From the movie She A Chinese
From the Movie La Tigra Chaco
Gothenburgh Film festival
Gothenburgh Film Festival has celebrated its 33rd festival and has every reason to be proud. Shall we believe their own numbers over 130.000 tickets has been sold, and over 200.000 have visited all events that have been arranged during 10 hectic days. It is quite impressing to really put a mark on the city like Gothenburg Film Festival (GIFF) does. With an extensive programme of some 450 films the festival reaches out to a variety of inhabitants. Sitting in a theatre that houses over 200 seats, 10 am a Tuesday morning it is quite amazing to recognize the theatre is almost full of enthusiasts waiting for an Indonesian psycho-horror-splatter film.
Personally I have been to the festival more or less regularly since 1995. The programme has grown extensively since that time, and on the way you’d might feel the festival also somewhat lost it sense of direction. The Nordic profile has grown to be the most important focus at the festival, but its international engagement is still strong through activities like the Göteborg International Film Festival Fund (GIFFF). This year this gave a result in Focus Africa a programme initiated by GIFFF and the Rotterdam Fest. Focusing African films is important in a period where stories are dominated by Hollywood and mainstream commercial thinking. Still I’m not sure that their project “Forget Africa” films of Africa made by Asian film directors ordered and paid for by GIFFF and Hubert Bals fund is the right way to go.
As a programmer for Films from the South Gothenburg Film Festival has served as a way of updating myself on the most important films screening in the fall season the year before. I found some fine moments in ONE – ZERO (Kamla Abu Zekry, Egypt), SHE A CHINESE (Xiaolu Guo, China) and LA TIGRA, CHACO (Federico Godfrid and Juan Sasiaín, Argentina).
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