(from Cannes Luigi Noera and Marina Pavido – Photos are courtesy of the Cannes Film Festival)

Very applauded Valeria Bruni Tedeschi enters the main selection talking about herself and her first steps on the set, mentre nella selezione Un Certain Regard storie intime diverse per genere e stile

Sogni e drammi di giovani attori agli inizi degli anni Ottanta – Les Amandiers di Valeria Bruni Tedeschi

Second feature film by actress Valeria Bruni Tedeschi as director, Les Amandiers - world premiere, in competition, at the 75th edition of the Cannes Film Festival - it turned out to be a pleasant surprise within the famous film event.

Extremely intimate and personal, the film stages Stella's story (an extraordinary Nadia Tereszkiewicz), a twenty year old girl, that, in the early eighties, along with many of his other peers, joins an exclusive theater school in Paris, with the aim of first doing an internship in New York, then, once again in France, to start performing in the first theatrical performances staged by some teachers of the school itself.

Anxiety for auditions, the first loves, and receive, important personal dramas e, not least, the problem of AIDS, which in those years spread very easily among young people, are staged by Valeria Bruni Tedeschi in a fresh film, dreamer but realistic at the same time. A film in which the eighties, with all the important socio-cultural changes they brought with them, they provide the perfect setting for not one, but many intertwining stories, that influence each other. Stories of personal growth and first - often even painful - confrontations with the world of "adults". Portraits of crucial years that will forever change the lives of the protagonists.

Sincere and passionate, Les Amandiers vede al proprio interno una serie di personaggi (some of which, especially with regard to Adèle, Stella's best friend, they would have needed more in-depth analysis, given their verve), each with their own dreams and problems, each with a distinct personality.

Les Amandiers ovviamente vede al proprio interno momenti fortemente drammatici e, in the same way, it also deals with rather thorny issues (oltre all’AIDS, there is also an important discussion on drug use and how they contribute to amplifying insecurities and that sense of disorientation experienced by those who are most vulnerable), without ever being redundant or didactic, but giving us a colorful and varied fresco of the Eighties seen from the perspective of those who for the first time found themselves dealing with the "outside world", as well as unforgettable characters, incredibly alive and pulsating. Una piacevole sorpresa all’interno del concorso di questo Festival di Cannes 2022.

Alla ricerca delle proprie origini – Retour à Séoul di Davy Chou

Family ties and the search for oneself and one's origins are a key theme within the selection of this 75th edition of the Cannes Film Festival. About that, Return to Seoul, second feature by director Davy Chou - presented in the Un certain Regard section - focuses on the story of the young Freddie, grew up in France with her adoptive parents, which, after twenty-five years, decides to return to his hometown. Here you will be able to contact, through the institution that dealt with its adoption, his biological parents. While her father will be thrilled to meet her, her mother seems unwilling to meet her.

Retour à Séoul è, therefore, a painful, but also a tender and moving journey between past and present. What Freddie will decide to become, it depends a lot on this crucial period for you. East and West meet and give life to something unique. Director Davy Chou, its part, he was able to capture every nuance with his camera, every single emotion, all the colors of this new world.

Night clubs, streets of the city illuminated by multicolored signs, but also lunches with friends away from the chaos of the city, together with old photographs make the present feature incredibly alive and pulsating. The young protagonist (played by Ji-Min Park) is an extraordinarily human character, magnetic, a strong-willed woman, but fragile at the same time, scared of a past she does not know, but extremely eager to find out more about her own life. The intense close-ups on his face, now while reading unexpected emails or long wait, now as he types on his cell phone messages in broken Korean they create a well-rounded figure, perfectly capable of carrying the entire feature film on his shoulders. Young Davy Chou's talent did the rest. Una piacevole sorpresa all’interno della ricca e variegata sezione Un certain Regard.

Successo e voyeurismo – Syk Pyke di Kristoff Borgli

The desire for visibility and success. What we have to offer and what others expect from us. It's still, the sick voyeurism and the particular attention to human dramas. Syk Pyke, biting black comedy directed by Norwegian director Kristoff Borgli and presented in world premiere at the 75th edition of the Cannes Film Festival, all’interno della sezione Un certain Regard, mette in scena tutto ciò senza paura di osare, di scioccare lo spettatore, attraverso una storia al limite del paradossale che nel presente in cui viviamo trova – tristemente – parecchi appigli.

Signe e Thomas sono giovani, belli, invidiati da tutti. La loro relazione, however, ha qualcosa di malato e tutti i problemi latenti vengono fuori nel momento in cui Thomas – artista contemporaneo – inizia ad avere successo, viene invitato a numerosi eventi e organizza mostre personali. Signe, la sua ragazza, è invidiosa di lui e fa di tutto per catalizzare l’attenzione di tutti su sé stessa, fino ad arrivare al punto di assumere delle droghe che causano una grave malattia della pelle, in modo da far pietà ai suoi follower e di tentare la strada del successo attraverso questa sua nuova condizione.

Syk Pyke, therefore, è un film spietato, irreverent, che – in pieno stile della cinematografia scandinava – vede in un crudo umorismo la giusta soluzione per aprire un ben più ampio discorso sul mondo in cui viviamo, sul desiderio malato della gente di osservare i drammi umani con spirito voyeuristico, più che per reale compassione, sul potere dei social media e dei giornali, in grado di trasformare in evento sensazionale situazioni del tutto normali.

Signe resta irrimediabilmente sfigurata. Eppure questo suo “nuovo volto” viene immediatamente notato da agenzie di moda, in seguito alla fitta pubblicità fatta su sé stessa su ogni qualsivoglia canale social. Dove porterà, But, the city of Thessaloniki is the setting for a recent tragedy that many seem to have forgotten? In Syk Pyke nessuno è realmente innocente. Nemmeno Thomas, that, per forza di cose, è costretto ad accudire la sua ragazza, pur rivelandosi particolarmente compiaciuto nel momento in cui una sconosciuta sull’autobus lo guarda intenerita e ammirata mentre egli si prende cura di Signe.

Kristoffer Borgli è riuscito a catturare ogni sfumatura dei suoi protagonisti in modo intelligente e spiazzante, dando vita a una commedia tristemente attuale, ma anche esilarante e graffiante, in cui sembra, Unfortunately, non esserci speranza di salvezza alcuna.

marina fears