The third retrospective from Ceau, Cineclub! this year will take place between April 25 and 27, at Cinema Studio, and proposes a unique series of five Slovenian and Italian fiction films on the theme of the border, selected from a large project that is part of the official European Capital of Culture 2025 program implemented together by the cities of Nova Gorica (Slovenia) and Gorizia (Italy).
Viewers will be able to discover two famous films made by two of the emblematic Slovenian filmmakers of the former Yugoslav period, Karpo Godina and France Štiglic, an important film by a great and lesser-known Italian director, Luigi Zampa, and two recent films, selected at top festivals and directed by filmmakers of the new generation, Gregor Božič (Slovenia) and Laura Samani (Italy).
The program and tickets are available on the Cinema Studio website. The films will be introduced by the Slovenian curator Jasna Pintarič, the special guest of the retrospective, and Ionuţ Mareş, the artistic director of Ceau, Cinema!
The event in Timişoara, the first city in the European tour of the retrospective entitled “The Border in Film and History”, is organized by Ceau, Cinema! and by one of the festival’s international partners in 2024 and 2025, the Kinoatelje audiovisual and intercultural services center, which operates in the two cities formerly separated by the border between Slovenia, part of the former Yugoslavia, and Italy.
The retrospective “The Border in Film and History” offers a cinematic exploration of the complex history of Europe’s border regions. The project immerses audiences in the rich, multicultural heritage of these cross-border areas. Through a diverse selection of films, the retrospective challenges the traditional perception of borders as simple divisions, instead presenting them as spaces of transition, exchange, and cultural fusion.
Selected at Locarno, the cult film “Red Boogie” (1982), made by one of Slovenia’s most important directors and cinematographer, Karpo Godina, is a tragicomic story about the relationship between art, politics and everyday life. Shortly after World War II, the authorities sent a group of musicians to the field, tasked with raising morale in agricultural cooperatives, labor brigades and construction sites during the first socialist five-year plan. While trying to entertain the masses, the young musicians find themselves in a dilemma: they too must be re-educated into a conscious socialist youth, because jazz, their beloved genre of music, is considered imperialist.
The story of “One Fine Day” (1962), made by the great Slovenian director France Štiglic, is set in a small town under Italian rule and where the inhabitants — apart from the representatives of the authorities — are all Slovenians. However, the city’s shame is a trio of ridiculed brothers who have joined the fascists. Through love stories and humorous marital adventures, the film explores both the light and dark sides of life in a rural border region between the two world wars. It is a true classic and one of the greatest comedy achievements of Slovenian cinema.
The story of the Italian film “The White Line” (1950), by Luigi Zampa, is set on the border between Italy and Yugoslavia, after World War II, when the Allied Commission draws the line that divides a city in two. Within a few hours, residents have to choose which way to go. Many dramas arise, especially for the children of the village, and conflicts break out. The film is a neorealist melodrama that stars the famous actress Gina Lollobrigida in the female lead.
All three classic films will be screened in restored versions.
Selected at the Cannes, Toronto and BFI, “Small Body” (2021), by Laura Samani, focuses on Agata, a woman from Italy in 1900 whose child was stillborn. Agata hears about a place in the mountains where babies can be brought back to life for just one breath, to be baptized. She takes a trip with her daughter’s small body hidden in a box and meets Lynx, a lonely boy who offers to help her. They embark on an adventure that will allow them both to get closer to a miracle that seems impossible.
In “Stories from the Chestnut Woods” (2019), the debut of Slovenian director Gregor Božič, we are in the middle of the chestnut forests on the border between Yugoslavia and Italy. Here, a miserly carpenter obsessively counts his money, while on the other side of the river, the last chestnut picker, Marta, prepares to leave the abandoned valleys and seek a new and better life overseas. A dream-like parable about life and death in forgotten and abandoned places.
The films will be subtitled in Romanian and English.
Organizers: Ceau, Cinema!, Kinoatelje Gorizia/Nova Gorica
Partners: La Cappella Underground, Slovenian Film Centre, La Cineteca del Friuli, Slovenian Cinémathèque, Slovenian Film Archive, Cinema Studio
Funded by the Municipality of Timisoara through the Project Center
Sponsors: Groupama Asigurari, Vitas Romania