Cinema buffs will have the opportunity to see 88 feature-length films, 28 documentaries and 68 short films. Thirty-eight of these productions are world premieres, according to organizers.
This year, 5,000 films from 96 countries have been submitted to the annual festival.
The event is set to open at 8 p.m. with a screening of Dangerous Gentlemen directed by Maciej Kawalski. The film is a story of four early 20th-century artists from Poland’s southern mountain resort of Zakopane.
“It's a film with a fantastic all-star cast: Tomasz Kot as Tadeusz Boy-Żeleński, Marcin Dorociński as Witkacy, Andrzej Seweryn as Joseph Conrad, and Wojciech Mecwaldowski as Bronisław Malinowski. A hundred and seven minutes of a wild ride,” Stefan Laudyn, the director of the Warsaw Film Festival, told state news agency PAP.
Ukrainian Competition
A special Ukrainian Competition will be held during this year's Warsaw Film Festival, in association with the Odesa International Festival, which cannot take place in its usual form this year due to the ongoing war in Ukraine.
“We have invited our friends from the Odesa International Film Festival, which is offering its entire Ukrainian Competition, with a total of 11 feature-length films and seven shorts,” Laudyn said.
"This will be an excellent opportunity to get to know Ukrainian cinema, but also an offer for Ukrainians living in Poland," he added.
In addition to films shown in 11 different sections, the organizers have prepared a series of accompanying events, including meetings with filmmakers and workshops.
This year's festival will close with a film by Riley Keough and Gina Gammella, entitled War Pony. The film won the Camera d'Or award t the Cannes Film Festival this year and is a look at the lives of members of the Oglala Lakota tribe of the Sioux people.
“It tells the story of how they are treated as second- or third-class citizens in a country that they morally own,” Laudyn said.
The Warsaw Film Festival runs until October 23 and is being held for the 38th time.
For details of screenings, go to wff.pl.
(jh/gs)
Source: PAP, WFF