2024-03-14 03:39:12
The One World festival, which is dedicated to human rights, this year, in addition to documentaries, will for the first time include live productions in its program. Images in virtual reality will also be on display. One of the highlights of the year is to be the documentary My new face about a woman who was attacked by an ex-boyfriend and who burned her face with acid.
The event will start next Wednesday, March 20, and will run until April 21. One World takes place in 48 cities across the Czech Republic.
“At a time when the state of human rights needs to be informed with even greater effort and enthusiasm than ever before, it is also necessary to involve different forms of storytelling and give power to the imagination about other, possible worlds,” explains the change in the dramaturgy of the show’s director Ondřej Kamenický.
Ondřej Kamenický, director of the One World festival. | Photo: CTK
According to him, many documentaries today already use acting techniques to achieve a stronger effect on the viewer. The strict division of films into documentaries and live-action thus ceases to make sense, Kamenický explains why, for example, the film Monster by the award-winning Japanese director Hirokazu Kore’eda, 20,000 species of bees awarded the Spanish Goya prize or the film I’m the Captain were included in the program. It was filmed by the renowned Italian filmmaker Matteo Garrone about two Senegalese heading to Europe in search of a better future.
For a similar reason, stories in virtual reality have been added to the offer, because according to the organizers, the viewer can empathize more with specific situations in 3D glasses. In addition to the traditional competitive sections, the festival will offer seven non-competitive categories that group the films according to the theme into the Identity, Layers of Power, Middle East, Ecosystems, Search for Freedom, Edge of Adolescence and Community sections.
This year, One World will present, among other things, works from countries where the film industry is not as developed as in Europe. “We want to give space to titles that have been overlooked in the Czech environment, and also to give a voice to creators who are not yet established festival names,” continues director Kamenický.
For example, viewers will see Malaysian director Lay Jin Ong’s debut feature film Brothers, about two orphans living in poor conditions in a neighborhood in Kuala Lumpur. The film Žal v Lod follows the fates of families from a town where Israelis and Arabs live side by side. The film Life is not a competition, but I win deals with gender norms in elite sports.
The documentary 20 days in Mariupol, recently awarded an Oscar, shows the behind-the-scenes of war journalism as well as the fate of ordinary people in war. In the film A Bit of a Foreigner, four generations of Ukrainian women are forced to reassess their relationship to their native country and to each other due to the Russian invasion.
Pioneer presents a portrait of a Mexican teacher whose unorthodox teaching methods are perhaps too radical for a conservative elementary school. La Singla returns to the forgotten story of an extraordinary flamenco dancer. The documentary One of a Thousand Hills looks back at the Rwandan genocide, during which almost a million people were murdered, but today the perpetrators and the survivors have to live in close proximity again. And, for example, the film Burití Flower brings to life the turbulent history of the indigenous Brazilian Kraho tribe living in the middle of the Amazon rainforest.
The twenty-sixth year of the festival is also expected to be exceptional with an extended period during which viewers will be able to visit screenings in the capital. One World will take place in Prague from March 20 to 28. From the 2nd to the 21st of April, Prague Echoes will follow, which will take the audience to film experiences even in locations outside the center and traditional festival cinemas. It will be possible to view the One World images, for example, in the Pragovka gallery or the Půda community center in Suchdol.
The show at the Prague Crossroads will be opened by the film Earth Verses, in which directors Ali Asgarí and Alirezá Khatami present nine eloquent stories from contemporary Iran. They named it after a poem by the Iranian artist Forúgh Farrochzád.
Polish director Agnieszka Hollandová will also perform at the festival. | Photo: Jakub Plíhal
On the very first day of March 20, a masterclass by award-winning director Agnieszka Hollandová, who won the Czech Lion last weekend, will take place in the main branch of the Municipal Library on Mariánské náměstí. In the evening, viewers in the Lucerna cinema will watch Oscar’s 20 days in Mariupol.
In advance of the usual distribution, visitors to Jedno svět will also see a new documentary film about Václav Havel by director Petr Jančárek called Tady Havel, do you hear me? or the new documentary by Apolena Rychlíková called Borders of Europe.
The program will include debates after the screenings. On the very first day of the festival, people can listen to a discussion about the documentary Three Promises about the life of a Palestinian family, the film When the Tide Comes in about the sinking Danish island of Mandø or the documentary Sorry/Not Sorry with the Konsent organization. This film concerns stand-up comedian Louis CK’s allegations of a series of sexual assaults and his return to the stage.
Executive director of the One World festival Lenka Lovicarová. | Photo: CTK
This year too, the audience will be able to vote in the audience prize of the Abakus foundation fund, which discussion was the most beneficial.
The Homo Homini award given by the festival will be received by representatives of the imprisoned editorial staff of the independent Azerbaijani server Abzas Media. The new editor-in-chief, Leyla Mustafajeva, working in exile, will receive the award at the opening ceremony.
“The Abzas Media editorial team is among the most important independent Azerbaijani media reporting on the state of politics, human rights and corruption in the state institutions there,” explains the executive director of the festival, Lenka Lovicarová.
In all the cities where the festival will take place, school screenings associated with the subsequent debate are also planned. During the One World festival, the 13th edition of the East Doc Platform event for professionals in the field of documentary film from Central and Eastern Europe will also take place. Among other things, it will include a special lesson by Ibrahim Naš’at about his debut Hollywoodgate, which won several awards, including at the Venice Festival.