Press Release #4/25

Opening Films on 29 April

Just about three weeks to go until the start of Crossing Europe Film Festival Linz. In today’s press release, we are announcing the films to open the festival on 29 April: In true Crossing Europe tradition, the beginning of the voyage of discovery into this year’s festival is signaled by four thematically and artistically different variations of European cinema.

Together with Saskia Rosendahl, Nina Hoss shines in the Berlinale entrant ZIKADEN /  CICADAS by Ina Weisse, a gentle drama about parent-child-relationships, responsibility, care work within a family, and the unexpected bond between two women. In 2022, following the outbreak of war, Ukrainian documentary filmmaker Alisa Kovalenko volunteered to defend her country against the Russian troops. In MY DEAR THÉO, she weaves video footage from her five-month service in the field and messages to her little son into a powerful document on the reality of war. LUCE is the second fiction feature film by Italian writer-director duo Silvia Luzi and Luca Bellino, who are the subject of this year’s Tribute program section. Employing a sophisticated visual language, they tell the story of a nameless, melancholic assembly line worker, played by a sublime Marianna Fontana, to once again deliver a work at the edge between reality and fiction set in the working class. Another duo is responsible for the start to this year’s Night Sight: Hélène Cattet and Bruno Forzani, who directed REFLET DANS UN DIAMANT MORT / REFLECTION IN A DEAD DIAMOND, a Eurospy extravaganza carrying as much punch as it is visually striking.
 

Feature Film World Premieres in the Competition Local Artists

Submissions for the 2025 Competition Local Artists section, which focuses on filmmaking with a connection to Upper Austria, featured a particularly high concentration of extraordinary-quality feature films.

Several of these feature-length works will have their world premieres at Crossing Europe:

In the documentary EIN LEBEN IN FARBE / A LIFE IN COLOR, director Alex Stasny takes us to New York, where he accompanies 92-year-old interior designer Eleanor in living her life to the fullest, despite or precisely because of some painful past experiences. Another world premiere is Carola Mair’s HELLWACH - HOMMAGE AN BODO HELL / AWAKE - HOMMAGE TO BODO HELL, an impressive portrait of the writer who left his mark on the Austrian cultural scene for decades and who has been missing since 2024. In the gentle documentary work WIRF DEIN HERZ INS MEER / THROW YOUR HEART INTO THE SEA, Eric Schirl and Christian Kogler talk to people in different countries to shed light on the psyche, and focus in particular on obsessive-compulsive disorders as coping mechanisms. Another film about to celebrate its first presentation on the big screen is the mid-length documentary WIR MIT DEM PA: Noah Berger has taken countless hours spent together and filmed scenes from everyday life to distill a loving and humorous portrait of his grandparents.
 

Focus on Slovenian Experimental Film

This year’s European Panorama Special section gathers two programs to provide a unique look inside Slovenian experimental film:

In Slovenia, a treasure trove of cinema’s avant-garde had long been waiting to be recovered – until the years 2013 to 2023, when the local film museum digitized 179 remarkable short films. They had been produced during the Socialist era, largely outside the state system. In their documentary ALI JE BILO KAJ AVANTGARDNEGA? / ALPE-ADRIA UNDERGROUND!, Matevž Jerman and Jurij Meden combine a smartly edited compilation of original materials and interviews with filmmakers and critics to provide an exciting overall view.
Under the title FROM WHERE I STAND, I SEE THE FUTURE, curator (e.g. Kinoteka – Slovenian Cinematheque) and filmmaker Matevž Jerman has compiled a program of nine experimental shorts made in Slovenia over the past decade. The program offers a window to a diverse and vital scene that reflects on the present with urgency and imagination – both in intimate and societal terms – while often projecting visions of a world unraveling.

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