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Giona A. Nazzaro will serve as Artistic Director of the Locarno Film Festival for an extra three years following a contract extension announced this afternoon by the Swiss festival.

Nazzaro, a popular critic, film historian, and former head of the Venice Film Festival’s Critics’ Week, has been Locarno’s chief since 2021. Under the extension, he will stay with the festival until 2028.

“I would like to thank President Maja Hoffmann and the entire Board of Directors of the Locarno Film Festival for the trust and esteem placed in me and in the team that I have the privilege of leading,” Nazzaro said in a statement.

“To pursue together the work of these first five years, in a moment full of unheard-of transformations in the audiovisual sector and film industry – at a complex historical moment – is an exciting challenge that will inspire us confidently towards our 80th anniversary.”

The festival’s...

A partner for the fifth time to the Marché du Film’s Goes to Cannes showcase, the Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival – the Baltics’ biggest film event – will dedicate a curated program to films from the region for the first time.

The five projects, among the best from Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, will be pitched on May 16 in Cannes. All are in post-production and looking for co-financing, sales and festival exposure.

“Baltic have been on the rise for some time already,” said Triin Tramberg, curator of the Tallinn Black Nights Goes to Cannes, referring to the astounding success of Latvia’s Oscar-winning sensation “Flow” and Lithuania’s double Locarno wins for “Toxic” and “Drowning Dry,” among others.

“It’s the right time to make a small presentation of what to expect for Q2 2025- Q1 2026. I believe the five selected projects show the variety of quality we have, and I...

Conan O’Brien can be forgiven for quipping “Over to you, Estonia” after Flow won Latvia its first Oscar last month. The concept of a shared Baltic Cinema is still a relatively obscure one: “We have this complicated identity, culturally,” Laurynas Bareiša explained to me recently at the Riga International Film Festival in a cozy corner of one of city’s oldest cafes, “because we’re not part of the Slavic world and we’re not geographically Scandinavian, but I think there’s a sense developing of this Baltic region.” If a wave is forming in that part of the world, Lithuanian filmmakers have been at its forefront––at least since Bareiša’s debut, Pilgrims, won Venice’s Orizzonti section in 2021.

That success has since been bolstered by films like Marija Kavtaradzė’s Slow (a winner at Sundance in 2023) and the remarkable sweep of awards in Locarno last year, where Best...

The 2024 global film festival circuit featured something for every taste — from celebrated Lithuanian art house fare, such as Locarno winner Toxic and Drowning Dry, to such audience favorites as Sean Baker’s Anora and Jacques Audiard’s Emilia Pérez, from the highs to the lows, all garnished, of course, with a big serving of star power.

Some film events, such as Poland’s Camerimage, were hit by controversy, while others boosted their prominence, with Switzerland’s Locarno, for example, cementing its role as a top-tier global fest, and Karlovy Vary in the Czech Republic showed once again why it is known as Central Europe’s biggest film party of the summer.

Here’s a look at The Hollywood Reporter highlights of the 2024 film festival season.

Female power at Cannes.

Anora, Emilia Pérez and body horror The Substance, starring Demi Moore and Margaret Qualley, were among the revelations of the world premieres on the Croisette.

Rich Peppiatt’s Irish comedy Kneecap has won the Crystal Arrow for best film atFrance’s Les Arcs Film Festival, which ran from December 14-21, 2024 in the mountain resort town.

The origin story of the titular Irish-language hip-hop group earned a €20,000 digital promotional campaign in partnership with France Televisions for its release. Wayna Pitch will release the film in France on June 18, 2025 and Charades handles international sales.

Kneecap,whichhas been shortlisted in the best international feature and best song categories for the 2025 Oscars, racked up several prizes at the festival including the young jury prize voted on by high-school students,...

Rich Peppiatt’s drama Kneecap, which made it onto short list for Best International Feature Film for the 97th Academy Awards earlier this week, has scooped the top Crystal Arrow for best film at France’s Les Arcs Film Festival.

The prize, awarded in partnership with state broadcaster France Télévisions, comes with a digital promotional campaign worth €20,000 to support the theatrical release in France next summer by local distributor Wayna Pitch.

The picture also won Best Original Music, with Michael ‘Mikey J’ Asante winning the €1,000 prize donated by the French music rights management body Sacem.

The jury – announced as a collective without a president – comprised actor Pio Marmaï, writer Delphine de Vigan, director and producer Peter Kerekes, actor Céline Sallette, singer, actor and producer Sofiane Zermani and composer Herdís Stafánsdóttir.

In a third prize, decided by eight local high school students, the film also won the Young Jury Prize. The...

Thom Lunshof’s “First Zone,” Jaume Claret Muxart’s “Strange River” and Janicke Askevold’s “Solomamma” picked up a trio of post-production prizes out of this year’s Les Arcs Film Festival Industry Village, which ran from December 14 – 17.

Capping its 16th edition, the industry event brought together 700 professionals – among them leading sales agents, festival programers, producers and distributors – for three days of collective pitches and one-and-one meetings, all with a healthy amount of skiing (and fondue) thrown in.

Held at a mountaintop resort high in the French alps, the industry event has leaned it to its getaway status, forgoing formal public pitches in order to prioritize one-on-one connections via unique networking activities. “We’ve calculated that the time spent on ski lift is perfect for a pitch,” says industry head Jeremy Zelnick.

While French sales and distribution outfits often flock to the Industry Village, the Les Arcs remains focused on...

Jacques Audiard’s “Emilia Pérez” won best film, director, screenwriter and actress at the 37th European Film Awards, which were held Saturday in Lucerne, Switzerland.

The best film nominees included narrative features “The Room Next Door,” “The Seed of the Sacred Fig,” “The Substance” and “Vermiglio,” as well as documentaries “Bye Bye Tiberias,” “Dahomey,” “In Limbo,” “No Other Land” and “Soundtrack to a Coup d’Etat,” and animated films “Flow,” “Living Large,” “Savages,” “Sultana’s Dream” and “They Shot the Piano Player.”

The statuette for actress was won by Karla Sofía Gascón for “Emilia Pérez.” The other nominees were Renate Reinsve in “Armand,” Trine Dyrholm in “The Girl With the Needle,” Vic Carmen Sonne in “The Girl With the Needle” and Tilda Swinton in “The Room Next Door.”

The director award went to Audiard for “Emilia Pérez,” who beat Andrea Arnold for “Bird,” Pedro Almodóvar for “The Room Next Door,” Mohammad Rasoulof...

The European Film Awards is taking place in the Swiss city of Lucerne tonight (December 7) and Screen is revealing the winners live from the ceremony, which kicked off at 20.00 Cet.

Scroll down for winners

To read the winners as they are announced, you can refresh the page and scroll down to the full list below.

The ceremony is also being live-streamed below.

Emilia Pérez and The Room Next Door are the front-runners for this year’s awards with four nominations apiece.

Fifteen features compete for the best European film prize, up from five last year. This follows a recent rule...

Lithuanian drama Toxic, the debut feature of Saule Bliuvaite, has picked up the Golden Peacock award for best film at the 55th International Film Festival of India.

At the closing ceremony of the festival in Goa, the film also scooped the best actress award, shared between co-leads Vesta Matulyte and Ieva Rupeikaite.

Scroll down for full list of winners

Toxic follows two teenage girls from a bleak industrial town who join an extreme local modelling school. Featuring a cast of non-actors, it premiered at Locarno in August where it won the Golden Leopard for best film as well as the best first feature award.

Lithuanian filmmaker Saulė Bliuvaitė’s “Toxic” took home the best film award at the 55th International Film Festival of India (Iffi) in Goa. The jury, headed by Indian director Ashutosh Gowariker, recognized the film for its portrayal of adolescence and economic hardship.

Previously, at Locarno, “Toxic” won not only the Golden Leopard for Best Film in the fest’s premier International Competition — from a jury chaired by Austrian auteur Jessica Hausner — but also, in an unusual double, the top prize in the separately juried First Feature Competition.

Variety‘s positive review of “Toxic” described the film as “sobering but not without glimmers of tenderness and humor as female friendship takes root in a hopeless place,” adding that its “alternation between chilly composure and kinetic movement roughly corresponds with [the protagonist’s] wavering sense of self.”

Romanian director Bogdan Muresanu nabbed the best director prize for “The New Year That Never Came,” a multi-narrative feature set during a revolution.

The 55th International Film Festival of India (Iffi) has unveiled its main competition lineup, with 15 features vying for the Golden Peacock award carrying an INR4 million prize purse, notably featuring nine films directed by women.

Among the world premieres are Manijeh Hekmat and Faeze Azizkhani’s Iranian drama “Fear & Trembling,” exploring an older woman’s struggles with isolation, and Nikhil Mahajan’s “Raavsaheb,” an Indian crime thriller examining man-animal conflict in tribal lands.

The slate includes festival circuit standouts like Louise Courvoisier’s “Holy Cow” (France), which nabbed the Un Certain Regard Youth Prize at Cannes 2024, and Saulė Bliuvaitė’s “Toxic” (Lithuania), winner of the Golden Leopard at Locarno 2024. Bogdan Mureșanu’s Romanian revolution drama “The New Year That Never Came” arrives fresh from winning Venice’s Horizons and Fipresci awards.

The lineup also includes Belkis Bayrak’s “Gulizar” (Turkey), which played at Toronto and San Sebastian, and George Sikharulidze’s “Panopticon” (Georgia-u.

Vietnam talent showed strong presence at the 12th QCinema International Film Festival in Quezon City, Philippines, as Trương Minh Quý’s “Viet and Nam” claimed the top prize, while compatriot Dương Diệu Linh’s “Don’t Cry, Butterfly” secured the Grand Jury Prize.

“Viet and Nam,” which made its debut in Cannes Un Certain Regard, emerged victorious in the Asian Next Wave competition. The jury, comprising Babyruth Villarama, Gabor Greiner, Ming-Jung Kuo and Nguyen Le, praised the film for “conjuring the haunting presence of trauma and memories that are embedded within the landscape, and tenderly following a romance that unfolds deep within the coal mines.”

“Don’t Cry, Butterfly,” Dương’s debut feature, follows a middle-aged wife who, upon discovering her husband’s infidelity, embarks on a mystical journey in search of a better life. The film previously won three prizes at Venice.

Elizabeth Lo took home the Best Director award for “Mistress Dispeller,...

France’s Les Arcs Film Festival has unveiled the line-up for its 16th edition of its mountaintop movie marathon, taking place from December 14-21, 2024.

Eight European films will vie for the festival’s Crystal Arrow awards.

They include Rich Peppiatt’s Kneecap, a comedy about titular west Belfast hip-hop trio that is Ireland’s entry for the best international feature Oscar race and leads the Bifa 2024 nominations, Runar Runarsson’s Icelandic drama When the Light Breaks that opened this year’s Cannes Un Certain Regard, and Kurdwin Ayub’s Moon about a former Austrian martial arts master hired to train...

It’s a shame Toxic wasn’t around for the recent excretions of body-horror discourse. Saulė Bliuvaitė’s debut feature, winner of the Golden Leopard at this year’s Locarno Film Festival, does at least as much to turn the stomach with its tablet of tapeworm eggs than either of The Substance or A Different Man‘s Faustian cures. The rub in Bliuvaitė’s film is that such a pill exists, if only for those willing to wade onto the dark web––even Googling its side effects, as the protagonist discovers, should be done with some degree of caution. The anatomical anxieties and queasy professional demands that create a market for such horrors are the subject of Bliuvaitė’s film, which follows two teenage girls living in the shadow of a Lithuanian power station whose best hope for escape––a dubiously dangled carrot of catwalk fame in Tokyo or Paris...

Emilia Pérez and The Room Next Door have emerged as the front-runners for the European Film Awards 2024, with four nominations apiece.

The nominations for the main categories of this year’s awards, which take place on December 7 in Lucerne, were announced this morning by the European Film Academy.

Scroll down for full list of nominations

Fifteen features compete for the best European film prize, up from five last year. This follows a recent rule change which means that films shortlisted for the best documentary and animation categories can also compete in the section.

Emilia Pérez is nominated in the best European film category,...

The European Film Awards has broadened the scope of its prestigious Best European Film category for this year’s ceremony. Documentaries and animated features will now be eligible to compete alongside traditional narrative films for the top honor.

This change is reflected in the nominations announced ahead of the December 7 ceremony in Lucerne, Switzerland. A record 15 films are nominated in the expanded Best European Film category, representing a variety of storytelling formats. This includes narrative films like “Emilia Pérez” and “The Substance,” documentaries such as Mati Diop’s “Dahomey” and Lina Soualem’s “Bye Bye Tiberias,” as well as the animated film “Flow” by Gints Zilbalodis.

The directing category also highlights both established names and newcomers. Past winner Pedro Almodóvar received a nomination for “The Room Next Door,” alongside Jacques Audiard for “Emilia Pérez,” Andrea Arnold for “Bird,” Mohammad Rasoulof for “The Seed of the Sacred Fig,” and Maura Delpero for “Vermiglio.

“Teen-age fashion doll! A real grown-up fashion model! Everything is real!”*

This Barbie is a model.

She has long blonde hair and distinguishable pace. A comb. Fashionable jeans that might or might not be stolen from a friend. Removable high heels… that she cannot walk in. She is spectacular but normal. Suburban but cosmopolitan. Japan, Korea and Paris are lying in her feet.

She is Marija. She is Kristina. She is Gerda, she is Diana. She is outstanding and on sale, in case you have anything to offer in return – escape, for example.

Marija (Vesta Matulyte) achieves the impossible: you could argue that a model with a limp is like a violinist using only one arm to play a Bach concerto. But in Saule Bliuvaite’s captivating but devastating debut, the Lithuanian filmmaker mixes child’s play with adult activities by commenting on beauty standards and their clash with eastern European insecurities.

In the dreary industrial town of Marija and Kristina, escape seems like a distant dream. Marija has just moved in with her grandmother after her mother leaves for pastures new.

A limp leaves the 13-year-old an easy target for bullies at her new school. Kristina lives a similarly tough life with her dad, who prefers boozing to parenting. Their paths first cross through a scuffle over stolen jeans, but a shared love of fashion and desire to break free of their bleak surroundings brings the unlikely friends together.

When a shady modeling agency rolls into town offering the promise of fame and fortune abroad, it seems like the chance they’ve been waiting for. But their excitement soon gives way to despair as they subject themselves to punishing regimes to meet impossible standards of beauty. Starving themselves thin and making themselves throw up, the pressures pile higher with each audition.

Festival hits Anora, Emilia Perez and Maria, a new Stockholm Series strand for TV works, and a theme of ‘Men in Crisis’ are among the highlights of this year’s Stockholm International Film Festival (November 6-17), the programme of which has been announced today (October 9).

The international feature competition includes Alonso Ruizpalacios’ Berlin title La Cocina; RaMell Ross’ Telluride premiere Nickel Boys; and Gustav Moller’s Denmark-Sweden-France co-production Sons. It has an even split of 10 titles directed by women, and 10 by men.

Scroll down for the full list of Stockholm Competition titles

The 16-title documentary competition includes the world premiere of Garbo: Leave Me Alone,...

The first batch of titles were announced in August, and now with Locarno and Venice firming up the selection process, we now have our second wave of films. Sixteen feature films (nominations of the European Film Awards will be revealed on 5 November) have been added and we find the likes of Venice competition winners in Pedro Almodóvar, Maura Delpero and Dea Kulumbegashvili, Orizzonti section winner Bogdan Mureşanu, Locarno Golden Leopard winner by Saulė Bliuvaitė and Toronto preemed Hard Truths by master filmmaker Mike Leigh.

April directed by Dea Kulumbegashvili

Conclave directed by Edward Berger

Hard Truths directed by Mike Leigh

Harvest directed by Athina Rachel Tsangari

Misericordia directed by Emma Dante (Italy)

Moon directed by Kurdwin Ayub (Austria)

Mr.…...

The European Film Academy has added a further 16 feature films to the longlist – known as the Feature Film Selection – for the European Film Awards. With the already announced 29 films the list comprises 45 titles.

These films will now be considered for the nomination stage of the European Film Awards. The nominees will be revealed on Nov. 5.

Among the titles are several Venice award-winners: Pedro Almodóvar’s Golden Lion winner “The Room Next Door,” Grand Jury Prize winner “Vermiglio,” Special Jury Prize winner “April,” and Horizon winner “The New Year That Never Came.” Other titles include Edward Berger’s “Conclave,” Mike Leigh’s “Hard Truths” and Luca Guadagnino’s “Queer.”

The films were selected by the European Film Academy Board, who consulted with a team of invited experts.

The European Film Awards take place on Dec. 7 in Lucerne, Switzerland.

These are the additional titles in the Feature Film Selection:

“April,” directed by Dea Kulumbegashvili

“Conclave,...

Luca Guadagnino’s Queer and Pedro Almodóvar’s The Room Next Door are among the 16 films added to the European Film Award 2024 contenders.

Several UK features have been shortlisted including Edward Berger’s Conclave, Mike Leigh’s Hard Truths and Athina Rachel Tsangari’s Harvest. Joshua Oppenheimer’s The End, a UK co-production with Denmark, Germany, Ireland and Sweden, has also been selected.

Further features include Dea Kulumbegashvili’s April, which won the special jury prize at Venice Film Festival as well as Maura Delpero’s Vermiglio, a Silver Lion winner at Venice and Italy’s submission for international feature at the Oscars.

Payal Kapadia’s Cannes grand prix winner All We Imagine As Light and Mohammad Rasoulof’s special prize recipient The Seed Of The Sacred Fig, along with Athina Rachel Tsangari’s Venice selection Harvest are among the international competition selections at the 60th Chicago International Film Festival running October 16-27.

A packed line-up also brings Joshua Oppenheimer’s Telluride entry The End to the International Feature Competition, along with the North American premiere of The Quiet Son from Delphine Coulin and Muriel Coulin, which debuted on the Lido.

There are world premieres for Clarissa Campolina and Sérgio Borges’s Suçuarana...

Payal Kapadia’s Cannes grand prix winner All We Imagine Is Light and Mohammad Rasoulof’s special prize recipient The Seed Of The Sacred Fig, along with Athina Rachel Tsangari’s Venice selection Harvest are among the international competition selections at the 60th Chicago International Film Festival running October 16-27.

A packed line-up also brings Joshua Oppenheimer’s Telluride entry The End to the International Feature Competition, along with the North American premiere of The Quiet Son from Delphine Coulin and Muriel Coulin, which debuted on the Lido.

There are world premieres for Clarissa Campolina and Sérgio Borges’s Suçuarana...

Between the pale walls of a school changing room, we meet Marija (Vesta Matulytė), who is searching for her stolen jeans. After being bullied away by her peers for her limp, she continues the search on her own. Suddenly, she's transfixed by the hypnotic hollowness of an empty locker, the shot prolonging quietly. Submerging the first minutes of her first feature within a surreal realm, director Saulė Bliuvaitė signals a clear appetite for the eerie and the bizarre. Yet, they are used as expressions of a blunt reality that affects the lives of two girls who navigate their transforming identities. Placing the body at the core of her vision, the Lithuanian filmmaker crafts a coming-of-age story that glows with compassion for the bruises of shortened adolescence.

Marija lives with her grandmother (Eglė Gabrėnaitė) in a small industrial town, after being entrusted to her by her absent mother. Switching schools just as.

Toxic. Saulė Bliuvaitė says they chose a young cast 'because this film tackles the topic of adolescent bodies and girls who are not yet experiencing the changes of their body, they're still children and sexuality is projected on them' Photo: Akis Bado Locarno Film Festival’s Golden Leopard winner Toxic is a gritty coming-of-age tale set in against a backdrop of a depressed industrial town in Lithuania. It follows new kid in town Marija (Vesta Matulyte) as she forges an unexpected friendship with local teenager Kristina (Ieva Rupeikaite) and the pair of them join the mass of teenagers from far around trying to catch the eye of a shady modelling agency that is recruiting in the town.

Writer/director Saulė Bliuvaitė draws on her own experiences growing up to chart a tale that is as much about the teenagers’ own relationship with their bodies as it is outside influences. Mostly shot in a docureal style,...

Saulė Bliuvaitė with her Golden Leopard for Toxic Photo: Locarno Film Festival / Ti-Press Saulė Bliuvaitė's debut feature Toxic Toxic (Akiplėša) has won the Golden Leopard top prize at the Locarno Film Festival.

Her drama is a gritty coming-of-ager, with experimental touches, set in a bleak industrial town in Lithuania. It also took home the First Feature award. The Special Jury Prize went to Moon, directed by Kurdwin Ayub, about a kickboxer who takes on a job as a personal trainer in the Middle East.

It has been a good week for Lithuania, with Laurynas Bareiša’s Drowning Dry also picking up multiple prizes. A puzzle box of a film, set around a family tragedy, it won the Best Director Leopard plus two of the gender-neutral acting awards for Gelminė Glemžaitė, Agnė Kaktaitė, Giedrius Kiela and Paulius Markevičius.

The other acting prize went to Kim Minhee for Hong Sangsoo’s By The Stream.

The 2024 film festival summer closed out with the prizing at the Locarno Film Festival and it’s the debut feature of a Lithuanian filmmaker who claimed to highest prize in the Golden Leopard aka the Pardo d’Oro. Our Nicholas Bell admired the “distinctive choices” made in Saulė Bliuvaitė‘s Akiplėša (Toxic) – “elevating this beyond both miserabilism or sentimental absolution, meandering like its subjects toward some ill-formed ideas about how to escape an environment they did not choose and will certainly not uplift them.” Read the full ★★★ review here. The film also landed the Swatch First Feature Award.…...

Lithuanian cinema, not typically that well represented on the international film festival circuit, was the big story of this year’s Locarno Film Festival awards ceremony, with two films from the Baltic nation taking a number of top prizes between them.

“Toxic,” an auspicious debut from writer-director Saulė Bliuvaitė, won not only the Golden Leopard for Best Film in the fest’s premier International Competition — from a jury chaired by Austrian auteur Jessica Hausner — but also, in an unusual double, the top prize in the separately juried First Feature Competition. Bliuvaitė’s compatriot Laurynas Bareiša, meanwhile, won Best Director in the International Competition for his sophomore feature “Drowning Dry,” while the same film’s ensemble also collectively took one of the jury’s gender-neutral acting prizes.

A hard-hitting study of alliances and rivalries between teenage girls enrolled at a modeling school in small-town Lithuania, “Toxic” stood out in the Competition...

Toxic (Akiplėša), the debut feature from Saulė Bliuvaitė, has won the 2024 Golden Leopard, the top prize at the Locarno Film Festival.

Toxic follows two teenage girls from a bleak industrial town who join an extreme local modelling school. Featuring a cast of non-actors, it was selected for Les Arcs work-in-progress programme in 2023, and was also a prize-winner at Meeting Point Vilnius this year.

Bendita Film Sales are handling sales. The film also won Locarno’s Swatch first feature award.

The Golden Leopard for best film includes a cash prize of Chf 75,000 to be shared equally between the film’s director and producer.

Akiplėša (Toxic), the feature debut from Lithuanian writer and director Saulė Bliuvaitė that explores the human body and mysterious model agencies, is the winner of the Locarno Film Festival’s 2024 international competition, which was honored with the Pardo d’Oro, or Golden Leopard, in the Swiss town on Saturday. Locarno77 organizers called the movie “an incisive portrayal of teenage girls and the crushing expectations imposed upon them.”

Meanwhile, the special jury prize went to Iraq-born Austrian auteur Kurdwin Ayub for her sophomore fiction feature Mond (Moon). The film follows former martial artist Sarah who leaves Austria to train three sisters from a wealthy Jordanian family. “It’s all about sisters, no matter where they come from, and about cages, no matter where they are,” according to Ayub.

Lithuania, which has a population of about three million people but was represented by two features in this year’s Locarno international competition,...

The mean girls of your average Hollywood teen movie wouldn’t last a morning in the ruthless adolescent playground of “Toxic,” where economic exploitation and unforgiving body image standards rule the bullies and their prey alike. Set in an industrial Lithuanian town where even the asphalt has seen better days, Saulė Bliuvaitė’s impressively tough-minded debut feature is uncompromising in its depiction of the punishment and self-abuse endured by girls enrolled at a fly-by-night modeling academy — where the vague promise of an escape to pretty much anywhere is enough to motivate frightening extremes of disordered eating and body modification. Sobering but not without glimmers of tenderness and humor as female friendship takes root in a hopeless place, this Locarno competition entry can expect a healthy festival run, with interest from edgier arthouse distributors.

“Toxic” promises something severe from its opening shot, as 13-year-old Marija (Vesta Matulytė) stands alone, tensely quivering in a bathing suit,...

The Taste of a Poison Paradise: Bliuvaite Explores the Commodification of Women’s Bodies

Lithuanian filmmaker Saulė Bliuvaitė perhaps could not have contrived a more succinct title than Toxic (Akiplėša) for her debut feature, set in the bleak confines of an industrial town where dysfunction and desolation is the day-to-day norm. Not all is despairing, despite what it sounds like on paper, as two thirteen-year-old girls, each outcasts for their own unique reasons, forge a fast friendship, initially as a means for subconscious survival. While the template of the narrative is quite familiar, Bliuvaitė makes some distinctive choices elevating this beyond both miserabilism or sentimental absolution, meandering like its subjects toward some ill-formed ideas about how to escape an environment they did not choose and will certainly not uplift them.…...

Sarajevo Film Festival has selected 18 titles for its Kinoscope strand and seven for its In Focus section, including a range of 2024 festival hits from Berlin and Cannes.

The Kinoscope selection consists of 12 Kinoscope films, and six titles in genre strand Kinoscope Surreal.

Scroll down for the full list of titles

Titles include Payal Kapadia’s All We Imagine As Light, which won the Grand Prix in Cannes Competition this year; and Santosh, the debut feature of 2023 Screen Star of Tomorrow Sandhya Suri, which debuted in Un Certain Regard.

Guan Hu’s Black Dog, winner of the Un Certain Regard prize,...

New films from well-known auteurs such as Hong Sang-soo, Wang Bing and Ben Rivers will compete for the Golden Leopard against potential discoveries by newcomers and lesser known helmers in a competition that Locarno Film Festival artistic director Giona A. Nazzaro has called “a mosaic that reflects the multiple forms of contemporary cinema.”

Interestingly, all of the four first works in the 17-title competition are directed by women.

Nazzaro spoke to Variety about his choices for what looks like his most ambitious edition.

Talk to me about your opener, Italian director Gianluca Iodice’s “Le déluge” on the last days of Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette before their execution, with France’s Mélanie Laurent and Guillaume Canet, who will be honored.

That was a no-brainer. It’s a hotly anticipated film, the second work of an Italian director who made a strong debut with a very personal and powerful film about [Italian protofascist poet] Gabriele d’Annunzio.

Taking place August 7-17, the official selection for the 77th Locarno Film Festival has been unveiled, featuring a stellar-looking slate of highly anticipated films. Highlights include Hong Sangsoo’s second feature of the year, By the Stream, starring Kim Minhee, Kwon Haehyo, and Cho Yunhee; Ramon Zürcher’s The Sparrow in the Chimney, Wang Bing’s second part of his Youth trilogy, Youth (Hard Times), as well as new films by Radu Jude, Bertrand Mandico, Courtney Stephens, Ben Rivers, Gürcan Keltek, Denis Côté, Kevin Jerome Everson, Fabrice Du Welz (featuring Abel Ferrara!), and many more. Also of particular note is the world premiere of Tarsem Singh’s restored cut of The Fall, which features a slightly different edit as he recently noted.

Giona A. Nazzaro, Artistic Director of the Locarno Film Festival said, “We are very excited and happy with our selection for Locarno’s 77th edition, which we believe...

Bendita Film Sales has picked up international rights to Saulė Bliuvaitė’s debut feature “Toxic,” selected to screen in Locarno’s International Competition this summer. On the occasion of today’s Locarno lineup announcement, Bendita has given Variety exclusive access to the Lithuanian film’s first trailer, seen above.

Set in a grim industrial village, “Toxic” tells the story of 13-year-old Maria, who lives with her grandmother after being abandoned by her mother. During a violent interaction in the street, Maria meets Kristina, another girl her age who dreams of becoming a model. Hoping to get closer to Kristina, Maria enrolls in a mysterious and cult-like modeling school where young girls are preparing for the area’s biggest casting event.

“As I myself grew up in a bleak industrial area, I was living with the thought of escaping – not just from my surroundings, but also from my body,” director Saulė...

The Locarno Film Festival (August 7-17) has revealed the line-up for its 77th edition, with directors including Hong Sangsoo, Wang Bing and Ben Rivers world premiering their latest films in its international competition.

Playing out of competition at Locarno are world premieres from directors including Radu Jude, Fabrice du Welz, Aislinn Clarke, Bertrand Mandico, and Marco Tullio Giordana. Locarno’s famed Piazza Grande screenings include world premieres from Paz Vega, César Díaz and Gianluca Jodice.

Locarno’s international competition comprises 17 films, all of them world premieres, which will vie for the coveted Golden Leopard awards.

Scroll down for full line-up...

Locarno has revealed this year’s official selection.

Known auteurs Hong Sang-soo (“By the Stream”) and Wang Bing (“Youth (Hard Times)”) will now battle it out in the official selection, which will welcome 17 world premieres. Italy will be represented by Sara Fgaier’s “Sulla Terra Leggeri” and “Luce,” directed by Silvia Luzi and Luca Bellino. Ala Eddine Slim’s “Agora” will also be shown, as well as Ben Rivers’ “Bogancloch,” “Cent Mille Milliards” by Virgil Vernier and Saulė Bliuvaitė’s “Toxic.”

“We are very excited and happy with our selection, which we believe represents the best of contemporary filmmaking. We have taken special care in highlighting those works that, while broadening the possibilities of cinema, are also consciously trying to spark a more meaningful conversation with the audience,” stated artistic director Giona A. Nazzaro, adding that the fest “continues to offer itself up as a platform for intersectional dialogue.”

The...

Switzerland’s Locarno Film Festival will debut 17 world premieres, including new works by Hong Sang-soo and Wang Bing, as part of its 2024 competition program. This year’s event runs from August 7 – 17.

The festival announced its competition lineups this morning. The Hong Sang-soo feature is titled Suyoocheon (By The Stream) and stars Kim Minhee, Kwon Haehyo, and Cho Yunhee. The Wang Bing feature is a France, Luxembourg, and Netherlands co-production titled Hard Times. Scroll down to see the full Locarno competition lineup, which also includes new titles from Ben Rivers, Mar Coll, and Christoph Hochhäusler.

The festival today also announced that French acting veterans Mélanie Laurent and Guillaume Canet will receive the event’s honorary Excellence Award Davide Campari at the opening ceremony on August 7. Previous recipients of the award include Riz Ahmed and Aaron Taylor Johnson.

Locarno’s separate Piazza Grande lineup features 18 titles, including Mohammad Rasoulof’s The Seed of the Sacred Fig,...

Lithuanian filmmaker Saulė Bliuvaitė’s Toxic, a coming-of-age teenage tale, secured this year’s Work in Progress prize at Meeting Point Vilnius (Mpv), the annual audiovisual industry event that takes place during the Vilnius International Film Festival, Kino Pavasaris.

The award lands the filmmaking team a €5,000 cash prize from the Lithuanian Film Centre,

Toxic is being produced by Lithuania’s Giedrė Burokaitė, with Bliuvaitė, the pair are looking for a sales agent and “a premiere at a film festival” for the title which they anticipate finishing by the end of May this year.

It is about a young girl abandoned...

Les Arcs Film Festival, the European equivalent to the Sundance Film Festival, has unveiled the list of projects which will be presented during its competitive Work-in-Progress showcase.

Curated by Tribeca and Les Arcs’ artistic director Frederic Boyer and Lison Hervé, the selection will present a broad range of movies in post-production seeking a sales agent, festival slots and international distribution.

This year’s roster includes several titles from Scandinavia, including “Acts of Love,” a Danish-language film directed by Jeppe Rønde, and “The Swedish Torpedo,” a period epic directed by Frida Kempff (“Winter Buoy”). Josefin Neldén stars in “The Swedish Torpedo” as Sally Bauer, the first Scandinavian to swim across the English Channel in 1939. The film is produced by Momento Film, with Amrion, Inland Film Company, and Velvet Films.

“Acts of Love,” meanwhile, tells the story of a young woman living in a religious community and stars Jonas Holst Schmidt (“Copenhagen Does Not Exist...

The Les Arcs Film Festival has unveiled the 13 upcoming features selected for its Work-in Progress showcase.

The selection includes respected French, New York-based artist and filmmaker Marie Losier’s bio-doc Peaches Goes Bananas about Canadian electronic musician Merrill Beth Nisker, aka Peaches.

Danish director Jeppe Rønde, who made waves with mass teen suicide drama Bridgend, is participating with second fiction feature Acts of Love, about a taboo sibling relationship within the confines of a religious community on Denmark’s west coast. (scroll down for full list).

Excerpts from the selected productions will be screened to industry professionals on December 17 as part of the festival’s Industry Village events, which also includes the Coproduction Village.

Both events are taking place within the framework of the festival’s 15th edition running from December 16 to 19 in the French Alps resort of Les Arcs.

The showcase received a record 181 project submissions this year, 38% of which are directed women.

Excerpts from the 13 selected films will be screened to attending industry on Sunday 17 in Les Arcs.

Ukrainian sci-fi U Are The Universe is among 13 feature projects selected for the Work in Progress strand of Les Arcs Film Festival, which runs from December 16-23.

The feature debut of Ukrainian filmmaker Pavlo Ostrikov, the film shot in 2022 and is currently in post-production, produced by Ukraine’s ForeFilms and Belgium’s Stenola, with backing from the Ukrainian State Film Agency.

Scroll down for the full list of projects

Set after the explosion of Earth, the film follows a lonely Ukrainian astronaut who believes...