Sebastian Lelio, Hong Sang-soo, Ulrich Seidl Bound for San Sebastian Main Competition
Sebastian Lelio’s “Wonder,” starring “Black Widow’s” Florence Pugh, “Winter Boy” with Juliette Binoche and directors Hong Sang-soo and Ulrich Seidl will compete in main competition at September’s San Sebastian Film Festival, the biggest film event in the Spanish-speaking world.
In “Wonder,” the latest from Academy Award winning director Lelio (“A Fantastic Woman”),Pugh plays an English nurse brought in to the Irish Midlands in 1862 to observe the alleged miracle of girls going months without food.
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Binoche co-stars in “Winter Boy,” from resilient French auteur Christophe Honoré who won at Cannes Un Certain Regard with 2019’s “On a Magical Night.” Hong Sang-soo, the prolific South Korean director, will present “Walk Up,” a film which is billed as taking a gently delightful new perspective on themes dear to his poetics.
Seidl’s “Sparta” forms part of a diptych with 2022 Berlin competition contender “Rimini,” both movies turning on men who cannot escape their past.
The 12 competition titles announced on Tuesday by San Sebastian join its four Spanish contenders, unveiled last month.
A brief breakdown on the new competition entries:
San Sebastian Main Competition: Newly Announced Titles
“Il Boemo,” (Petr Václav, Czech Republic, Italy, Slovakia)
The passions and ambitions, breakthrough and tragic fall from grace of Czech opera composer, Josef Mysliveček, a mentor to Mozart. Czech Václav (“Parallel Worlds,” “We Are Never Alone”) directs.
“Foreover,” (“Resten Af Livet,” Frelle Petersen, Denmark)
The second feature of 2019 Tokyo Grand Prix winner with “Uncle,” the story of a family in placid central Denmark suddenly confronted by seemingly unbearable tragedy.
“Great Yarmouth – Provisional Figures,” (Marco Martins, Portugal, France, U.K.)
A fiction take on new wave immigration, encapsulated by the diaspora of Portuguese workers to food-processing plants and caravan parks in a Great Yarmouth, which is ravaged by unemployment. One, Tania, now battles for U.K. nationality and a proper job on the eve of Brexit.
“A Hundred Flowers,” (“Hyakka,” Genki Kawamura, Japan)
The debut feature of Genki Kawamura, producer of “Your Name.” As his mother, diagnosed with dementia, slips towards oblivion, son Izumi uncovers the life she lived without him. Adapting the director’s own novel, a potentially intense son-mother drama.
“The Kings of the World,” (“Los Reyes del Mundo,” Laura Mora, Colombia)
Mora’s awaited follow-up to 2017’s breakout “Killing Jesus,” backed by producer-director Cristina Gallegos (“Birds of Passage”), the fantasy-laced tale of five Medellín street kids whose t of into the mountains to find a promised land
“Pornomelancholy,” (“Pornomelancolia,” Manuel Abramovich, Argentina)
The latest doc feature from Argentine Manuel Abramovich, a 2019 Berlinale Silver Bear winner for “Blue Boy,” depicting Lalo, an out-of-sorts sex influencer living in he mountains of southern Mexico.
“Runner,” (Marian Mathias, U.S., Germany, France)
The buzzy feature debut of Brooklyn-based Mathias developed at a 2018 Cannes Cinéfondation Residence and plumbing the relationship between Hass and Will, long lost souls in America’s vast mid-West.
“Sparta,” (Ulrich Seidl, Austria)
A companion piece to Seidl’s Berlin Competition entry “Rimini,” with George Friedrich playing Ewald, aman who make a fresh start in Romina, but remains caught up by his past.
Courtesy of San Sebastian Film Festival
“The Substitute,” (“El Suplente,” Diego Lerman, Argentina)
Pitched at San Sebastian 2019’s Co-Production Forum where it was seen as a potential move towards the mainstream for Lerman (“Suddenly”), a leading light of the New Argentine Cinema. Produced by Nicolás Avruj at Campo Cine, the hope-tinged drama is set at secondary school on Buenos Aires’ violent, marginalized outer radius.
“Walk Up,” (“Top,” Hong Sang-Soo, South Korea)
The second feature in 2022 from the prolific director after Berlin Silver Bear winner “A Novelist’s Tale,” and already selected for Toronto. An interior designer introduces her home floor by floor to a middle-aged film director and his estranged daughter.
“Winter Boy,” (Christophe Honoré, France)
Headed by Juliette Binoche and Vincent Lacoste (“The French Kissers”), the 14th feature from redoubtable French auteur Honoré (“On a Magical Night”), turning on a high-school student in crisis.
“The Wonder,” (Sebastian Lelio, Chile)
Starring Florence Pugh, Ciarán Hinds, Niamh Algar and Tom Burke, the first Netflix production commissioned out of the U.K. by Fiona Lamptey, a psychological thriller set in the Irish Midlands in 1862 with Pugh playing an English nurse brought in to observe the alleged miracle of girls going months without food.
Courtesy of San Sebastian Film Festival
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