Off Plus Camera 2012

Paving the Way for Films

Vertigo guaranteed: the festival programme of the 5th Off Plus Camera is simply stunning. During the ten days of the festival, the Association of Independent and Other Arts Off Camera will present almost 100 films from across the world. Two competitions, plenty of thematic sections… And most of all, new programme features: Woman Make Movies, Geek Cinema, New Israeli Cinema, and New British Cinema.

Following reviews of Korean, Irish and Nordic cinema, it’s time for a retrospective of some of the most interesting and dynamic cinematography of recent years. In New Israeli Cinema, the carefully selected line-up of the most interesting films from the land by the Dead Sea will allow viewers to discover issues key to the understanding of contemporary cinema and politics.

New British Cinema has been divided into two parts. The first, prepared with the New British Cinema Quarterly, will feature the latest independent British films. The second part will include art documentaries made by BBC Arena. They feature exceptional people such as Salvador Dalí, the Mona Lisa, the groups Dire Straits and The Everly Brothers, Orson Welles, Buddy Holly, Bob Marley, and even places such as the Chelsea Hotel in New York.

Women Make Movies is a section held on the 40th anniversary of the formation of the organisation of the same name, popularising an image of strong women and condemning false images ubiquitous in the media. We’ll see ten brave, uncompromising productions which will clearly present women’s passion, talent and engagement.

In recent years, cinema has taken a real shine to geeks, perhaps because they differ from the usual Hollywood standards of beautiful and successful protagonists. Geek Cinema will attempt to present them from various perspectives, and pose questions on their significance and function in contemporary culture. The title of Madeleine Olnek’s film Codependent Lesbian Space Alien Seeks Same is self-explanatory. Fat Girls by Ash Christian puts a humorous twist at depicting growing pains in American suburbia. Other films telling stories of awkward adolescences are Ash Christian’s Magnus and Miguel Arteta’s Youth in Revolt, starring Michael Cera. There will also be Meet Monica Velour (dir. Keith Bearden) telling the tale of a connection between a small-town 17 year old boy and a 1970s porn star, and Sabine Bernardi’s Romeos: an unusual love story of exclusion and not being able to fit in, in which the transgender protagonist – still a rarity on cinema screens – has to fight for social acceptance as well as facing up to his own identity.

The main competition Paving the Way will present twelve productions from across the globe, competing for the Kraków Film Prize of 100,000 US dollars. The jury will be geaded by Polish director Andrzej Żuławski. The Polish Feature Film Competition will include ten productions made in 2011 and 2012, competing for the Polish Film Noble, valued at PLN 100,000. Films will be assessed by an international jury.

Discoveries will feature the latest films by both established and debuting directors, which have been successful at international festivals. They include Jonathan Levine’s 50/50 with its outstanding cast (Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Anjelica Huston, Seth Rogen and Bryce Dallas Howard), and The Guard, John Michael McDonagh’s feature-length debut starring Brendan Gleeson, awarded at the 2011 Berlinale. The programme will also include The Lie – a project, base on T.C. Boyle’s story, by Joshua Leonard, renowned for his acting roles in the Blair Witch Project and Humpday, as well as Jason Eisener’s Hobo with a Gun, an interplay between film clichés and B movies (terror, fear, rivers of blood, and Rutger Hauer in the title role!).

What else – perhaps Catching Up? It includes productions released in other countries, which somehow never made it to Poland. They include Nash Edgerton’s The Square (2008), regarded as one of the best Australian films of recent years, and Rebecca Miller’s The Private Lives of Pippa Lee (2009) about a middle-aged woman reflecting on her life, starring the brilliant Robin Wright. Based on a true story, Wisconsin Death Trip (1999) by James Marsh is an intriguing tale of a small town in Wisconsin state, which experienced a wave of disasters in the late 19th century – crime, disease, arson, mental illness, suicides – befalling the local population. The screenplay was based on Michael Lesy’s book of the same title. The film includes archive photography and press cuttings from the local paper.

Want to learn more about independent American cinema? In the section From the Gut – American Independents, we’ll be able to see some original films, selected especially for the Off Plus Camera festival by Trevor Groth and Mike Plante, programming directors of the Sundance Film Festival. In The Color Wheel, Alex Ross Perry will describe toxic games played between siblings; in The Catechism Cataclysm, Todd Rodhal tells a tale of a priest bored with his lot; and finally, Aurora Guerrero’s Mosquita y Mari portrays two Mexican teenage girls and their dilemma: choose forbidden passion, or conform to century-old family traditions. The next film, Restless City by Andrew Dosunmu, is described as an Afro-American version of Chungking Express. In The Oregonian, Calvin Lee Reeder encourages the viewers to play with conventions; Sophia Takal’s Green is a story of an emotional triangle which evolves from an innocent game into deep jealousy and frustration; and David Nordstrom’s Sawdust City describes two brothers taking a crazy journey in search of their alcoholic father. In Mike Plante’s words, “The section intends to present films that step outside form and narration boundaries in contemporary independent American cinema. The movies vary in genre from bizarre horrors to gentle love stories; each one is a personal vision of its creator, which he shares honestly with his audience. The films haven’t been made purely with profit in mind, but rather to share remarkable ideas and emotions, coming straight from the gut of their creators.”
Book your time off now – you can’t miss this!