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
147 desperate survivors crammed onto a 12 x 6 metre raft. The shipwreck of the frigate La Méduse in 1816 was a dehumanising hell that inspired various artists over the years, including filmmaker Augustí Villaronga.
El ventre del mar was originally intended as a play, but the Spanish director modified his plans during the Covid-19 pandemic. His story about two survivors of the shipwreck is now a mix of theatre and film. Sometimes the actors are clearly standing in scenery with a shallow layer of water, while at other moments they are on a real raft with a sea of drowned bodies in the background.
Villaronga has his two main characters, an officer and a sailor, reminisce about their indelible traumas. This story, told in a slightly abstract, poetic style, is sometimes abruptly contemporised using news footage.
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
These intimate, at times almost magical, portraits of soulmates prove that love comes in all shapes and sizes.
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