The Hong Kong International Film Festival (HKIFF) announced that they will present a special program called “The Engaging Detachment of Lucrecia Martel” focusing on the remarkable Argentine director.

An important mission of the Hong Kong International Film Festival is to bring promising directors and pioneering films to the local audience. In its “New Argentine Cinema” programme in 2004, the Festival introduced the then emerging Argentine director Lucrecia Martel to Hong Kong filmgoers. Martel rapidly went on to become a prominent figure in contemporary Latin American and world cinema. This year’s Festival is pleased to celebrate her achievement by showcasing four of her acclaimed works, including Zama (2017), her latest and multiple award-winning film.

Zama

A film director, screenwriter and producer, Lucrecia Martel is recognized as a major auteur and forceful leading light of the New Argentine Cinema. Known for her varied yet critical female viewpoints, she has developed a poetic aesthetic that digs deep into the contradictions of modern Argentine identity. Zama, her latest feature is a period piece that is loosely based on the Argentine classic novel about Don Diego de Zama, a frustrated functionary of the Spanish Crown whose exasperated wait for a royal transfer spirals out into a full-blown tropical malady. In her exquisite, inventive command of sound and image, Martel offers deep meditation on class and colonization, identity and destiny.

Martel’s impressive talent was immediately recognized in her debut feature, The Swamp (La Ciénaga) (2001), which won the Silver Bear Alfred Bauer Prize at the Berlinale. With a radical take on narrative style, the director turns her tale of a dissolute matriarchal family into a stunning affront to bourgeois complacency.

Continuing style and themes, her two subsequent works, co-produced by Pedro Almódovar, were selected in competition at Cannes. The Holy Girl (La Niña Santa) (2004) is a coming-of-age film anchored by a teenage girl who faces the temptations and challenges of sexual desire; while The Headless Woman (La Mujer sin Cabeza) (2008) is a masterpiece exploring guilt, denial and the return of the repressed, through a middle-class woman trying to cope with the aftermath of a traumatizing car accident. Lauded by critics for its cinematography and social commentary, the film won three major awards including Best Film at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences of Argentina, and was selected by BBC as one of the 100 greatest films of the 21st century.

We would like to remind readers that the Festival’s full programme will be announced on February 28th, while tickets will be available from 10 am on March 2nd at all URBTIX outlets.

About the HKIFF:
The HKIFF is one of the Asia’s oldest and most reputable platforms for filmmakers, film professionals and filmgoers from all over the world to launch new work and experience outstanding films. Committed to discovering new talent, the festival premieres the breadth of Chinese cinema and showcases Asian talent. As a life-style event, festival-goers watch world-class films, experience talks with leading filmmakers, visit film exhibitions and attend parties celebrating the Festival community, and much more.

To see other articles about the HKIFF please go HERE
*Note: The Photo used for this article was taken by Darren Hughes for Mubi.com