Lost In Bosnia to open Sleepwalkers International Short Film Festival in Tallinn
The Sleepwalkers International Short Film Festival, held between 18th and 22nd November, will open its 15th edition with a screening of the portmanteau feature film Lost In Bosnia. This collection of shorts is an ode to films and filmmaking and highlights the works of the first batch of students from the Sarajevo based film.factory. The film school, founded by the legendary Hungarian film director Béla Tarr, aims to support the development of new artistic talent and currently counts 24 young filmmakers from across the world in its ranks. Its teachers and mentors are some of the world’s most prominent film theorists, film historians and critics, film directors and film artists, so far including: Fridrik Thor Fridriksson, Gus Van Sant, Carlos Reygadas, Apichatpong Wheersethakul, Brothers Quay, Pedro Costa, Guy Maddin, Tilda Swinton, Cristian Mungiu, Jean-Michel Frodon, Jonathan Romney and Jonathan Rosenbaum amongst many others.
Lost In Bosnia represents a collection of some of the very first films to come out of the film.factory. Each of the 11 films examines films and filmmaking is a paean to the pains and pleasure of the cinema and the moving image. A director’s statement about the film says “The film begins as an experiment within the family of Film Factory. Align with the factory’s spirit, the experiment urges filmmakers to keep telling personal stories. Armed with a small recording device, they set up themes that speak about filmmaking. The experiment presents a cinematic poem to filmmaking and film itself.”
The feature will kick off a five day extravaganza that celebrates all aspects of short filmmaking. Four competitions – International, Student, Baltic Sea and National – will see some of the very best films from the past year with this year’s highlights including moving Indonesian film Maryam, the winner of the Best Short at the 2014 Venice Film Festival. There’ll be the infamous Vitamin Pills programmes full of funny and shocking shorts that are all 10 minutes and under and country retrospectives including one dedicated to Croatia. Also this year, Sleepwalkers will have a special focus on the Polish National Film School in Łódź, which will include short films directed by likes of Roman Polanski and Krzysztof Kieślowski.
Laurence Boyce, programme director of Sleepwalkers said:
“It’s apt that Lost In Bosnia will be opening this year’s Sleepwalkers. We’ve always celebrated cinema and the art of the short film, and it’s wonderful that a film that embodies our ethos and spirit is there to kick off our 15th year. And given that we’re also about showcasing brilliant student work, I am really happy that we’re able to celebrate a new film school whose philosophy seems set to make it an important force in the world of cinema over the years to come.”
As a sub-festival of the Black Nights Film Festival, Sleepwalkers will also bring some shorts to Black Nights audiences including the Short Matters! Tour from the European Film Academy. Consisting of films that have been awarded at prestigious festivals from across Europe, the three EFA programmes represent a snapshot of some of the most talked about short films of the past few years.
The full Sleepwalkers programme will be announced at the end of October.
22 October 2014, by Cineuropa Shorts
