Best Directors Tizza Covi and Rainer Frimmel, Best Actress Vera Gemma – that’s the awesome verdict of the Orrizonti 2022 jury announced for VERA on the closing night of the 79^th Venice Film Festival.
First time director David Wagner took the IWONDERFULL Grand Prize of the Settimana della Critica for his debut EISMAYER.

Alma Mahler is often reduced to being labelled "the wife of...". At some point, when Gustav Mahler was no longer alive and his widow was in the process of forging plans for the future with the architect Walter Gropius, Oskar Kokoschka appeared on the scene. He would have been only too happy to be united with her in matrimony. That never happened. But what did take place was an explosive affair. Dieter Berner and screenwriter Hilde Berger, in their depiction of ALMA & OSKAR, present the battle between the sexes as it begins to erupt at the turn of the century… along with a musician whose talent has received little attention.

SPARTA
It is a film about identity, about guilt and, most obviously, about pain. A very good film
El Mundo
 
a precise, intense film
Blickpunkt Film

The San Sebastián IFF is hosting the world premiere of Ulrich Seidl's SPARTA in its Golden Shell competition, the second part of Seidl's brother diptych (together with RIMINI). Also invited – two of our highly performing festival faves 2022 – CORSAGE by Marie Kreutzer and MUTZENBACHER by Ruth Beckermann who will also be holding a masterclass.

Marie Kreutzer’s CORSAGE, starring Vicky Krieps, is the Austrian entry to the Oscar race for Best International Feature Film. Vicky Krieps is the winner of the Best Actress Award at Cannes Un Certain Regard and the Heart of Sarajevo for her outstanding performance in the role of Empress Elisabeth.

The first Pardo Verde WWF, a newly launched initiative by the Locarno IFF and the WWF for outstanding films tackling environmental issues, went to Nikolaus Geyrhalter’s stunning essay on our growing amounts of garbage.
 
Ruth Mader’s SERVIAM – I WILL SERVE, also a contender of the Locarno 75 International Competition, took one of the Junior Jury Awards.

Reality and fiction merge and collide in both Austrian entries at the 79^th Venice Film Festival (August 31 to September 10):

• VERA by Tizza Covi & Rainer Frimmel is invited to the Orizzonti Competition
• EISMAYER, directorial debut by David Wagner, is  part of the Settimana della Critca selection

Vera's father Giuliano Gemma is an Italian screen legend. He bestowed upon his daughters a childhood of glitz and glamour – but also the burden of fame. In Tizza Covi and Rainer Frimmel's new film VERA the protagonist is involved in a minor car accident in a suburb of Rome, and this brings about a collision between two contrasting realities of the city. Good-natured, generous and unworldly, Vera navigates these two worlds full of ambushes and traps… and despite all her doubts, she remains unwaveringly at one with herself.

None of his colleagues in the Austrian Army could have even dreamt that Eismayer was concealing a double life behind his brutal rigour. The young soldiers under his command had nothing to laugh about. But when the recruit Mario Falak embarks upon his military service, Charles Eismayer's life – consisting of the military, an apparently ideal family and hidden homosexuality – begins to come apart. In his feature film debut EISMAYER David Wagner slowly lets the true and unusual love story take its course within the brittle structures of an army barracks.

The 70^th San Sebastián IFF (September 16 to 24) has unveiled its competiton line-up including Ulrich Seidl’s SPARTA in the Golden Shell competition. SPARTA, with Austrian actor Georg Friedrich in the lead, completes Ulrich Seidl’s brother diptych; its first part RIMINI was a Golden Bear contender earlier this year.
 

Marie Kreutzer’s CORSAGE and Ruth Mader’s SERVIAM – I WILL SERVE, both released at top festivals this spring and summer, will also be vying for the Heart of Sarajevo. Thomas Fürhapter’s LIVING TOGETHER is a contender in the Documentary competion. Ulrich Seid’s Golden Bear entry RIMINI will be presented In Focus.

Two strong Austrian voices are to present their highly anticipated new films:
MATTER OUT OF PLACE by Nikolaus Geyrhalter who provides stunning observations on waste on a global scale
SERVIAM – I WILL SERVE by Ruth Mader who tackles the question of faith in her thriller set in an all-girl Catholic boarding school
 
Both films are contenders of the Pardo d’oro International Competition

Garbage-free zones no longer exist on this planet. In MATTER OUT OF PLACE Nikolaus Geyrhalter makes this abundantly clear, also stressing that despite huge efforts to place it out of sight, garbage cannot be eliminated.

It is primarily the prestige of this elite establishment that prompts well-heeled parents to send their daughters to the 1980s Catholic boarding school which is the setting of Ruth Mader's thriller SERVIAM – I WILL SERVE. A deeper bond with God appears to be lacking among the parents and many members of the religious order as well. Except for one young nun. In her religious verve she sends a particularly sensitive girl on a dangerous path to God; they both become lost in the labyrinthine search for healing – but ultimately salvation from outside is their only hope.

A single location dominates Ruth Mader’s new film SERVIAM – I WILL SERVE: a Catholic girls’ boarding school for the daughters of wealthy families. The film is set in the 1980s, and money seems to count more than faith in this atmosphere, where girls-only schools were as natural a part of life as landline phones. One of the sisters takes her mission seriously and attempts to guide her pupils on a spiritual path – not necessarily to the benefit of their mental state. Ruth Mader filmed her thriller in association with epo-film during the 2021 summer vacation and has now begun postproduction work.

Who should you save if you can’t be sure any longer what good it would do? The three crew members of the Rubikon space station know that the ecological disaster on Earth can’t be avoided. But when a tiny glimmer of hope emerges the three individuals, whose characters and motives for venturing into outer space could hardly be more different, find themselves in an impossible dilemma. Leni Laurisch has embarked upon a tricky mission with her sci-fi debut RUBIKON and staged a spacey chamber piece about survival.

Being young could feel easier. From the family's winery and the forgetful grandfather to her role as captain of the ice hockey team, 20-year-old Mira has quite a lot of duty in her life. But there’s also the fear of not being equal to the expectations placed upon her, and grief for lost members of her family. In Clara Stern's debut BREAKING THE ICE it takes Mira a long time to see that although the ice is always hard when she slams against it despite her armour, it can thaw very quickly.

When Simone arrives at the country cottage owned by her Aunt Claudia, the famous nutrition expert, she doesn’t exactly get a hearty welcome. The overweight teenager had been hoping to lose a few kilos over the Easter holidays, with Claudie’s expert guidance. But getting that sort of help from Claudia entails vows of renunciation and devotion, and there’s no escaping from the pact. Peter Hengl lets his debut horror feature film FAMILY DINNER simmer on a slow heat before serving up a truly gruesome banquet.

Some historical sources put the figure at 45 cm. Apparently a tape measure would only have to be that long to completely encompass the waist of the Habsburg Empress Elizabeth. However, if the legendary beauty had difficulty breathing at the imperial court in Vienna it was due not only to her extremely tight-laced corset but also to the attitudes and conventions which permitted the Emperor’s wife no other function than to be a beautiful appendage at his side. Marie Kreutzer focuses on Elisabeth’s 40th birthday as a turning point which prompts her to withdraw gradually from this suffocating confinement. In CORSAGE she creates a portrait of a woman whose potential goes far beyond the limitations of the period.

The demands placed upon the Costume Department of CORSAGE were twofold in nature. Alongside the task of creating the gowns worn by Elisabeth and her entourage they also faced the perhaps greater challenge of creating efficient and wearable corsets to go underneath the fine material, to reproduce the astonishing waist measurements of the Habsburg empress. Interesting insights provided by Costume Designer Monika Buttinger.

Great news from NYC: Two Austrian directorial debuts will enter the festival scene at the Tribeca Film Festival (June 8 to 19): BREAKING THE ICE by Clara Stern in Viewpoints, Peter Hengl’s FAMILY DINNER has been selected a Midnight entry.