"The Beksińskis. The Sound and Picture Album" at the Slamdance Festival





Co-financed by the Polish Film Institute, documentary film “The Beksińskis. The Sound and Picture Album” by Marcin Borchardt qualified as the only European production for the documentary film competition at the Slamdance festival, which takes place from 25 to 31 January 2019.  

American premiere of “The Beksińskis. The Sound and Picture Album” 

The selection committee of the Slamdance festival invited Marcin Borchardt to participate in the full-length documentary film competition. It will be also its American premiere. The competition section include also 11 feature and 9 documentary films, however “The Beksińskis. The Sound and Picture Album” is the only European production.

Portrait of Beksiński

“The Beksińskis. The Sound and Picture Album” is a full-length documentary film made of sound, film and photographic archival materials, most of them come from the private archive of Zdzisław Beksiński and have not been shown publicly before. The painter for almost fifty years scrupulously documented his and his closest family’s life. He kept a journal, wrote letters, took photos, and passionately filmed everyday events. From these materials emerges an extremely complex picture of the relationship between the artist and his wife Zofia and his son – a charismatic radio journalist and translator – Tomasz.

Creators

The director of the film is Marcin Borchardt, who also wrote the script based on the book “Beksińscy. Double portrait” by Magdalena Grzebałkowska. The producer and Polish distributor of the film is Darek Dikti Biuro Pomysłów. The film is co-financed, among others by the Polish Film Institute and the Gdynia Film Fund.

Festivals

The world premiere of the film took place at the 57th Krakow Film Festival in a Polish and international competition, where he won the jury’s distinction. Marcin Borchardt’s image also qualified for the competition section of the Film Festival in Trieste, or the Canadian Hot Docs.

In autumn 2017, it appeared in Polish cinemas.

“Users” in the Narrative Shorts Programme

The second Polish film at Slamdance Festival is “Users” by Jakub Piątek. The selection committee of the Slamdance Festival has invited a Polish short film to take part in the Narrative Shorts Programme. The screening in the competition section of Slamdance will be the international premiere of “Users”. The film’s world premiere took place at the 58th Krakow Film Festival where it was awarded the Special Mention.

Press materials

In “Users” a man and a woman were joined into a couple by a video chat algorithm. It is a one to several thousand chance. They say that the Internet is the last sphere of freedom. If everything is allowed, what shall we start with? How much can you experience in one night? How much can you truly feel?

[Based on the information from the polishshorts.pl website.]

Slamdance

The Slamdance Film Festival was created in 1995 as an alternative to the Sundance festival. The first edition was organized by a group of filmmakers whose films did not get into the Sundance festival program. Both events take place in the same place – Park City, Utah, in the United States. Slamdance promotes low-budget videos of debuting artists. The upcoming edition will take place from 25 to 31 January 2019.

Polish accents

In 2017, Wojciech Kasperski documentary “Icon” was presented in the competition section of the festival. Two years earlier  a documentary film “Super Unit” by Teresa Czepiec and the animation “The Wayward Carnality” by Joanna Maria Wójcik participated at the Slamdance. In 2014, the pictures for the film “Sometimes I Dream I’m Flying” directed by Aneta Popiel-Machnicka were honored with the Blackmagic Design Cinematography Award. In 2011, the festival featured a short feature film by Kuba Czekaj “Twist & Blood”.

The official website of the festival: www.slamdance.com.


30.11.2018