Venice shorts section opens with Bahrani's Plastic Bag

The section will open with Man Push Cart and Goodbye Solo director Ramin Bahrani’s eco-themed short Plastic Bag, out of competition. The short traces an epic, existential journey of a plastic bag in a world of globalization concerns. Bahrani, who was last in Venice with Goodbye Solo (2008), is also on the Lion of the Future (first film) jury this year.

Plastic Bag is the first of 26 shorts (18 of which are in competition) that were selected out of 1,600 submissions this year.

The 18 films competing in this year’s Corto Cortissimo line up, represent 16 countries and include three Italian films including the debut of actor Adriano Giannini’s The Game (Il gioco), ample Asian entries such as Kwang bok-Kim’s Mom’s Vacation (Umma-e-huga) and Japan’s Edmund Yao’s Kingo. Others titles hail from Brazil, such as Bliss (O teu sorriso) from Pedro Freire as well as titles from Eastern Europe, Europe, South Africa and the United States.

The section closes with the Italian-Swiss co-production The It.Aliens by filmmakers Clemens Klopfenstein and Lucas Tiberio Klopfenstein, out of competition.

As previously announced – the section will be judged by a three-member jury led by – US filmmaker Stuart Gordon, Russian actress and critic and festival director Sitora Alieva and American scholar Steve Ricci. The jury will assign three prizes in the section:

-Corto Cortissimo Lion for best short film

-Candidate Venice Film Festival – nomination for the European Film Awards

-Special Mention

Corto Cortissimo Line Up:

Ramin Bahrani- The Plastic Bag – out of competition opening film

Clemens Klopfenstein and Lucas Tiberio Klopfenstein – The It.Aliens – out of competition closing film

Competition:

Salome Aleksi – Happiness – Georgia

Tomek Baginski – The Kinematograph – Poland

Gianclaudio Cappai – I Know There’s A Man – Italy

Jan Cvitkovic – This Is Earth My Brother – Slovenia-Italy

Sara Eliassen – Still Birds – Norway

Pedro Freire – Bliss – Brazil

Adriano Giannini – The Game – Italy

Murad Ibragimbekov – Objekt No 1- Russia

Rowland Jobson – GirlLikeMe - Great Britain

Etienne Kallos – Firstborn – South Africa / USA

Kwang-bok Kim – Mom’s Vacation – Korea

David Lea – Storage – Great Britain

Simone Massi – Nuvole Mani - France

Meni Philip – Sinner – Israel

Martin Stitt – Family Jewels – USA/ Great Britain

Shijie Tan – For Two – Singapore

Dean Yamada – Bicycle – Japan / USA

Edmund Yeo – Kingyo – Japan/Malaysia

Corto Cortissimo – Events

Leonardo Carrano / Alessandra Pierattini – Recordare – Italy

Giacomo Cimini – The City In The Sky –Great Britain/Italy

Alberto Dell’Ara - La Seconda Famiglia - Italy

Riccardo Pugliese – Radio – USA/Italy

Paolo Sassanelli – War – Italy

Annarita Zambrano – A La Lune Montante – France

Corto Cortissimo in agreement with Circuito Off Venice Short Film Festival

Tzu Nyen Ho – Earth - Singapore