“WITHOUT SNOW” AND “FROZEN STORIES” IN LOCARNO!

Two Polish short films made by students of Polish National Film School in Łódź will be competing for the main prizes at 64th International Locarno Film Festival – one of the top festivals worldwide.

“Without snow” by Magnus von Horn and “Frozen stories” by Grzegorz Jaroszuk were selected to the international competition Pardi di domani/ Leopards of tomorrow. The festival’s importance is based not only on its long tradition but also stems from the outstanding, carefully composed programme that every year presents the best author films from all over the world.  For Polish young directors the screening at the festival might be a first step to the path followed by the great maters of world cinema such as: Claude Chabrol, Stanley Kubrick, Milos Forman, Marco Bellocchio, Alain Tanner, Mike Leigh, Bela Tarr, Chen Kaige, Edward Yang, Aleksander Sokurov, Jim Jarmusch, Spike Lee, Gregg Araki, Gus Van Sant, Pedro Costa, Fatih Akin, Claire Denis, Kim Ki-Duk among many others. Locarno brought them recognition and helped them to reach the multicultural audience.

Both films have already been appreciated at film festivals in Poland. This May “Without snow” by Magnus von Horn was awarded the Golden Hobby Horse at Krakow Film Festival, Lucjan Bokiniec Award for the best film at Young Cinema Competition at Polish Film Festival in Gdynia (for exceptional artistic maturity and awareness of film tools and their precise usage) and First Prize at “Łodzią po Wisle”. Grzegorz Jaroszuk’s “Frozen Stories” were awarded Grand Prix and the People’s Choise Award at the very same festival.

“Without snow” is a story about the circumstances of a tragedy. A group of teenagers taunt another student. At their age, one is seized by extreme emotions. Linus cannot deal with it. He cannot communicate with his mother and his best friend dates a girl that he is in love with. He does not realize that their behaviuor will lead to a tragedy: ‘it is neither my fault, nor yours, it is the fault of the landscape’.

On the contary „Frozen stories” is a film with a hint of irony that shows the life of two worst supermarket employees who have only two days to find the goal in their dull lives. The popular television show aims to help them to achive that. The film in a grotesque way shows the deep loneliness of two outsiders and their attempt to escape from the previous lives.

Magnus von Horn was born 1983 in Göteborg, Sweden. He studied film theory at the university of Göteborg between 2002 and 2003. Worked as lightning assistant and camera assistant on several Swedish film productions between 2003 and 2004. He started his studies at the directing department of the Polish National Film School (PWSFTviT) in 2004. “Without snow” is his graduate film.

Grzegorz Jaroszuk was born in Warsaw in 1983. In 2011 he graduated from directing department in the Polish National Film School in Lodz. During his studies, he made six short films and some of them were shown on many festivals in Europe

The Locarno Film Festival will be held between 3rd and 13th August.

More information at: www.pardo.ch