FID Marseille 2022: new Lav Diaz and Albert Serra among the films generating heat

Marseille is a lively place at the start of the French school holidays, filled with a diverse cross-section of boisterous Provençal families, unflappable pleasure-seekers and hardy cinephiles. Watching several of the more memorable titles playing the 33rd edition of FID Marseille International Film Festival, it felt as though the bustling port city’s searing July heat had seeped into the auditoria and manifested itself on screen. Who can say whether instances of art reflecting hot-and-bothered life were intended by director Tsveta Dobreva and the festival’s programming team, but FID prides itself on showcasing innovative new work regardless, unveiling 49 world premieres across its 123-film programme.  

Although predominantly a documentary festival, plenty of intriguing fiction was on show, with a pair of sultry dramas offered by the festival’s best-known arthouse filmmakers in attendance. Making its world premiere in the international competition, Lav Diaz’s A Tale of Filipino Violence is another epic of slow cinema from the Filipino director. At around seven hours, it’s a tense and occasionally brutal adaptation of Ricardo Lee’s short story ‘Servando Magdamag’. Set in the Philippines during 1973 and 1974, under the Ferdinand Marcos dictatorship, it focuses on the familial complexities of Servando Monzon III (John Lloyd Cruz). On the cusp of inheriting a huge farm from his dying grandfather, Monzon negotiates the demands of an imperious military general implementing martial law and the dangerous actions of a revolutionary brother-in-law, all while he discovers shocking family secrets. Diaz’s trademark long takes and static camera shots dominate, but patient viewers will be richly rewarded with hypnotic monochrome scenes of great richness and nuance.

Having debuted at Cannes Film Festival, Albert Serra’s Pacifiction screened out of competition in Marseille as part of a seven-film retrospective of the Catalan director’s films, which also included his minimalist Don Quixote film Honour of the Knights (2006) and his dogging-aristocrat drama Liberté (2019). Set on a perma-clammy Tahiti, Serra’s latest sees the island’s oily French high commissioner De Roller (Benoît Magimel) schmooze his way around sleazy nightclubs and hold testy meetings with locals, all the while denying rumours that France may restart nuclear tests nearby, having stopped in 1996. De Roller’s almost-romance with transgender dancer Shannah (Pahoa Mahagafanau) is typical of the official’s actions, in that nothing concrete seems to be achieved. His diplomacy rarely seems to attain anything meaningful, his words always pacifying, his actions always preening. Magimel’s smart and smarmy performance is the highlight of another slow, sweaty piece.

Premiering in the international competition, Aftersun – no relation to Charlotte Wells’ excellent recent debut feature of the same name – keeps the on-screen temperature high but is more fluid in its form. What begins as a documentary retelling of the 1980 kidnapping of Swiss child René Henzig at Sant Pere Pescador on the Costa Brava morphs into a cross between a coming-of-age tale about three young girls in a holiday camp and a noir-ish detective story. Director Lluís Galter shot the piece on a Handycam, which gives proceedings an as-it-happens feel, by turns personal and creepy, almost as though you’re watching evidence in some horrific court proceedings.

Franssou Prenant’s French competition title About the Conquest tackles harrowing events from France’s colonial history in original and striking documentary fashion. Visually, Prenant crafts his feature from mixed sources, including material filmed in Algiers during 2009/10, Algeria’s rural interior in 2017 and footage shot between 1986 and 2004 in Paris. Over these scenes, all-male voiceovers read first-hand testimonies of the French invasion of Algeria between 1830 and 1848. Many are sourced from the military, with others coming from politicians, writers and French mathematician Joseph Fourier. Attitudes and deeds are laid bare as we learn about heinous would-be war crimes – such as a cave massacre in which many Algerians were burned alive or the needless demolition of Algerian homes to build a town square. In just 75 minutes, viewers are presented with a harrowing picture of murderous imperialism.

Less severe in tone, but even more formally inventive, was international competition title A Woman Escapes, directed by Sofia Bohdanowicz, Burak Çevik and Blake Williams. Working in 3D, 16mm and HD, the trio – two Canadians and a Turk – crafted a film based on Bohdanowicz’s own experiences in early 2020. It follows a woman grieving the loss of a friend and the break-up of a long-term relationship while struggling through the early months of the pandemic, yet repurposes the directors’ actual collaborative work with in-jokes, tricks and other meta-cinematic devices. It could have been an incomprehensible mess, but somehow the film succeeds: a slice of multi-region pandemic life and toil wrapped in a surprising, stimulating visual presentation. The Robert Bresson homage in the title was inspired by a pivotal viewing of A Man Escaped (1956). Feeling emotionally and creatively imprisoned by the lockdown and grief, Bohdanowicz’s chance watch of the prison-break classic inspired her to have another crack at working with Çevik and Williams. 

More formally traditional but artfully composed and original in its perspective is Nikola Spasic’s docufiction Christina, which won the festival’s First Film Prize. In Belgrade, a transgender sex worker’s life is explored through her dealings with clients, her familial relationships and her religious beliefs. Shot with painterly skill by DP Igor Lazić, the film’s casting also intrigues: the actors playing Christina (Kristina Milosavljević) and monastery worker Marko (Marko Radisić) are the only people playing their real-life selves.

Writer-director Delphine Kreuter’s X14, showing in the French competition, was perhaps the most accessible work at FID. A sci-fi social-realist comedy set in the Parisian suburbs, it’s about Liz (Lucie Cure), a thirtysomething woman with an artificial electric heart awaiting a transplant, who lives with a robot housemate. Determined Liz goes on Tinder dates and has to remember to keep her heart charged, while jealous X14 watches on. Denis Lavant plays a whacky neighbour, while Jeanne Balibar – fresh from her supporting role in Memoria (2021) – plays Liz’s oft-ignored mother. The resulting feature veers towards silliness at times, but – much like Brian and Charles (2022), the lo-fi British comedy it shares similarities with – it’s a welcome blast of joy that never outstays its welcome.