THE DEBT – Ritesh Batra
12 projects have been selected to participated in the first workshop of the second edition of Biennale di Venezia’s Biennale College – Cinema (2013 – 2014) held in Venice from the 5th to the 14th of October 2013. The first edition of the Biennale College – Cinema 2012/13 closed with the screening of three feature films at the 70th Edition of the Venice Film Festival in 2012: MARY IS HAPPY, MARY IS HAPPY – Nawapol Thamrongrattanarit (director, Thailand) , MEMPHIS – Tim Sutton (director, USA) and YURI ESPOSITO – Alessio Fava (director, Italy) .
The 12 selected projects with a brief synopsis.
BLOOD CELLS – Joseph Bull (director, the UK), Luke Seomore (director, the UK), Samm Haillay (producer, the UK): a decade after a catastrophe destroyed his family and their farm, an eruption from the past compels an exiled young man to embark upon an odyssey through the broken and beautiful margins of contemporary Britain.
H. – RANIA ATTIEH (director, Lebanon), Daniel Garcia (director, USA), Shruti Rya Ganguly (producer, India): a tale of two women, both named Helen, whose lives and relationships begin to unravel in the wake of a meteor explosion over their town of Troy, NY. It is a modern and lyrical re-imagining of a classic Greek tragedy.
IMACULAT – Kenneth Mercken (director, Belgium), Marcian Lazar (producer, Romania): when a 19-year-old girl from a good family is committed to rehab, she becomes a prey to the male junkies. She learns that in order to regain control over herself and her own body, she must first destroy her old self.
LA BARRACUDA – Jason Cortlund (director, USA), Julia Halperin (director, USA), David Hartstein (producer, USA): when an odd young woman named Sinaloa shows up on Merle’s front porch claiming to be her half-sister, an exciting surprise leads to violence.
LA MUJER DE LOS PERROS – Laura Citarella (director, Argentina), Verónica Llinás (director, Argentina), Mariano Llinás (producer, Argentina): a woman shares her life with ten dogs in a shack in the outskirts of a big city. The realistic story of a strange queen.
NANCY – Christina Choe (director, USA), Gerry Kim (producer, USA): Nancy, a 40-year-old serial impostor, lives at home with her abusive, elderly mother. Desperate for love and connection, she creates a fake blog and catfishes a lover, until her hoaxes result in epic and tragic consequences.
RIVER OF EXPLODING DURIANS – Edmund Yeo (director, Malaysia), Ming Jin Woo (producer, Malaysia): a peaceful coastal town in Malaysia is turned upside down by the construction of a potentially radioactive plant. A young boy at the cusp of adulthood and an idealistic history teacher find themselves fighting for the soul of their hometown.
SHORT SKIN – Duccio Chiarini (director, Italy), Babak Jalali (producer, Iran / the UK): one has to grow hard but without ever losing tenderness.
THE DEBT – Ritesh Batra (director, India), Seher Latif (producer, India): a cop tries to prove his worth when he takes on the most important case of his life and learns how to be a parent.
THE STRIKE – Adam Breier (director, Hungary), Akos Schneider (producer, Hungary): one day a middle-aged family man asks himself what if his life would be different and decides to exchange the known for the unknown. An absurdly minimalist tragicomedy.
UNLESS – Matteo Servente (director, Italy), Ryan Watt (producer, USA): an imaginative 11-year-old boy barrels into a rural town on a stolen Trans-Am, upending the careful routines of an elderly police dispatcher and a secretive barber.
WINTER – Aamir Bashir (director, India), Alan McAlex (producer, India): Nargis was abandoned by her husband for the cause of Kashmir’s freedom. She waits and hopes for her love to return. But when he does return, scarred by violence, Nargis is forced to choose between love and freedom.