BCN Film Fest kicks off for a week of cinema, literature, and history
Festival coincides with Sant Jordi celebrations and offers tickets for as low as €3.90
The BCN Film Fest gets underway on Thursday for a week of cinema all related to literature or historical events and figures. This year's edition will last from April 21-29.
This year sees the 6th edition of the event take place in the Catalan capital, with seven world premieres and some 70 titles in total.
Selections for the official lineup tend to be adaptations from the literary world, productions based on or related to historical events, or even biopics of famous figures.
The festival aims to gather together high-quality films from across the movie spectrum, from the indie art-house productions, to commercial crowd-pleasers.
Thursday saw the BCN Film Fest 2022 inaugurated with a screening of the comedy 'Espejo, espejo', directed by Marc Crehuet.
Oliver Stone was present in Barcelona as the gust of honor for the opening of the festival. The filmmaker will present his documentary, 'JFK Revisited: Through the Looking Glass'.
Also featuring this year is, 'El Pilar', a film pieced together from clandestine footage taken in the latter years of the Franco dictatorship.
The director of the BCN Film Fest, Conxita Casanovas, hopes to surpass the 11,000 spectators of the previous edition. This year’s event, lasting from April 21 to 29, will feature a total of 70 titles.
Tickets start at just €3.90, and cinemas all over Barcelona will host screenings, notably at Cines Verdi in the neighbourhood of Gràcia, with others taking place in the Institut Français, the CaixaForum, and Casa Seat, from April 21 to 29.
There are eight awards up for grabs, including Best Film, Best Actor/Actress, and Best Script, all to be presented at the Closing Ceremony.
Categories
The Official Selection category of the event, which comprises literary adaptations, productions based on historical events and biopics, also includes 'I Want To Talk About Duras' by Claire Simon; 'The World Champion' by Aleksey Sidorov; 'Eugénie Grandet' by Marc Dugain; 'The Accusation' by Yvan Attal; 'The Phantom of the Open' by Craig Roberts; and 'The Storms of Jeremy Thomas' by Mark Cousins.
Like last year, five more sections make up the festival: Cinema amb Gràcia – Comedies –, Zona Oberta, Imprescindibles – The Essential Ones –, Art al Cinema and CineAsia. The last of these celebrates cinema from a different Asian country every year, with 2022’s choice being the Chinese-made 'The Battle at Lake Changjin', a fictionalized retelling of the Battle of Chosin Reservoir in the Korean War.