News

Amos Gitai’s drama about the assassination of Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin to world premiere in competition at the Venice Film Festival.

Paris-based Indie Sales has acquired international sales rights to Rabin: The Last Day, a drama about the events leading up to the 1995 murder of Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin.

Directed by Israeli film-maker Amos Gitai, the film will receive its world premiere in competition at the Venice Film Festival (Sept 2-12).

Gitai has previously been nominated five times for Venice’s Golden Lion with Berlin-Yerushalaim (1989), Eden (2001), Alila (2003), Promised Land (2004) and Ana Arabia (2013).

Gitai, who co-wrote Rabin with regular collaborator Marie-José Sanselme, shot the film in February at various sites in Israel, from Tel Aviv’s Rabin Square to the settlement of Kedumim in the West Bank

At the Jerusalem Film Festival last month, where the director gave a masterclass, Gitai told ScreenDaily: “Israeli society is still feeling the shockwaves of [Rabin’s] killing, even if it’s...

Last month, we noted that the Venice International Film Festival had landed several big-ticket world premieres, among them Alejandro González Iñárritu's "Birdman."  Also world-premiering in Venice next week is "Tsili," the new film from Israeli auteur Amos Gitai. Gitai's career began in documentaries, in which he focused mostly on the Arab-Israeli conflict and Middle Eastern politics.  He's also directed many narrative films, working with actors such as Natalie Portman and Juliette Binoche.  His most recent film was last year's "Ana Arabia," a story of a young reporter visiting the mostly Arab township of Jaffa, just outside Tel Aviv, which Gitai filmed in a single long Steadicam shot. "Tsili" is based on the "Aharon Appelfeld" novel of the same name, about a young woman living in Eastern Europe during World War II who is left behind to tend her family's house and escapes into the forest to hide....

Damián Szifrón’s Cannes Competition film Wild Tales and Palm d’Or winner Winter Sleep to open the T-Mobile New Horizons International Film Festival in Wroclaw.

A total of 20 films from Cannes Film Festival have been secured for the 14th New Horizons International Film Festival (July 24-Aug 3), Poland’s largest film event.

The festival, held in Wroclaw, will comprise screenings of around 365 films, including 199 features.

The opening film will be Damián Szifrón’s Cannes Competition film Wild Tales, an Argentinian satire co-produced by Pedro Almodovar.

A second opening film will be this year’s Palme d’Or winner Winter Sleep, by Nuri Bilge Ceylan.

Third, after the opening gala, will be Olivier Assayas’ Sils Maria starring Juliette Binoche and Kristen Stewart.

The festival will close with Cannes Grand Prix winner The Wonders by Italian director Alice Rohrwacher.

Main programme

The main programme will include Aleksey German’s Hard to be God, Naomi Kawase’s Still...

Highlights include Anton Corbijn’s A Most Wanted Man, starring the late Philip Seymour Hoffman, and Abel Ferrara’s controversial Dsk feature Welcome To New York.

The full line-up of the 68th Edinburgh International Film Festival (Eiff) has been revealed this morning by artistic director Chris Fujiwara at Edinburgh’s Filmhouse.

This year’s festival, which runs from June 18-29, will comprise 156 features from 47 countries, including 11 world premieres, eight international premieres, seven European premieres and 95 UK premieres.

New titles announced today include Anton Corbijn’s A Most Wanted Man, starring the late Philip Seymour Hoffman in one of his final performances that was first shown at Sundance in January.

Straight from its lively premiere in Cannes is Abel Ferrara’s controversial title Welcome To New York, inspired by the case of former Imf managing director Dominique Strauss-Kahn, starring Gérard Depardieu, which will receive its UK premiere at Eiff.

Other new titles added to the line-up include [link=nm...

A still from Ana Arabia

Ana Arabia (Israel-France) directed by Amos Gitai will open the 12th Pune International Film Festival 2014 to be held from January 9-16, 2014.

Kanyaka Talkies (Virgin Talkies) by Kr Manoj is the only Indian film in World Competition section.

The films that will compete in Marathi cinema competition are: 72 Miles Ek Pravas by Rajeev Patil, Astu (So Be it) by Sumitra Bhave, Fandry by Nagraj Manjule, Maunraag (Monologue) by Vaibhav Abnave, Narbachi Wadi by Aditya Ajay Sarpotdar, Rege by Abhijit Panse and Tapaal (The Letter) by Laxman Utekar.

The festival will hold Country Focus sections on Taiwan, Hungary, Israel, France, South Korea and Spain. There will be Retrospectives of Hungarian director Istvan Szabo, Italian director Federico Fellini, Serbian director Goran Paskaljevic, American director Billy Wilder, French director Benoit Jacquot and Indian director Adoor Gopalakrishnan.

Indian Cinema Today section will present films like Shyamaprasad’s Artist, Laxmikant Shetgaonkar’s Baga Beach,...

Thiruvananthapuram, Dec 6: The 18th edition of the International Film Festival of Kerala got underway at 11 venues here Friday with the official inauguration slated for the evening, when Israeli filmmaker Amos Gitai's "Ana Arabia" will be screened.

The state-owned Kerala State Chalachitra Academy has organised the event, which has seen the biggest participation of more than 9,000 delegates. The festival, during which 217 films from 64 countries will be screened, will end next Friday.

The highlight of the event is a competition section for 14 films from Asia, Africa, and Latin America that will vie for the Golden Crow Pheasant.

Steve McQueen’s 12 Years A Slave to open festival; director Peter Greenaway to receive Visionary Award.Scroll down for full line-up

Steve McQueen’s historic drama 12 Years a Slave is to open the Stockholm International Film Festival (Nov 6-17) and is nominated in the Stockholm Xxiv Competition.

Starring Chiwetel Ejiofor, the drama about free black man kidnapped from his family and sold into slavery in the 1850s debuted at Telluride and has received positive reactions throughout its festival tour of Toronto, New York and London among others.

It will be released in Sweden on Dec 20 by Ab Svensk Filmindustri.

Screenwriter John Ridley, who will be present during the festival, is nominated for the Aluminum Horse in the category Best Script.

McQueen’s Hunger won Best Directorial Debut at Stockholm in 2008.

Line-up

The 24th Siff includes more than 180 films from more than 50 countries.

As previously announced, the spotlight of this year’s festival is freedom but Chinese artist...

Ana Arabia, La Dune also honoured in Haifa.

Yuval Adler’s Bethlehem, fresh from its international tour through Venice, Telluride and Toronto, landed back home for a triumphal opening reception at the Haifa Film Festival, grabbing both the Best Israeli Film Award and a Best Actor award for Tsahi Halevy, who plays an Israeli security officer at odds with his bosses and in trouble with the young Palestinian he is trying to turn into his own agent. The film is also now confirmed as the Israeli submission for the Oscar race for best foreign-language film.

Amos Gitai’s one-shot feature, Ana Arabia, predictably collected a Best Cinematography award for Giora Bejach and Nir Bar’s 82-minute tour-de-force. A second prize went to the film’s script authored by Gitai with his regular partner, Marie-Josee Sanselme. Hila Vidor, who plays a sexually repressed, inhibited young married wife in Funeral at Noon by Adam Sanderson, was selected...

If there was one stylistic trend at Venice this year, it was bravura, lengthy shots. The festival kicked off with the twenty-minute opening shot of "Gravity," and the rest of the festival sometimes felt like some kind of who-can-hold-a-shot the longest competition, with Steven Knight's "Locke" and Tsai Ming-Liang's "Stray Dogs" also getting in on the real-time act. But if this competition had a winner, it was undoubtedly Amos Gitai, with his latest film "Ana Arabia." Almost uniquely ("Russian Ark" is the obvious forerunner here), the film is made up of a single take, an unbroken 81-minute Steadicam shot without a single cut. It's a bold and ambitious move for the Cannes and Venice favorite, behind films like "Kadosh," "Kippur," "Promised Land" and "Free Zone,"  but while "Ana Arabia" is well-meaning, its central gimmick ultimately proves to be the only really interesting thing about it. Gitai's camera follows Yael...

In Competition

Golden Lion – Sacro Gra, directed by Gianfranco Rosi

Silver Lion (Best Director) – Alexandros Avranas, Miss Violence

Grand Jury Prize – Stray Dogs, directed by Tsai Ming-liang

Special Jury Prize – The Police Officer's Wife, directed by Philip Gröning

Volpi Cup for Best Actor – Themis Panou, Miss Violence

Volpi Cup for Best Actress – Elena Cotta, A Street in Palermo

Best Screenplay – Philomena, written by Steve Coogan & Jeff Pope

Marcello Mastroianni Award for Best Young Actor or Actress – Tye Sheridan, Joe

Horizons (Orizzonti)

Orizzonti Award for Best Film – Eastern Boys, directed by Robin Campillo

Orizzonti Award for Best Director – Uberto Pasolini, Still Life

Special Orizzonti Jury Prize – Ruin, directed by Michael Cody & Amiel Courtin-Wilson

Special Orizzonti Prize for Innovative Content – Fish & Cat, directed by Shahram Mokri

Lion of the Future Award

Best Debut Film – White Shadow, directed by Noaz Deshe

Fipresci

Competition Fipresci Prize – Tom at the Farm, directed by Xavier Dolan...

★★★☆☆ No stranger to the Venice Lido, Amos Gitai's new film Ana Arabia (2013) - in competition this year - is a quiet exploration of love and tolerance in Israel. On the border between Jaffa and Bat Jam exists a small dusty enclave of Arabs and Jews. A young reporter, Yael (Yuval Scharf), arrives to question the inhabitants about a recently deceased resident, a Jewish woman who survived Auschwitz as a child and subsequently fled to Israel where she married an Arab and converted to Islam. Yael interviews her husband, Yussuf (Yussuf Abu-Warda), his daughter Miriam (Sarah Adler) and daughter-in-law Sarah (Assi Levy).

Everyone seem happy to tell Yael their stories and muse on the meaning of them, as well as occasionally having neighbours butt in to joke and/or flirt with the pretty journalist (or just to exchange gossip). The one outstanding feature of Gitai's Ana Arabia is that it...

One sequence shot of 81 minutes is the way director Amos Gitai chooses to capture a moment in the life of a small community of outcasts, where Arabs and Jews live together in an enclave at the border between Jaffa and Bat Yam. One day a young journalist visits them and gets captivated by their accounts and their universe. Amos Gitai talks about his Ana Arabia: How did you get acquainted with the situation portrayed in the film? I’ve been working for 30 years through documentaries and fiction and these fragments of stories. I’m a big collector of contradictions and eventually decided to make this film also because I had [ Read More ]

The post Interview: Amos Gitai Talks Ana Arabia appeared first on Shockya.com.

With the rise of the encroaching Toronto, the domestic competition offered by Rome and a hugely successful Cannes this year, the 70th Venice Film Festival - which begins on 28 August - is facing some pretty stiff competition. The lineup, however, is on the face of it relatively low-key, though there are some very interesting possibilities and potential surprises. Regular attendee George Clooney opens proceedings with Alfonso Cuarón's Gravity, whilst in the main competition lie a mix of old hands - Errol Morris with his Donald Rumsfeld documentary, Hayao Miyazaki's last fable - along with fresh talents such as Kelly Reichardt (Night Moves) and Jonathan Glazer (with his Birth follow-up, Under the Skin).

Terry Gilliam also returns after an elongated absence, his The Zero Theorem starring Christoph Waltz as a hacker searching for the meaning of existence. The film hopefully marks a return to form for a filmmaker who...

* Oldest global film fest tries to see off upstarts

* Will open with premiere of space fantasy "Gravity"

* Films starring Johansson, Efron, Damon vie for Golden Lion

By Michael Roddy

London, Aug 25 (Reuters) - Space, stars and taboo sex will be on display in Venice this week as the world's oldest international film festival fights to keep its head above water in a city slowly slipping into the sea.

The 70th Venice Film Festival will try and see off competition from increasingly popular extravaganzas in Rome and Toronto by opening with the world premiere of 3D space fantasy "Gravity", starring George Clooney and Sandra Bullock.

Directed by Mexico's Alfonso Cuaron, of "Children of Men" and Harry Potter-sequel fame, the film depicts Bullock and Clooney as astronauts cast adrift after disaster strikes their shuttle.

"I think the main theme of Venice is that it is proving it is not letting Toronto take...

Amos Gitai‘s latest movie Ana Arabia is one of the titles that will compete for Golden Lion prize at this year’s Venice Film Festival, which runs from August 28 – September 7th. Today, we’re here to take the first look at lovely Yuval Scharf, who plays the female lead in the movie that will (reportedly) evoke passions, trauma and disappointments from the past. Head inside to check her out, and read more about this interesting story… Gitai directed the movie from a script he co-wrote with Marie-Jose Sanselme, which follows seven characters living on the Jaffa-Bat Yam border in a community isolated from the real...

Click to read original and full article: Venice 2013: Ana Arabia by Amos Gitai on http://www.filmofilia.com...