Around the Globe in 14 Days | Epics, Romance and Documentaries

The “Around the World in 14 Films” festival will take cinephiles on a world tour for the 6^th time this year, but for the first time, the departure destination we be Berlin. The films were previously screened exclusively at festivals like Cannes, Venice, Locarno and San Sebastian. Each movie also brings with it either the director, leading cast or a crew representative that will speak and discuss with the audience.

“Around the World”'s organizers want to show that international cinema has more to offer than just rounding up the “usual suspects”. Lesser known artists will get a chance to present new stylistic impulses and narrative techniques. The festival will open with the Spanish movie “Mad Circus – A Ballad of Live and Death” by Álex de la Iglesia, who will be present along with lead actress Carolina Bang. Set during the Spanish civil war, “Mad Circus” is a mix between black comedy, romance and war movie. It's no surprise that Quentin Tarantino had named it as one of his favorites at the 2010 film festival in Venice. 

The Latinamerican “El Sicario, Room 164” sets new standards in documentary film – it's a tell-all portrait of a hit-man for the Mexican mob, recorded in great detail by the Italian director Gianfranco Rossi. "El Sicario" is no walk in the park. It's “extremely hard to watch” and not advisable for “sensible viewers”, warns film patron Emely Atef. The same goes for the Norwegian “Oslo, August 31” by Joachim Trier, Lars von Trier's nephew, who has portrayed a drug addict on a suicidal trip around the Norwegian capital.

Fans of the epic will be happy to hear about the 4 hour and 20 minute long “Mysteries of Lisbon”, a portrait of passion playing across three decades in Portugal, Spain, Italy and France, by the recently deceased Raúl Ruiz.

Further East, Nuri Bilge Ceylan's “Once Upon a Time in Anatolia” about a group of men looking for a corpse in the Anatolian tundra, brilliantly leaves viewers in the dark about its character's motives to reveal a capturing modern Turkish drama.

Contributions from Korea, Japan, India, Russia, Canada, Mexico, Morocco, Rumania, Iran and Germany's “Kriegerin” by David Falko Wendt round off the event. A festival pass for die hard fans is 30 euros. The end of the festival will be marked by the Intercultural Film Award, which will ber rewarded to the movie that best shows intercultural dialogue.

(ms)