The Zagreb Film festival (14-21 October) recently selected Peter Brosens & Jessica Woodworth’s The Fifth Season and the minority co-productions Taking Chances by Nicole van Kilsdonk and Kinshasa Kids by Marc-Henri Wajnberg. At the close of the festival, the audience also voted Kinshasa Kids as Best Film of the feature-length program.
Peter Brosens & Jessica Woodworth’s third feature, The Fifth Season (pictured on the left), is screening in the ‘My Third Film’ sidebar of the Zagreb fest. The directors duo’s earlier film Khadak also screened at the fest in 2007. The Fifth Season is a haunting tale of mysterious calamity as spring refuses to come as the cycle of nature is derailed. Alice, Thomas and Octave, three kids in a village deep in the Ardennes forest, struggle to make sense of a world that is collapsing around them. Flemish co-producer of the film is Bo Films. International sales are handled by Berlin based Films Boutique.
After its successful premiere in Venice, Kinshasa Kids went on to festivals such as Toronto and Busan. In Zagreb, the film convinced the festival audience and was voted Best Film. In its announcement, the fest praised Kinshasa Kids for how ‘manages to recreate the spirit and structure of the city.’ In Kinshasa, Congo, around 30,000 children are accused of witchcraft and are kicked out of their homes. Living on the street, José and his friends - all treated like witch children - decide to form a music band to ward off bad luck with a crazy impresario called Bebson. Together they will rock Kinshasa!" Flemish producer was Peter Krüger for Inti Films.
In Taking Chances a nine-year-old girl Kiek worries about her dad who works as a doctor in warzones. She is looking for ways to decrease chances of him getting killed while on the job. In the struggle to find ways to get grip on the situation Kiek gets in all sorts of trouble, while her mother is trying to convince her that nothing bad will happen. The film is produced by Lemming Film and won the Cinekid Award for Best Dutch Film in 2011. It is part of the Bib for Kids program, which is the only program for children at the Zagreb Film Festival.
All three films in this article were made with the support of amongst others the Flanders Audiovisual Fund.