Accidental Luxuriance of the Translucent Watery Rebus
Hybrid noir showing in moving collages the hunt for a man who could be anyone. Cigarettes burn. Ash falls. ‘Silence fiction’.
80'
Croatia
IFFR 2021
A street corner in the Palestinian district of Ramla, in Israel. Neighbours going to work; children playing; mothers doing the shopping; at night, a man running past; a boy throwing a stone. Further away, a garden and a busy road. All this was recorded by the security camera Kamal Aljafari’s father installed in 2006, in the hope of catching the vandal who kept on damaging his car.
After his father’s passing, Aljafari finds the footage. He uses it as the raw material for this idiosyncratically edited and manipulated impression with fitting musical accents, a touch of dry humour and succinct intertitles. Such as: “Abu Rizeq, what’s he doing so early in the morning?” Or: “A man is in love with my sister.” Sometimes, a child – the director’s niece – gives a commentary in voice-over. Finally, a text full of highly personal memories puts it all into context – also politically. The result is a sober, poetic homage to this neighbourhood, dismissively referred to by Israel as ‘the ghetto’. An artistic act of resistance against eradication.
IFFR 2021
Programme IFFR 2021
Echoing Rotterdam’s port city identity, IFFR’s newest programme offers a safe haven to the full range of contemporary cinema that the festival champions.
Still: El ventre del mar
Read more about this programmeHybrid noir showing in moving collages the hunt for a man who could be anyone. Cigarettes burn. Ash falls. ‘Silence fiction’.
80'
Croatia
IFFR 2021
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102'
Portugal
IFFR 2021
In 2024, 88-year-old Suzanne uses deep-fake technology to recreate her deceased husband Edouard, but is he still the same?
67'
France
IFFR 2021