In 2014 — already having proven himself (with films such as Los muertos and Liverpool) a master of so-called neo-neorealism (characterized by the blurring of distinctions between fiction and documentary, actor and character, and narrative and observation) — Lisandro Alonso made a bold move in his career with the release of Jauja, a dreamlike fable that proved him comfortable in a register that is tonally very different from his earlier films. What still links Jauja to Alonso’s earlier works, is a penchant for heightened realism — in which he emphasises off-screen spaces and receding backgrounds, through image, sound and narrative — that builds “a bridge between a civilized modern world and an alternate primitive and barbaric world to which the former feels drawn and watches with fascination.”‘Into the Unknown’, Quintín, Film Comment, September/October 2014

Lisandro Alonso is the most maverick of the many mavericks of the New Argentine Cinema — not only because as a young man he started making films totally under his own steam, but because his style is so utterly uncompromising, focusing on people who live on the farthest margins of Argentine society. This symposium proposes to examine Alonso’s cinema, its specific production context and aesthetic strategies, focussing on its freedom from restrictions of generic cinema (psychological realism, causal narration…).

Schedule

• 10:00 – Welcome
• 10:15 – Lecture by Tom Paulus
• 11:30 – Jauja (2014, 109′)
• 13:30 – Lunch break
• 14:30 – Rapado (Martín Rejtman, 1992, 75′)
• 15:45 – Coffee break
• 16:00 – Q&A with Lisandro Alonso & Ilse Hughan
• 17:30 – End

Lisandro Alonso (Buenos Aires 1975) studied at the Universidad del Ciné (FUC) and made his first short film Dos en la Vereda in 1995. After working as a sound engineer, he returned to directing to make his first feature, La libertad (2000), which was selected for the Cannes Film Festival (Un Certain Regard 2001). In 2004, 2006 and 2008, he was once again in Cannes with Los muertos (2004), shown in the Director’s Fortnight, Fantasma (2006) and Liverpool (2008), which had its world premiere at the Director’s Fortnight. In 2014 Alonso travelled to Cannes again with Jauja, which was presented in Un Certain Regard. Now 43, he has five feature films under his belt and is working on a new project, titled Eureka.

Ilse Hughan (Amsterdam 1953) studied Literature and Translation at the university of Amsterdam and worked for years as a Dutch translator of French and Italian movies. In 1992 she brought new life to the film company Fortuna Films, founded by her grandfather Jean Desmet in 1909. She is managing director of Fortuna Film Productions in Amsterdam and president of ‘Fundacion TyPA’, a cultural foundation based in Buenos Aires. She also works for the International Film Festival Rotterdam as a member of the selection committee of the Hubert Bals Fund. Fortuna Films (co)produced Los muertos, Fantasma, Liverpool and Jauja by Lisandro Alonso and Hamaca Paraguaya by Paz Encina, all selected for the Cannes Film festival (Quinzaine des Réalisateurs or Un Certain Regard).

Tom Paulus teaches film studies in the department of Theatre and Film Studies at the University of Antwerp. He has published on issues of genre and film style in such journals as Film International. His essays on pictorial style in the films of John Ford were published in three edited collections, John Ford in Focus (Stoehr & Connolly eds.) from McFarland, Westerns: Movies from Hollywood and Paperback Westerns (Paul Varner ed.)  from Cambridge Scholars Press, and New Perspectives on The Quiet Man from the Liffey Press. His edited collection (with Rob King) Slapstick Symposium: Essays on Silent Comedy was published by Routledge in the American Film Institute Film Readers series.

Practicalities

All talks will be held in English.

Tickets can be booked by sending an e-mail to info@cinea.be (click the button at the top of the page). General admission is 10€, students only pay 5€.

This symposium is held on the occasion of the retrospective and carte blanche, organized by CINEMATEK, Cinea and Courtisane, in collaboration with Research Center for Visual Poetics of the University of Antwerp, Instituto Cervantes & the Embassy of Argentina in Belgium. More info: www.courtisane.be and www.cinematek.be.