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Edinburgh International Film Festival · 2019

Edinburgh International Film Festival 2019

Black Box

In addition to the longer features, there are also a number of short showcases (indicated after the film in italics)

  • Communicating Contact
  • Entangled Experience
  • Politics Of Place

Programme

25 films · 1 review

Jump to a film

Altiplano

Filmed in the Andean Mountains in the traditional lands of the Atacameño, Aymara, and Calchaquí-Diaguita in Northern Chile and Northwest Argentina, this short takes place within a geological universe of ancestral salt flats, volcanic deserts, and coloured lakes.

(Country: Chile, Argentina, Canada; Year: 2018; Director: Malena Szlam) , Trailer

UK premiere. Communicating Contact

Body All Eyes

This 8mm split-screen film explores the symmetry in the shapes that take flight and the bodies that remain.

(Country: Finland; Year: 2018; Director: Saara Ekström)

Scottish premiere. Entangled Experience

Churubusco Inventory

The legendary lab of Churubusco Studios in Mexico City comes back to life in stop-motion animation.

(Country: Mexico; Year: 2019; Director: Elena Pardo)

UK premiere. Communicating Contact

Epoch

Animation of eye-in-the-sky commonality.

(Country: Ireland; Year: 2018; Director: Kevin McLoughlin)

Politics Of Place

Home In E Major

Documentary about the filmmaker's own move from Jerusalem to Durham, North Carolina.

(Country: US; Year: 2019; Director: Tamar Rachkovsky; Stars: Elisabeth Jezierski, Tamar Rachkovsky, Li Zhen, Stuart Barr, Vera Gutkina)

It Has To Be Lived Once And Dreamed Twice

Emerging from the debris of static and fractal noise, an emotionless overseer conveys the story of the sixth extinction from their post-human vantage point.

(Country: Austria, Germany; Year: 2019; Director: Rainer Kohlberger; Writer: Rainer Kohlberger; Stars: Annika Henderson, Annika Henderson)

UK premiere. Politics Of Place

It Matters What

A textual and textural filmic manifesto combining extracts from Donna Haraway’s essay ‘Tentacular Thinking: Anthropocene, Capitalocene, Chthulucene’ with in-camera animation.

(Country: Canada; Year: 2018; Director: Francisca Duran)

UK premiere. Entangled Experience

Kleep Toowit, Klip Klip, Too-ow-wit

Birdwatching provides a critical space for thinking about marginal landscapes and shared spaces.

(Country: UK; Year: 2018; Director: Maria Anastassiou)

Scottish premiere. Politics Of Place

Las Breas

An observational portrait of three tar pits, of which there are only six in the world.

(Country: US; Year: 2019; Director: Laura Kraning, Blue Kraning)

International premiere. Politics Of Place

Lumen

A silent exploration of light and gesture, finding the light, losing it, moments of exploration, hesitation and connection.

(Country: UK; Year: 2018; Director: Richard Ashrowan)

UK premiere. Communicating Contact

Mensch Maschine Or Putting Parts Together

A playful take on gendered technology and the mechanisation of society.

(Country: Austria; Year: 2018; Director: Adina Camhy)

UK premiere. Communicating Contact

Not (A) Part

Dead bee parts found on walks around South West England are assembled and contact printed directly onto 16mm film, creating reanimated on-screen bodies.

(Country: UK; Year: 2019; Director: Vicky Smith)

Scottish premiere. Entangled Experience

Past Perfect

Consideration of the political implications of nostalgia.

(Country: Portugal; Year: 2019; Director: Jorge Jácome; Writer: Jorge Jácome, Pedro Penim)

Scottish premiere. Politics Of Place

Philately

A keenly perceived macro-photographic study of the dot-print artwork of postage stamps.

(Country: US; Year: 2018; Director: Pam Minty)

International premiere. Communicating Contact

Porquerolles

Structural filmmaking exploring multiple framings of six stone blocks that lie in a field in the south of France.

(Country: France, Belgium, UK; Year: 2019; Director: Nicky Hamlyn)

UK premiere. Entangled Experience

Pwdre Ser: The Rot Of Stars

Pwdre ser is the Welsh name for the mythical substance star jelly, which has been observed since the 1400s. The film depicts an encounter with a mysterious, luminous, electrical substance.

(Country: US; Year: 2018; Director: Charlotte Pryce)

UK premiere. Entangled Experience

Sir Bailey

A portrait of the filmmaker's old friend suffering from bone cancer.

(Country: Canada; Year: 2018; Director: Matthew Ripplinger)

UK premiere. Entangled Experience

Starts Wednesday

Time seems to have stalled, as recovered 35mm strips of weekdays revolve disorderly in a carousel of past attractions.

(Country: UK; Year: 2018; Director: David Leister)

International premiere. Communicating Contact

A Study of Fly

A reflection on the relationship between insect, human, environment and the universe.

(Country: US; Year: 2018; Director: Cherlyn Hsing-Hsin Liu; Stars: Wen-Chu Yang, Zheng Fu)

European premiere. Entangled Experience

Total Commitment

A diver at the 1936 Olympic Games in Berlin is caught in mid-air across a triptych patterned by a series of tense sonic interrogations.

(Country: UK; Year: 2019; Director: Lars Koens)

Scottish premiere. Communicating Contact

Unless You're Living It

The simultaneous vulnerability and endurance of a marginalised community is transferred on to this portrait of the quintessential post-industrial town of Mount Forest, Ontario.

(Country: Canada, US; Year: 2019; Director: Sarah Bliss)

UK premiere. Politics Of Place

Vulture

Review preview for Vulture

The chemistry of film and filming is such that it makes something special.

Andrew Robertson · 4 out of 5
Consideration of farm animals.

(Country: Canada; Year: 2019; Director: Philip Hoffman)

Full review

Water And Clearing

An old bucket travels to fill a well.

(Country: Austria; Year: 2018; Director: Siegfried A Fruhauf)

UK premiere. Communicating Contact

Winter's First Moons

A companion piece to last year’s Summer’s Last Moons. Filmed over several nights and using multiple exposures and in-camera editing, Rugh creates a conversation between moons in different phases.

(Country: US; Year: 2019; Director: Kathleen Rugh)

UK premiere. Entangled Experience

Wunderschein

Documenting the production of euro banknotes.

(Country: Germany, New Zealand; Year: 2019; Director: Guillaume Cailleau; Writer: Matteo Conti)

World premiere. Communicating Contact