MVFF47 - RSVP Guide

Thelma is a penguin who lives in the Land of Ice. She’s four years old and she’ll turn five in five days—or at least she hopes she will. Will her birthday ever come? And what if she’s not there when the Birthday arrives—will she be forever stuck at age four? But Thelma is an adventurer and a mischief-maker, too. With her parents distracted by their computer screens, she sneaks away to find her friends Wilhelm the flying cat and Sofija the dancing mouse in the Great Forest, far from home. She hopes to meet the Birthday in person, with her magical candles in hand. Director Reinis Kalnaellis’ stunning watercolor palette and captivating animation bring to life a universal story of self-acceptance, friendship, courage, and the true meaning of growing up in a film that won the prestigious Special Jury/Best Animation Award at Annecy. An ageless story, perfect for all ages.

In her latest film, director Andrea Arnold (Fish Tank; Cow, MVFF44) returns to the hardscrabble lives of Brits that established her career. Protagonist Bailey (newcomer Nykiya Adams) is a 12-year-old girl forced into beyond-her-age maturity by ill-equipped parents. Her dad, Bug (Barry Keoghan, Saltburn, MVFF46), is focused on his upcoming wedding while her mom lives in a seedy part of town with an abusive boyfriend. Bailey’s favorite activity is wandering the countryside, filming animals, especially birds, on her phone. When she meets a free spirit in a skirt looking for his parents and coincidentally named Bird (Franz Rogowski; Undine, MVFF43), a bond forms and an adventure begins. Adams shines in the lead role, veering from petulance to empathy with grace, and Arnold deftly develops Bailey’s burgeoning friendship with Bird to explore various tensions within adolescent life, most importantly the guidance and nurturing that folks on the cusp of adulthood need.

Initiative: Mind the Gap
Country: UK, US, France, Germany

A woman (a dazzling Nisrin Erradi) pursues her dream of becoming a singer of traditional Aita with the same fierceness as the Bedouins who came before her, facing her modern-day obstacles with an exuberance equaled by her songs.

Nisrin Erradi dazzles as the charismatic Touda, a single mother determined to earn her living as a singer of Bedouin Aita, poetry defiantly written by women at a time when they were forbidden a voice. The challenges of her particular ambition are excruciatingly clear from the start when men, who see her only as a commodity they might purchase for cheap or take for free, sour her joy in performing. The camera moves in close as she persists, overcoming obstacles subtle and overt, not only for herself but also to give her deaf son a better life. Co-written by director Nabil Ayouch (Much Loved) and Maryam Touzani (The Blue Caftan, MVFF45), it is the latest powerful work from the longtime collaborators, whose work is always empathetic to women facing worlds hostile to their desires. In Everybody Loves Touda, they avoid sentimentality while suffusing their drama with an exuberance and complexity equaled by Touda’s songs.