical, while Nina is sensitive, generous and deeply religious. While on a belated honeymoon on a friend's estate in the country, Nina falls from a horse and is apparently killed, but she miracously recovers. During her convalescence on the estate she gets to know Stas, their host's son, who goes back to Warsaw with her to work for Julian. Outwardly, lead a glamorous life, but each is privately suffering an intense pressure: Nina realizes that war is coming and Julian discovers that the factories are smuggling ars to German suporters. Instead of telling the police, he and Stas get rid of the arms, and suffer violent reprisals from the Germans: Julian's offices are burned and Stas is murdered. Estrangement seems inevitable for Julian an Nina.

Zhen nü / Good Woman

Huan Jianzhong

China

110 min.

Qingyu and Guihua are two young women who live in different times, but both suffer the trauma of tradicional Chinese morality. Qingyu is an innocent Qing Dynasty maiden of only 18. After her husband dies an early death, she is forced to remain a widow. The rest of her life she chants scriptures and abstains from eating meat. Her only companies are an oil lamp and a dog. In her self realization process, Qingyu gradually becomes aware of the evils of feudal ethics and dies for lover, nursing her hatred. Guihua is a modern day innkeeper. she is young, beautiful and hard working. Her husband is a truck driver named Wu Laoda. After suffering enough of her husband's maltreatment Guihua asks for a divorce. Because of this action, she faces insults and abuse from her neighbours, and is almost buried alive.

Entry

Recover password

New user registration