The 75th edition of the Locarno Film Festival reinforced what’s been apparent for some time: programming a major festival largely composed of world premieres that falls between Cannes and Venice is no easy task. Embracing its cinephilic reputation with more conviction than ever, Locarno continues to search for challenging works in their two main prize-giving sections, the International Competition and Cineasti del presente, yet especially in the former category the number of titles that felt merely undisciplined resulted in a dispiriting sense of enervation only occasionally relieved by works whose boldness was matched by narrative as well as formal interest. Fitting that bill is this year’s Golden Leopard winner Rule 34 (Regra 34) by Brazilian director Julia Murat, which the Film Verdict’s Oris Aigbokhaevbolo called “a brave, well-crafted work.” Yet looking at the awards, in which three major prizes all went to one film, Valentina Maurel’s Costa Rican coming-of-age drama I Have Electric Dreams (Tengo sueños eléctricos), it’s possible to imagine the frustrations felt by many attendees.
There were of course strong works, the best of which elevate that catch-all classification “genre”: Serviam – I Will Serve (Serviam – Ich will dienen) and Lola are cases in point, while other films such as Stone Turtle (awarded the FIPRESCI prize) toy with storytelling conventions in intriguing if not always completely successful ways. The Piazza Grande, certainly the most difficult section to program given the need to find movies that cater to popular tastes while also ticking certain “festival film” boxes, was especially problematic, and though Thomas Hardiman’s debut Medusa Deluxe had a campy adventurousness (and fabulous hair), too many of the other entries were either manifestly earnest, such as Blandine Lenoir’s well-made yet unremarkable Angry Annie (Annie colère) or frustratingly uneven like Michele Vannucci’s Delta, a visually striking work with a very shoddy screenplay.
It’s become something of a game for those on the festival circuit to second-guess why certain films appear in sections where they don’t seem to belong, and Locarno gave us frequent opportunities to indulge in that pastime. Predictability of course leads to complacency, which is never a good look for a festival (one need only look at Cannes, where the same directors inevitably nab the competition slots no matter the quality of their latest offering), but some degree of cohesion is helpful in order to have a sense of a film’s position within this overcrowded industry. So although Alexander Sokurov’s name is big enough for him to expect a festival berth, his Fairytale (Skazka) doesn’t belong in the main competition, whereas Santiago Fillol’s Matadero could have used the exposure in that section rather than in Cineasti del presente.
What Locarno continues to do so well is treat its filmmakers with respect and warmth, and the festival thrives on a summer atmosphere that elevates a love of cinema to a higher plain. The industry platforms were back in full swing (although it was impossible not to notice the paucity of Asian guests due to ongoing global COVID issues), and a robust program of talks and panels, including a surprising 24-hour series in which speakers addressed “the state of attention and its futures” literally from before dusk to after dawn frequently generated more lively conversations than those outside the cinemas. There was no lack of starry guests, with Kelly Reichardt, Costa Gavras, Matt Dillon, Laurie Anderson and others reinforcing Locarno’s longstanding commitment to celebrating the creative spirit. Also on-hand was Todd Haynes, an appropriate mascot of sorts for the superb Douglas Sirk retrospective curated by Bernard Eisenschitz and Roberto Turigliatto (with an accompanying publication by Eisenschitz). A few hours in the GranRex cinema, home to the retrospectives, was all that was needed to refresh the spirit.
