The fifth edition of Bif&st – Bari International Film Festival – will take place April 5th to 12th, 2014. Ettore Scola is President of Bif&st, created and directed by Felice Laudadio.

The 8 days will showcase 332 different events, out of which 238 screenings. 54 of these are for free, in particular those of the Tribute dedicated to Gian Maria Volonté, that sums up 75 events altogether.

141 feature films, 44 short movies, 40 documentary films and 14 special events (among the competitive and non competitive sections, including reruns and retrospectives), will be screened and presented at the Teatro Petruzzelli and 11 other cinema halls.

1.              INTERNATIONAL PREMIÈRES
All the following movies will be screened in their original language, with English subtitles.
The Official Inauguration of Bif&st 2014 will be Saturday April 5th at Teatro Petruzzelli with the Absolute Italian Première screening of

• NOAH by Darren Aronovsky, starring Russell Crowe, Jennifer Connelly, Emma Watson, Anthony Hopkins, Nick Nolte. USA 2014, 138’. The movie will be screened in 3D version. Italian distribution: Universal Pictures International Italy.

The movie is a cinematographical adaptation of the story of courage, sacrifice and hope of the Ark: the Biblical Noah suffers visions of an apocalyptic deluge and takes measures to protect his family from the coming flood.

The other movies featured among the International Premières – all of them unreleased in Italy – are:

• THE GRAND BUDAPEST HOTEL by Wes Anderson, starring Ralph Fiennes, F. Murray Abraham, Mathieu Amalric. Adrien Brody, Willem Dafoe, Harvey Keitel, Jude Law, Edward Norton, Tilda Swinton. USA 2014, 100’. Distribution: 20th Century Fox. April 6th. Italian distribution: Fox Searchlight.

The movie follows the adventures of Gustave H, a legendary concierge at a famous European hotel, and those of Zero Moustafa, a lobby boy who becomes his most trusted friend. Theft and recovery of a famous Reinassance painting, an extreme battle to take over of a family fortune and a sweet love story, are but the movie setting. All this happens between the two wars, as the Continent is undergoing rapid and radical changes.

• THE OTHER WOMAN by Nick Cassavetes, starring Cameron Diaz, Kate Upton, Nicolaj Coster-Waldau, Leslie Mann, Don Johnson. USA 2014, 110’. April 7th. Italian distribution: 20th Century Fox.

After discovering her boyfriend is married, a woman tries to get her ruined life back on track. But when she accidentally meets the wife he’s been cheating on, she realizes they have much in common, and her sworn enemy becomes her greatest friend. When yet another affair is discovered, all three women team up to plot mutual revenge on their cheating, lying, three-timing SOB.

• WAR STORY by Mark Jackson, starring Catherine Keener, Anthony Hopkins, Hafsia Herzi, Vincenzo Amato, Donatella Finocchiaro. USA 2013, 88’. April 8th

Lee (Catherine Keener) is a war photographer who has spent her adult life in the world’s most treacherous conflict zones, documenting the catastrophes of others. When we meet her, she has recently experienced her own horror after being taken hostage and brutalized in Libya. Instead of returning to New York where her concerned colleagues and loved ones anxiously await her, Lee detours to Sicily, where she holes up in a small hotel to weather her PTSD on her own terms, not far from the home of her former lover and mentor Albert (Ben Kingsley). As Lee struggles to recover from her psychic and physical wounds, she crosses paths with Hafsia (Hafsia Herzi), a young Tunisian migrant in need of an abortion and safe passage to France, who bears a striking resemblance to a Libyan girl Lee photographed just before her capture. Desperate to connect, Lee tries to help Hafsia, and conquer her own formidable demons in the process.

• THE INVISIBLE WOMAN by Ralph Fiennes, starring Ralph Fiennes, Felicita Jones, Kristin Scott-Thomas, John Kavanagh. UK 2013, 111’. April 9th  Italian distribution: Warner Bros. Entertainment Italy.

Charles Dickens – famous, controlling and emotionally isolated within his success – falls for Nelly, who comes from a family of actors. The theatre is a vital arena for Dickens – a brilliant amateur actor – a man more emotionally coherent on the page or on stage, than in life. As Nelly becomes the focus of Dickens’ passion and his muse, for both of them secrecy is the price, and for Nelly a life of “invisibility”.

• LOVE IS THE PERFECT CRIME (L’AMOUR EST UN CRIME PARFAIT) by Arnaud and Jean-Marie Larrieu, starring Mathieu Amalric, Karin Viard, Maïwenn, Sara Forestier. France-Switzerland 2013, 111’. April 10th

Literature Professor at the University of Losanna, Marc is known for collecting love affaires with his students. A few days after the disappearance of his latter conquest, who was the most brilliant of them all, he meets Anna, that is trying to find out more about her missing daughter in law.

• THE HUNDRED YEAR OLD MAN WHO CLIMBED OUT OF THE WINDOW AND DISAPPEARED by Felix Herngren, starring Robert Gustafsson, Iwar Wiklander, David Wiberg. Sweden 2013, 114’. April 11th. Italian distribution: Eagle Pictures.

It is Allan Karlsson’s 100th birthday, and the retirement home he lives in wants to celebrate the event with a big party. Allan, though, doesn’t agree and, deciding that it’s never too late to make a fresh start, he flees from the institution and heads to the bus station, from which he can leave in search for his past.

 Bif&st 2014 will have his Closing Night on April 12th, with the screening at Teatro Petruzzelli of the movie:

• FADING GIGOLO by John Turturro, starring Woody Allen, John Turturro, Sharon Stone, Sofia Vergara. USA 2013, 98’. Italian distribution: Lucky Red.

Two best friends, with the stage names of Virgil and Bongo, enter the world of male prostitution. One as a gigolò and the other as his agent; until the first falls in love and their illegal enterprise starts arousing suspects amongst the hortodox Hebrew community they live in.

2.               THE INTERNATIONAL PANORAMA MOVIES

The International Panorama section will showcase at the Teatro Petruzzelli 11 movies produced all over the world during last year and absolutely unreleased in Italy before. The screenwriter and director Francesco Bruni will chair the Audience Jury, composed of 30 spectators, that will assign the Bif&st 2014 Award to the director of the best movie. These are the titles, and the authors:

April 6th:

• GIRAFFADA by Rani Massalha. France-Germany-Italy-Palestine 2013, 85’

Palestina. Ziad is a 10 years old kid, deeply fond of the two giraffes living in the zoo of Qalqiya. During an aerial attack of the Israeli Air Force, the male giraffe gets killed. His female companion is shocked and stops eating: her survival is at risk. There is but one place in which the father of Ziad and local veterinary Yacine, can find a new male giraffe – the Ramat Gan Safari Park in Israel.

• WEST (WESTEN) by Christian Schwochow. Germany 2013, 102’

A woman escapes East Germany with her young son in the late 70s, only to discover the same surveillance and suspiction that drove her from the East awaiting her in the “West”. At the World Premiere in official competition at the Montreal World Film Festival 2013, the film won the Critics Award (FIPRESCI) as well as the award for ‘Best Actress’ (Jördis Triebel).

April 7th:

• GREAT-GRANDFATHER (DIDI PAPA) by Irakli Kochlamazashvili. Russia-Georgia, 2014, 72’

Is there life after death? Is there a place for happiness after the war takes the future away from you? The film is about old people in a village who have no one to wait for. It is not a film about war. This film is about people, losses, dreams and hopes.

• ONIRICA: FIELD OF DOGS (PSIE POLE) by Lech Majewski. Poland-Sweden-Italy 2014, 102’

Adam is the lone survivor of a car accident in which his lover, Basia, and his best friend, Kamil, both died. In deep schock, he throws out his academical career. Having always been obsessed by Dante, he gives in to the onirical visions of The Divine Comedy, in the attempt to overcome his sorrow. As Dante with Beatrice, Adam may rejoin his beloved Basia only in his dreams.

April 8th:

• FEVER (FIEBER) by Elfi Mikesch. Austria-Luxembourg 2014, 87’

Franziska (Eva Mattes), a renowned photographer, is on a journey to come to terms with her past. Along the way she’s haunted by memories of her youth and of her father’s (Martin Wuttke) strange behavior when he returned from his time in the french Légion Étrangère in North Africa. He was haunted by images of what he saw during the colonial wars, and was not able to deal with it when he returned home.

• FRIENDS FROM FRANCE (LES INTERDITS) by Anne Weil and Philippe Kotlarski. France- Germany-Russia-Canada 2013, 100’

1979. Carole and Jérôme are 20 and go on an organized trip to Odissea, behind the Iron Curtain. They’re cousins but pretend they’re engaged. In the day, simple tourists, they visit monuments and museums. In the evening, they slip away from the group and secretly meet “refuseniks”, Jews persecuted by the Soviet regime for wanting to leave the country. They discover an underground world, cruel and absurd. While Carole is motivated by political commitment and a taste for risk, for Jérôme, the real motivation behind this trip is Carole.

April 9th:

• TANGERINES (MANDARIINID) by Zaza Urushadze. Estony-Georgia 2013, 89’

Autumn in the 1990s. An Estonian village in Abkhazia. Forest-covered hills, the sea, tangerine orchards. The Abkhazian War in Georgia. Two villagers – the old man Ivo and his neighbour, Markus – are the only ones who have not yet left. Markus wants to harvest his tangerine plantation, although Ivo is against cropping during wartime. As the war approaches and the conflict takes place before their very eye…

• KIDON by Emmanuel Naccache. France-Israel 2014, 89’

“Kidon” begins in the morning of the 18th of February 2010 in Tel-Aviv when the whole world wakes up discovering, on the front page of all the newspapers, pictures of the Mossad agents caught while killing Mahmoud al Mabhouh in Dubai a month earlier. But undoubtedly, the most surprised of all were the Mossad leaders who were the only ones to know for sure that the 3 men and the woman, whose faces were in all the newsrooms of the world, had nothing to do with them. From then on, a race against time is undertaken hoping to understand why everything is aiming at them.

April 10th:

• OF HORSES AND MEN (HROSS Ì OSS) by Benedikt Erlingsson. Iceland 2013, 81’

The man loves the woman and the woman loves the man but the man is in love with his most prized possession, the mare, and the mare is obsessed with the stallion. In a remote valley in Iceland where neighbors follow each other closely, the couple’s first official visit is closely monitored. Spring is coming and with it, the dangerous force of nature. This can not end well. Love and death become interlaced and with immense consequences for the whole community. We follow the fortune of people through the horses’ perception.

April 11th:

• NOT MY TYPE (PAS SON GENRE) by Lucas Belvaux, France 2014, 111’

Clement, a young Parisian philosophy professor is transferred to Arras for a year. Far from Paris and its nightlife, he doesn’t quite know what to do with his free time. Then he meets Jennifer, a pretty hairdresser who becomes his lover. While Clement’s life revolves around Kant and Proust, Jennifer’s is punctuated with chick lit, tabloids and karaoke evenings with her girlfriends. Free love and free hearts, they could live a beautiful romance together, but is it enough to bridge the gaping social and cultural divide between them?

• HOUSE OF SHADOWS (CONTRORA) by Rossella De Venuto. Italy 2013, 85’. Out of competition.

Megan is an Irish successful artist and she lives in Dublin with her husband Leo, an Italian architect who moved to Ireland years before. The couple receives the news of the death of Leo’s uncle, a powerful prelate. They decide to go back to Apulia to deal with the inheritance. Leo’s intention is to sell the whole family palace he inherited to his brother Nicola, who became priest of the little town. But…a thriller’s plot is never revealed!

Almost all the directors of the selected movies will be in Bari to present their works, and participate to the press conferences.

3.              FEDERICO FELLINI PLATINUM AWARDS AND CINEMA MASTERCLASSES

The Federico Fellini Platinum Awards for Cinematic Excellence will be conferred during the evening events at the Teatro Petruzzelli to 5 leading personalities of the cinema world: Paolo Sorrentino (April 6th), Sergio Castellitto (7th), Cristina Comencini (8th), Luis Bacalov (10th), Michael Radford (11th); while the Federico Fellini Platinum Awards for Artistic Excellence will be assigned to two great personalities of the audiovisual culture: Ugo Gregoretti (9th) and Andrea Camilleri (12th), both among the protagonists of 60 years of the radiotelevision public service history in Italy, RAI.

At morning, in the Teatro Petruzzelli, each of them will hold a Cinema Masterclass, right after the screening of a movie. Over the past years, each of these lessons was attended by an average of 1.200, mainly young, cinema enthusiasts.

The Fifth Edition of the Bif&st – Bari International Film Festival will take place from 5th to 12th April, 2014. Ettore Scola is President of the Bif&st, which is created and directed by Felice Laudadio.

The 8 days of the kermesse will showcase 332 different events, out of which 238 screenings. 54 of these are for free, in particular those of the Tribute dedicated to Gian Maria Volonté, that sums up 75 events altogether.

141 feature films, 44 short movies, 40 documentary films and 14 special events (among the competing and non competing sections, including reruns and retrospectives), will be screened and presented at the Teatro Petruzzelli and 11 other cinema halls, that will also host exhibitions, round tables and workshops.

The net cost of this Grand Celebration of Cinema – that got 70’000 spectators participating to the 402 events of the 2013 edition, is but a little over one million euro.

Noah, directed by Darren Aronofsky, and Fading Gigolo, directed by John Turturro, will be screened as International Premières on the opening and closing night of the 5th Bif&st edition. The Bari International Film Festival, chaired by Ettore Scola and both created and directed by Felice Laudadio, will be held 5th to 12th April, 2014.

Noah will have its absolute Italian Première at the Teatro Petruzzelli on April 5th. Written, directed and produced by Darren Aronofsky, and starring Academy Award Winner ® Russell Crowe as the biblical patriarch Noah, the movie is a cinematographical adaptation of the archetypal story of courage, sacrifice and hope, regarding the Ark. The italian theatrical release of the movie, distributed in Italy by Universal Pictures International Italy, and in the United States by Paramount Pictures, is scheduled for April 10th.

Fading Gigolo will be the final event of the festival, and it will be screened during the closing soiree of April 12th. Directed by John Turturro, and, together with Woody Allen, Sharon Stone and Sofia Vergara, starring Turturro itself amongst the interpreters – the movie tells the story of Fioravante (Turturro) who, pushed by his friend Murray (Allen), enters the oldest profession in the world and becomes a gigolò. The italian theatrical release of the movie, distributed by Lucky Red, is scheduled for April 17th.

The six other International Premières and the General Programme of the Bif&st 2014 will be revealed during an upcoming press conference on March 20th.

The New York Times has selected Hannah Arendt by Margarethe von Trotta – which had its absolute premiere during the last edition of the Bif&st – amongst the 10 best movies of 2013, with the following mention: “Those who complain that movies can’t think don’t really know how to think about movies. This one, focusing on the controversy surrounding its subject’s 1963 book “Eichmann in Jerusalem,” brilliantly dramatizes the imperative at the centre of her life as a writer and philosopher, which was to compel the world to yield to the force of the mind.”
Barbara Sukowa, protagonist in Hannah Arendt, received the “Federico Fellini Award for Cinematic Excellence” at the Teatro Petruzzelli in March.