San Sebastian International Film Festival (SSIFF, September 22-30) has unveiled the 11 first and second features competing for the New Directors award.
Among the selection is Niclas Larsson’s Mother, Couch! starring Ewan McGregor, Taylor Russell and Ellen Burstyn. The film is a co-production between the US, Sweden and Denmark and sees three estranged siblings brought back together by their mother’s bizarre behaviour.
The strand will open with Miang Ling’s second film Carefree Days which follows a 25-year-old woman with a terminal illness who embarks on a road trip with her two closest friends. The Chinese director’s debut Wisdom Tooth screened at multiple festivals in 2019 including Göteborg, Rotterdam and Hong Kong.
Closing the programme will be Beyond The Fog, the debut feature from Japanese director Daichi Murase, about a family who run a boarding house in a remote mountain village.
Henry Bernadet is also competing with his second feature Gamma Rays which is a blend of fiction and documentary and uses young, non-professional actors from immigrant communities. Bernadet’s debut West Of Pluto played in main competition at Zurich and Rotterdam back in 2008.
The winning film receives a €50,000 prize which is divided between the director and the Spanish distributor.
The line-up includes seven first films and four second films, all of which are also eligible for the festival’s main competition prizes. First titles were announced earlier this month and featured Robin Campillo’s Red Island and Cristi Puiu’s MMXX.
San Sebastian New Directors 2023
Carefree Days (China) - opening film
dir. Liang Ming
Beyond The Fog (Jap) - closing film
dir. Daichi Murase
Achilles (Iran-Ger-Fr)
dir. Farhad Delaram
Bahadur The Brave (India)
dir. Diwa Shah
Bauryna Salu (Kazakhstan)
dir. Askhat Kuchinhirekov
The Other Son (Col-Fr-Arg)
dir. Juan Sebastian Quebrada
Hi, Mom (Russia)
dir. Ilia Malakhova
The Blue Star (Arg)
dir. Javier Macipe
Last Shadow At First Night (Sing-Jap-Indo-Slo-Phil)
dir. Nicole Midori Woodford
Gamma Rays (Can)
dir. Henry Bernadet
Mother, Couch! (Swe-US-Den)
dir. Niclas Larsson
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