Les Films de Cannes à Bucarest is honoring Luc Dardenne, Arnaud Desplechin, and Stéphane Brizé this year with a national premiere of their latest films as well as other landmark titles from their careers screened in three special retrospectives.

Directors Thomas Salvador and Tarik Saleh will also be presenting their films at the festival, the organizers have announced, according to News.ro. Additionally, because this year marks the one-century anniversary of Pier Paolo Pasolini's birth, the festival will dedicate a fourth retrospective to him.

Thomas Salvador is a director and screenwriter, who often stars in his own films. He has directed six short films which were awarded at numerous festivals, most notably Petits Pas (Quinzaine des réalisateurs 2003) and De sortie (Jean Vigo prize in 2006). La Montagne, his second feature film, had its world premiere at this year's Cannes Film Festival and was awarded the SACD prize.

On Friday, October 21, at 18:00, the director will be at the Elvire Popesco Cinema for an open discussion in two parts: during the first part he will discuss his film La Montagne with critic Ionuț Mareș, and in the second part he will talk with Mihai Zotta - a forestry engineer with over 20 years of experience in the field of nature conservation. Thomas Salvador will also meet the public on Saturday, October 22, at 17:00, at the Peasant Museum Cinema.

Tarik Saleh started out as one of Stockholm's leading graffiti artists in the 1980s. He directed and wrote the screenplay for The Nile Hilton Incident, which won the Grand Jury Prize at Sundance 2017, received a Guldbagge Award for Best Film in 2018, and was nominated for Best Foreign Film at the César Awards.

The filmmaker will meet festival audiences at screenings of Boy from Heaven on Saturday, October 29, at 20:00, at Cinema Elvire Popesco, and Sunday, October 30, at 18:00, at the Peasant Museum Cinema.

The Belgian Dardenne brothers are filmmakers who have always kept their same thematic and stylistic obsessions. Two-time winners of the Palme d'Or, they have become famous for their scrupulously realistic social dramas, following a lesser-known career in documentaries. The filmmakers have tried from the outset to blend their liberal political views, with a masterful, unostentatious style, and the often breathtaking denouement of spiritual redemption.

Tori et Lokita, their latest film, was awarded the Cannes 2022 Anniversary Prize. In modern-day Belgium, a boy and a teenage girl of African descent, who arrive here without any other family members, rely on their indestructible friendship to face the challenges of exile.

Luc Dardenne will participate in a Q&A moderated by film critic Ionuț Mareș after the screening of the film on October 23, at 20:00, at Cinema Elvire Popesco.

Arnaud Desplechin, one of Cannes' darlings, has been in the official competition since his first feature, the much-celebrated La Sentinelle. He returned with Comment je me suis disputé... (ma vie sexuelle) to launch a new generation of French actors. In 2016, Desplechin received the César Award for Trois souvenirs de ma jeunesse, which had a smash premiere at the Cannes Film Festival, an event that cemented his status as one of the most respected French filmmakers of his generation.

At this year's Les Films de Cannes à Bucharest he will be presenting his latest film, Frere et Soeur, as well as Trois souvenirs de ma jeunesse. After the premiere of the film, which will take place on October 22, at 19:30, at Cinema Elvire Popesco, Arnaud Desplechin will take part in an open discussion moderated by film critic Ionuț Mareș.

Director, screenwriter, and actor, Stéphane Brizé says: "For me, making a film means creating emotion. That's all. You have to build a story to create emotion. If you are in cinema, you have to generate emotion. When the spectator leaves the cinema, he has to leave with a reflection on emotion."

Pier Paolo Pasolini Retrospective

"Wild, primitive, passionate and provocative: 2022 is the year of Pasolini's 100th birthday, 100 years since the birth of a controversial genius," write film critics on the Mubi website.

The powerful tensions in his films challenged the status quo and pushed the boundaries of censorship. The sacred in Pasolini's films can be found where you least expect it: embedded in the mud and palpable at the furthest edges of social life.

Les Films de Cannes à Bucarest.13 will be screening three of the titles for which he is now known around the world: Accattone - Best Film, Karlovy Vary 1962, Il Vangelo secondo Matteo - Grand Jury Prize, Venice 1964, and Oedipus Rex - In Competition, Venice 1967.

Il Vangelo secondo Matteo will be introduced by Stefano Francia di Celle, a cultural manager, curator, and film historian, together with film director Andrei Ujică, and the screening will be preceded by the short film 2 Pasolini (d: Andrei Ujică) on October 21, at 18:30, at the Eforie Cinema.

maia@romania-insider.com

(Photo source: Les Films de Cannes à Bucarest Facebook page)