The scents of "Cinema Spring" 3

Jurga Tumasonytė
www.kamane.lt, 2015-04-03
Still from the film "In the Crosswinds"

In brief: Already a 20th "Cinema Spring." In no other Lithuanian film festival will you see so many trendy people, who look like they had just stepped down from the cover of the magazine; big and small celebrities, sponsor's advertisements broadcasted in various ways, people of cinema, program related festival events and bustle. No wonder that such a massive event receives many and very diverse opinions. Big festival, perhaps, should be like that - offering both an avant-garde and culinary cinema.

In his first feature film "In the Crosswinds" young director Martti Helde tries to talk anew through the historical memory of the nation and cultural traumas. Based on an authentic diary of one of the victims, named Erna, film shows the history of her family's genocide. It is interesting to observe how young director interprets memory that he, himself, has never experienced.

Romanian director Alexander Nanau films his "Toto and His Sisters" so openly that it starts to feel like maybe it is not a documentary. Film tells a story about a family of Roma origin - a young boy Totonel, his two sisters, loads of junkie uncles and mother, who is in Jail. From the first frames of the film it seems that there is no director, nor camera, only a naked, intimate image, which we, viewers somehow got an opportunity to see. We see how uncles use drugs, how Toto, bored, is lying down on the only sofa and moving various scattered things around with his nail while his uncles are lying around all high.

In his documentary "Basement" Austrian Ulrich Seidl travels to the world of distorted time, space and logic, which is reigned by various manias, instinct satisfying orgies and things that are not discussed in public. Of course, if it is not a documentary. In this case, Seidl picks strange people with unusual hobbies or philosophy of life and films them.

Alejandro González Iñárritu film "Birdman" that has received so many praises and Oscars did not appear to be so good and worthy of so many awards. Philosophizing characters remind of teenager gibberish on meaning of life and aspirations to philosophize in a way so you look cool and seem to have really good insights. Film critic, always sitting in a bar - ugly "as a homeless person's ass" - angry and constantly scribbling something in her scrapbook looked funny.

Giedrė Žičkytė's documentary "Master and Tatiana" (also featured in "Scanorama") about the life of photographer Vitas Luckus and his wife Tatiana - or shall I say about the examination of reasons why photographer killed himself, disappointed. I understood from the film that he did it as a sacrifice for his beauty Tatiana, whom he loved madly. V. Luckus' friends are interviewed in the film, photography archive is shown. His wife, now living in the USA, speaks only a few times. She sort of remains mute.


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