FDCP brings Cannes-winning films to Philippines

A group of political prisoners seeking revenge, a family grappling with generational trauma, and a dreamer hopping from one time period to another. These are the stories selected by the Film Development Council of the Philippines (FDCP) for this year’s World Cinema series.

These entries are notable for nabbing major awards at the Cannes Film Festival last year. Iranian political thriller “It Was Just an Accident” won the festival’s top prize, the Palme d’Or, while Norwegian family drama “Sentimental Value” took home the Grand Prix, and Chinese epic sci-fi “Resurrection” received the Special Award.

Two of the films also earned nominations at this year’s Oscars. “Sentimental Value” leads with nine nominations, including Best Picture, while “It Was Just an Accident” secured two, including Best International Feature Film.

SM Seaside is the sole cinema in Cebu screening the films curated by the FDCP, UN until February 3, with tickets priced at P250 per film.

This review of FDCP’s World Cinema lineup does not include the fourth entry, “The Sound of Falling,” due to its R-18 rating, as SM Cinema has a policy against screening R-18 films.

It Was Just an Accident

Written and directed by Jafar Panahi, “It Was Just an Accident” centers on Vahid (played by Vahid Mobasseri), an ethnic Azerbaijani who one night recognizes the distinctive squealing sound of a man with a prosthetic leg (Ebrahim Azizi) inside his auto shop.

Traumatized by his time in prison, Vahid sees this as an opportunity to exact revenge and kidnaps his former tormentor, Eghbal, inside his van, who was nicknamed “Peg Leg” because of his prosthetic.

As Vahid prepares to bury the man alive, doubt creeps in when the man insists that the scars on his leg are still fresh, and that he couldn’t possibly be the same Eghbal he was looking for.

This sparks a series of escalating events as Vahid recruits fellow former political prisoners – including a photographer named Shiva (Mariam Afshari), her ex, Hamid (Mohammad Ali Elyasmehr), and a bride (Jadis Pakbaten) who is set to be married the next day – to help determine whether the man is truly their abuser or simply an innocent person with a prosthetic leg who happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

The film was shot without the permission of Iran’s government. Panahi has long been at odds with the regime and has even served jail time after authorities accused his films of being propaganda against the Islamic Republic.

With this in mind, it’s impressive that the auteur filmmaker was able to complete the project in secret, with many scenes shot in public spaces, including an open road sequence where the cast had to push a van that ran out of gas.

It’s easy to see why the film would never be approved by the Iranian government, as it sharply critiques the country’s social realities. For this reason, the film was submitted as France’s entry to the Oscars instead of Iran’s.

Panahi balances edge-of-your-seat suspense, razor-sharp dialogue, and dark humor, making “It Was Just an Accident” a gripping political thriller about the lengths individuals will go to confront their abusers, and the years stolen from them by unjust imprisonment. Five stars out of five.

Sentimental Value

“Sentimental Value” follows two sisters, Agnes and Nora (Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas and Renate Reinsve), who reunite with their estranged father, Gustav (Stellan Skarsgård), following the death of their mother, Sissel.

Gustav is an acclaimed film director who hasn’t made a movie in a decade. Nora is a moderately successful stage actress, while Agnes is a former child actress from one of Gustav’s films who is now a historian with a family of her own.

While the sisters are close, Nora harbors deep resentment toward her father following his divorce from their mother, while Agnes is more forgiving.

Gustav plans to make his first film in 15 years, to be shot at his ancestral home where Nora and Agnes once lived. The project is inspired by his mother, who committed suicide in the same house when he was seven.

He wants Nora to play the lead role, but she refuses even to read the script. A chance meeting with American actress Rachel Kemp (Elle Fanning) at a film festival leads to her being cast instead.

Over the course of its two-hour runtime, the film explores how generational trauma fractured the family, tracing the dark past that led to Gustav’s mother’s death and examining how its characters attempt to heal their relationships.

The film also critiques the current state of the industry, where streaming platforms wield enormous power that often limits filmmakers’ creative freedom. Wanting to shift gears on his project, Gustav had to repurpose his script from Norwegian to English to keep Rachel as the lead, while also working with an entirely different crew than he is used to.

Following up his critically acclaimed 2021 romantic drama “The Worst Person in the World,” Joachim Trier handles these themes with empathy and restraint, ensuring that none of the characters feel like stereotypes.

Complementing Trier’s nuanced screenplay are the performances that earned the film its well-deserved Oscar nominations.

Skarsgård, nominated for Best Supporting Actor, delivers an egotistical yet deeply flawed director who nonetheless longs to reconnect with his daughters, while Best Actress nominee Reinsve and Best Supporting Actress nominee Lilleaas portray their characters’ empathy, passion, and resentment with striking authenticity.

Also nominated for Best Supporting Actress, Fanning’s portrayal of Rachel is layered, deconstructing the dedication of an actress to her craft despite her big celebrity status. She attempts to understand Gustav and his family’s story while grappling with doubts about whether she can deliver a genuine performance rooted in such deeply personal material.

The main takeaway from “Sentimental Value” is that while trauma may define us, the only way to truly heal is to look inward as a means of moving forward. Don’t watch this without bringing tissue. Five stars out of five.

Resurrection

“Resurrection” unfolds across different decades in a world where people have lost the ability to dream.

A Deliriant (Jackson Yee), one of the few who can still dream, is tracked down by Miss Shu (Shu Qi), an agent tasked with stopping him. However, she is moved by Deliriant’s determination to continue dreaming.

Instead, she chooses to give him a gentle death by installing a film projector in his head, allowing him to experience dreams in a more poetic, cinematic form – spanning from the mid-20th century to the turn of the millennium.

The film is divided into six chapters, each corresponding to the six senses in Buddhist thought: sight, hearing, smell, taste, touch, and mind.

Across these decades, the Deliriant inhabits different characters, all portrayed brilliantly by Yee in a transformative performance – a man accused of murder pursued by an investigator, an art thief who befriends a trickster spirit, a con artist who recruits a young girl, and a hoodlum deeply infatuated with a mysterious karaoke singer.

Known for his distinctive visual style, Chinese filmmaker Bi Gan crafts a story rooted strongly in imagery, with Dong Jingsong’s striking cinematography giving the film a surreal, dreamlike quality.

With its nearly three-hour runtime, “Resurrection” demands patience, as its slow pace may test viewers early on. It gains momentum in the second half, when the filmmaker’s intentions become clearer.

The film remains open to interpretation, but in a nutshell, “Resurrection” feels like a lengthy love letter to the films Bi Gan grew up watching, suggesting that the stories we watch through the big screen is how we measure our lives.

While mainstream audiences want a straightforward, stronger plot-driven narrative, “Resurrection” is likely to be better appreciated by hardcore cinephiles for its fascinating exploration of humanity’s relationship with visual storytelling. Three and a half stars out of five.