26.10.15

The King is dead...


I belong to the a generation that was hiding its secret love rendez-vous in cabs filled with inflamable love.

A generation fed with  true faithfulness and big words, growing up transcended by the beauty of declaring pure “I love you”s, without any GIF on it, just out of the blue, one morning, one afternoon.

May be this still exists around me and I just do not grasp it.

May be I am still seeing it around without really understanding I do.

As I am certain love is so different of the insipid stories I keep hearing around me, ending with dots dots dots…Devoid of beginning or ending.

It would be easy to blame Internet and the consummers’ society, all these children of Satan that we keep taking out of the closet for explaining each fragment of our society’ drifting away, of a general lack of poetry.

But I find that there is something else happening nowadays.

Something connected with fear.

“To really love” has drifted in the camp of anxiety.

People are scared to lose love as when losing a job. There is a general fear, and rare are those who still dare anything at all anymore.

What truelly breaks my heart is to read biographies as those of Anjelica Huston and Jack Nicholson, of Patti Smith and Robert Mapplethorpe. With horse rides in the forrest first thing in the misty mornings, with impossible problems to solve, with bitter glory, with common drunkeries, with the assumed inconsequence of an union, with accidents.

Filled with the possibility of failure. Of decline.

There was a time when people were not supervising their kids each second, when falling in a ravine, taking drugs, dying, were mear possibilities.

And in that fine gap between life and death, layed the shining unknown. With Death lurking from around the corner, of course, but also with adventure and fresh breaths.

I watch the younger generations that have nowhere to go for a flirt, for love,  just because everything and everywhere is too boring. But tacitly they would love to be left to love, in a crazy and total manner.

Just that nowadays they see the andat on love restraining, just as all the laws about security in traffic.

Their love stories are left without zest.

Just nothings.

And dots dots dots…

Casting anemic “love”   as hurling a plasticized hologram of their heart.

Their heart, their real one, they keep it for themselves.

5 am this morning, a man of my generation who, I believe, likes me a great deal, sent me a facebook mess: “What are you up to ..”… I answered: “ I am ready for love. As always. Without you. Without dots”.

giulia d


28.8.15

MUSTANG has it all at the 21st Sarajevo SFF




Cinema is not a country for women...

 And more than often ,
this world is not a country for women...

So here is a film written

and directed by women,

on the story of women

who resist to the stupidity of the surrounding people...

... to their dictate and absurd laws...



I am not usually impressed

by these kinds of stories

about family dynamics,

where the viewer can only be limited

to remain

an impotent witness ...



But this time I was taken

to a strong and unexpected level of empathy

and affection

for the five protagonists ...



The Franco-Turkish Deniz Gamze Ergüven

presents us with five girls

as a single body with five heads...

... a beautiful sea monster

risen from the depths

of 'prevailing ignorance,

ready to eat up

everything on its path...



Charmingl, young, vital,

sensual, intelligent, delightful,

eager to have fun

and express themselves,

our five heroines will clash with an equally powerful monster:

the wretched world that surrounds them. 

In a village in northern Turkey overlooking the Black Sea,

it is the last day of school. 

Five sisters jump into the water

to celebrate the arrival of summer

but have the unfortunate idea

to do it together with classmates.

The grandmother

who has raised the orphaned girls

decides to wash the shame ...

Their big wooden house turns into a real prison,

with bars,

shapeless clothes to wear,

and the decision to keep them away even from school...

But the grandmother and the uncle

 have not come to terms

with the desire for life

of the five girls...



Amazing how even today, in 2015,

repression performs mainly

through the management of sexuality!

Which is demonized,

denied,

denigrated,

while virginity is still a subject of trade:

this girl is a virgin,

so  I can sell her to you as a worthy spouse...



The drama develops in a very complex

and dynamic manner.

It swirls with counterpoints of strong character comedy,  

with breaks coming from the constant frustrations

of the protagonists

and by postponing the pleasure of the viewer...

...until it reaches a thrilling climax

obtained through the mechanisms

of sowing and admirable reaping.



We laugh and cry along with five sisters

who do not understand the reasons for such fury...

... for the conservation of obsolete traditions...

 that lead to no one’s happiness ...

...what remains stuck to our mind after this film

is these girls’ irreverence

and their desire of healthy rebellion...

... especially that of Lale, 12 years old.

She is the soul of the group:

she wants to go see at all cost the ball game,

she wants to learn to drive,

she does not want her sisters to marry strangers ,

she spits in the coffee,

 she wants to flee to Istanbul, no matter how,

even with her slippers on...

Her happy little pest face

makes us hope for the best

for the future of humanity...

... while the music of Warren Ellis invades the screen ...

It could be tricky, girls,  

but we can do it!

Let’s make that Mustang run at full speed!



By Giulia Ghica Dobre

@ 21st Sarajevo SFF



Last week in Sarajevo at the 21st SFF “MUSTANG” received the Award of the Best Film:

HEART OF SARAJEVO FOR BEST FEATURE FILM
MUSTANG

Turkey, France, Germany, Qatar
Director: Deniz Gamze Ergüven
Financial Award, in the amount of 16,000 €, is provided by Council of Europe



And its cast ensemble The Award for Best Female Acting:

HEART OF SARAJEVO FOR BEST ACTRESS
Güneş Şensoy, Doga Doğuşlu, Tuğba Sunguroğlu, Elit İşcan, Ilayda Akdoğan (MUSTANG / Turkey, France, Germany, Qatar)
Financial award in the amount of 2,500 €

26.8.15

Chevalier at the 21st Sarajevo SFF



It is quite frosty on the  Aegean Sea...

Aboard a luxurious yacht,

friends are spending a week
of fishing and leisure.

To make time pass,
the six men decide to compete
in an unusual game.

One that would prove who is...

the most excellent man...

Every gesture, every habit, personal tastes

and even  blood
will be analyzed and voted for.

Once back at shore, the preeminent man
will be the victorious “chevalier”...

“Chevalier” by Athina Tsangari, presented at the 21st Sarajevo SFF,
enlightens male competition,
the bonds and the complicity
between men...

...tells about male worries and beliefs...

...about male sexuality,
about gambling,
about male sensitivity...

...about the strength of muscles...

...and male astuteness or idiocy...

...about male wellbeing or maladies...

CHEVALIER by Athina Tsangari is not only a film about Greek men...

...It is a colorfull movie about he human being with its arrogance,
about psychological blackmail,
about feelings of inferiority
(or superiority)...

A sincere portrait,
self-deprecating,
wise,
that demolishes prejudices
and preconceptions
about the common vision
on the alfa male...

A most unexpected and intriguing plot...
Where one can smile to the many circumstances
and the inevitable immaturity that emerges...

Where one can be so troubled
by the absurd tensions
that erupt on this yacht,
demonstrating that even
an unpretentious game
holds a strong potential risk.

When preferences and habits are examined
under a microscope,
a sort of animal instinct detonates
and gives way to a series
of small disasters.


But CHEVALIER is such a stunning exploration
of the male of the new millennium!

A male sometimes female,
sometimes "macho"...
...sometimes just a child,
sometimes terrified,
sometimes valiant,
sometimes on display,
and other times confidential,
sometimes noble,
sometimes damaging,
sometimes with a uncovered soul,
sometimes wearing his body as an armour,
sometimes in the nude,
sometimes dressed in spirit....

Between a joke and another,
no one will come out unscathed
from what soon turns out to be
a massacre game
with no valid winner.


It is a film breathing

with an undefined tension
pulsating
in a world of men,
aware of their
complementary role
to women...

....All in the same boat.


by Giulia Ghica Dobre
@21st Sarajevo SFF


PS: In Sarajevo at the 21st SFF the ensemble cast of "Chevlier": 
Yorgos Kéntros, Vangelis Mouríkis,
Panos Kóronis, Makis Papadimitríou,
Yorgos Pyrpassópoulos, Sakis Rouvás

won the

Heart of Sarajevo Award for Best Male Acting.
and
SPECIAL JURY MENTIONCHEVALIER
Greece
Director: Athina Rachel Tsangari