Blue Bird

Nicolas Provost’s feature debut The Invader and Gust Van den Berghe’s Blue Bird have been nominated for The Ingmar Bergman International Debut Award at Sweden’s Göteborg International Film Festival (27 January-6 February). The festival also selected Lotte Stoops’ Grande Hotel and Tom Fassaert’s An Angel in Doel in the Dokumentärt and Visionärer sections respectively.

A total of eight films from around the world were nominated for the prestigious award. With two Flemish filmmakers nominated out of eight, Belgian cinema from Flanders clearly demonstrated its vibrancy and talent. The Ingmar Berman International Debut Award is awarded to “a debutant who in his film treats an existential theme with a dynamic or experimental approach to the cinematic means of expression.”

Gust Van den Berghe’s Blue Bird grabbed yet another Special Mention in the category Best Feature Film, International Selection at the 40th edition of the Festival of New Cinema in Montreal (12-23 October). Only recently, Blue Bird also received a Special Mention for Best Film at the Ghent International Film Festival.

Blue Bird is a story about how one day in a child's life can change its world. One morning, Bafiokadié and his sister Téné, two African children, leave their village. The only thing on their mind is to find their lost blue bird before the day is over. But they will find much more along their way: they encounter their deceased grand-parents, they fight the soul of the forest and learn from the Chief of Pleasure. Everyone tells them a story about life and death. At the end of their long journey, the brother and sister enter the Kingdom of the Future and meet some yet-to-be born children. Delighted with this discovery, they eventually return home. For as we lose something we gain something.

Both Nicolas Provost’s The Invader and Gust Van den Berghe’s Blue Bird received special honours at the awards  ceremony of the 38th Ghent International Film Festival (11 – 22 October). The Invader grabbed the Georges Delerue Award for Best Music and Sound Design (Sacha & Evgueni Galperine en Senjan Jansen) while the film's lead actor Issaka Sawadogo received a Special Mention from the International Jury. The same Jury also gave a Special Mention to Gust Van den Berghe's Blue Bird in the category of Best Director.

The Invader recently  premièred at the Venice International Film Festival.  From there the film went on to the Toronto and San Sebastian International Film Festivals. Less than 24 hours prior the Fest's Award Ceremony, Provost received the Jo Röpcke Award for Indigenous Filmmaking Talent.

The 38th edition of the Ghent Film Festival (11-22 October) has added four Belgian films to its programme. Blue Bird (Gust Van den Berghe), The Invader (Nicolas Provost) and L’Hiver Dernier (John Shank) have been selected for the official competition of the festival, while Lena (Christophe Van Rompaey) will have its Belgian premiere at the festival.

Blue Bird, the second feature by Gust Van den Berghe, is based on a story by Belgian Nobel Prize winner Maurice Maeterlinck. Two African children leave their village with just one thing in mind: finding their lost blue bird before the day is over. But along the way they will find much more: they encounter spirits and ghosts. Van den Berghe’s first feature, Little Baby Jesus of Flandr, was given a huge ovation at the Cannes Film Festival last year and this year Blue Bird was received with even more enthusiasm at the festival.

Last year, Gust Van Den Berghe’s debut feature Little Baby Jesus Of Flandr was shown to a huge ovation in Cannes. Now, a year later, he has completed a new feature film, Blue Bird, which has already been snapped up by leading international sales agent The Coproduction Office and is bound to enjoy a very long festival life. The prodigiously talented Van Den Berghe, who is now busily plotting a third feature, is only 25 years old.

Text Geoffrey Macnab Portrait Bart Dewaele

Cannes 2010. At the screening of Little Baby Jesus Of Flandr in the Quinzaine, the audience was wildly enthusiastic. The film’s young director sat there, gratified but startled.

‘It was pretty extreme… but good extreme!’ he says of his experiences at his first major festival. ‘The people at the Quinzaine are wonderful people. They gave birth to me as an artist. It’s a very important moment in my life. I’ll never forget and I’ll never be able to have that same pure experience as at that particular screening where, for the first time, I had a contact with an audience.’