The 22nd Zurich Film Festival opened on Thursday evening with a programme featuring 133 films and running until 4 October, while three of the festival’s films address the Palestinian cause from perspectives including the work of hospitals in the Gaza Strip during the war, the life of Palestinian-American intellectual Edward Said, and the mechanisms used to target civilians in Israeli air strikes on the territory.
Three films approach Palestine from different perspectives
The documentary film “Life Support”, directed by Daniel Roher, is receiving its international premiere in the “Now/Future” section, after its world premiere at the Sheffield DocFest. The film follows conditions in Gaza’s hospitals amid shortages of supplies and food, as wounded people continue to arrive, drawing on testimony from doctors including Khaled Dawas, Tania Al-Haj Hassan and Anna Gilani.
“Life Support” will screen in Zurich on 28 September in the presence of its director and Dr Omar Abdelmanna, followed by two further screenings on 30 September and 2 October. The film is part of the new section focusing on environmental, social and economic sustainability issues.
The documentary “Edward Said Between Two Worlds”, directed by Maken Baird, examines the life of the Palestinian-American intellectual more than two decades after his death. The film will have its European premiere in the “Signatures” section, after its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival.
The film uses archival material covering different stages of Said’s life and traces his personal and intellectual experience and its links to questions of identity, displacement, power and political responsibility, themes that occupied part of his writing. It will screen on 27 September in the presence of its director, followed by further screenings on 2 and 4 October.
The third Palestine-related work is “Naza”, by directors Yuval Abraham and Rachel Zor, who were part of the directing team behind the documentary “No Other Land”. The film examines the mechanisms used to target civilians during Israeli air strikes on the Gaza Strip and will be screened twice, on 28 and 30 September.
Arab participation in the two official competitions
Arab participation extends to the two official competitions, with Syrian-American director Ramzi Bashour entering the fiction competition with his film “Hot Water”. The film is competing alongside 14 others for the Golden Eye award in a competition chaired by American director Cary Joji Fukunaga.
In the documentary competition, Syrian director Atia Azam and director Jack MacInnes are taking part with “One in a Million”, alongside 13 other works competing for the Golden Eye. The competition jury is chaired by Danish director and anthropologist Sine Plambech.
The festival reserves the two competitions for the first, second or third feature films in their directors’ careers, as part of its focus on supporting new talent and bringing established cinema names together with filmmakers still at the beginnings of their careers. The winner of each competition receives 25,000 Swiss francs, or about 29,000 dollars.
Tributes to Leïla Bekhti and Gabriel Yared, and the festival’s stars
The guest list includes Swedish-Lebanese actor Fares Fares, who is attending with the film “The Senior Supervisor”. French actor of Algerian descent Leïla Bekhti will also receive the honorary Golden Eye award, among a group of artists the festival has chosen to honour during the event.
The festival will honour French-Lebanese composer Gabriel Yared with a lifetime achievement award, placing him on a list that also includes American director Richard Linklater. American actor Julianne Moore leads the honourees, receiving the Golden Icon award.
The programme also includes 21 Swiss films, another record, while organisers expect to welcome around 500 directors, actors and other people working in the film industry. The programme sections include the fiction and documentary competitions, gala screenings, the “Signatures” section and the “Voices” section, as well as a section devoted to works addressing artificial intelligence and the impact of technology.
They are joined by the “Now/Future” section, launched by the festival to present films linked to environmental, social and economic sustainability. The festival is also welcoming a number of cinema stars and filmmakers, including Julianne Moore, Naomi Watts, Tom Hiddleston, Willem Dafoe and Olivia Colman, as well as Alexander Skarsgård, Jesse Eisenberg and John Turturro.
The list of participants also includes Wim Wenders, Anna Kendrick, Casey Affleck, Richard Linklater, Martin McDonagh and Danny Boyle. The festival opened with “Tenzing”, directed by Australian filmmaker Jennifer Peedom, which had its European premiere in the presence of the director and its stars Tom Hiddleston and Willem Dafoe.
Tenzing opens screenings at the Swiss festival
The opening was also attended by Swiss Federal Councillor Elisabeth Baume-Schneider and Zurich Mayor Raphael Golta. “Tenzing” tells the story of Nepalese mountaineer Tenzing Norgay and New Zealander Edmund Hillary, who reached the summit of Everest in 1953. The film focuses on Tenzing’s relationship with the British expedition and on the difference between Western climbers’ view of the mountain and his view of it as a sacred place.
Tenzin Norgay is played by Tendzin Phuntsok, while Tom Hiddleston portrays Edmund Hillary and Willem Dafoe appears as expedition leader John Hunt. The film’s selection as the opener accords with the festival’s slogan, “Dream Big”. Festival executive director Christian Jungen said this year’s programme was built around that slogan by selecting films about characters who push beyond their limits and seek to achieve major ambitions.
The opening film conveys this approach through the experience of climbing Everest and the relationship between the people taking part in the expedition and their differing perceptions of the mountain. Alongside premieres and competing films, the festival brings together a selection of films from the international cinema season.
It is also devoting a full programme to films examining the impact of artificial intelligence and technology, including the documentary “Musk”, directed by Alex Gibney, which focuses on Elon Musk. The same section is screening “Tech Diplomacy”, which follows Denmark’s first technology ambassador and his relationship with Silicon Valley.
The festival uses these two descriptions to define the subjects of the films, not as an assessment of Musk’s character or his political impact. The festival’s screenings continue until 4 October, while the winners of the two Golden Eye awards in the fiction and documentary competitions are expected to be announced in the final days of the festival, following competitions featuring 14 films each.
