Must-see films at the festival

While Ōtepoti’s film lovers have become accustomed to a few festival titles bypassing our city in recent years, this year’s shortened catalogue still delivers a rich and varied selection — sobering political dramas, cosy analog horror that wouldn’t be out of place at an ’80s VHS rental, introspective soft science fiction, and animated features redolent with childlike wonder. Here are 10 chosen by The Weekend Mix’s film reviewers they consider essential viewing. Amasio Jutel’s picks NZIFFPhoto: NZIFF Little Amelie or the Character of Rain (Amelie et la metaphysique des tubes) Painterly animation has long defined the NZIFF experience for me, and this Belgian-French gem captures that childlike wonder I look for at the festival. Little Amelie or the Character of Rain, directed by Mailys Vallade and Liane-Cho Han, approximates a child’s sensory experience of life. The vibrant, kaleidoscopic, and post-war saturated world looks Miyazaki-esque, as it focuses on intimate, personal stories of people whose lives have been complicated by the fallout of World War 2, as seen through the curious eyes of a child. ● August 16, 10am, Regent Theatre NZIFFPhoto: NZIFF The Voice of Hind Rajab (Sawt Hind Rajab) Hind Rajab was a 5-year-old Palestinian girl who, on January 29, 2024, was murdered by Israeli military forces while evacuating Gaza City with her family. After an Israeli tank fired hundreds of bullets at their family car, only Hind and her 15-year-old cousin Layan survived. While Layan phoned the Palestine Red Crescent Society (PRCS) for help, the tank fired again, killing her. Hind was alone, gravely injured, and surrounded by the bodies of her family members, while PRCS volunteers pleaded for permission from the Israeli forces to save her. The permission never came. An investigation later found the tank operators, stationed no more than 23m from the vehicle, had a clear view of the two children inside. The Voice of Hind Rajab recreates the experience of the PRCS volunteers, using audio of Hind’s phone calls. The film is a sobering indictment of the Israeli military’s systematic and indiscriminate targeting of civilians and healthcare workers in Gaza. ● August 20, 6pm, Regent Theatre NZIFFPhoto: NZIFF Teenage Death and Sex at Camp Miasma Jane Schoebrun’s I Saw The TV Glow was a standout at the 2024 NZIFF — think Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me meets Videodrome in a Buffy-obsessed queer dreamscape. With Teenage Death and Sex at Camp Miasma, they return to the silver screen with a queer deconstruction of the slasher genre they’re describing as their “sleepover classic”. Schoenbrun understands how we use media to define ourselves and learn to be in the world, and their postmodern, multimedia approach to representing this experience — using the very form they are deconstructing — captures nostalgia without cheapening it. The movie similarly promises to engage with the horror/slasher lineage — many of its famous killers linked by their gender deviance. Moving from genre-less storytelling to a masterful deconstruction of convention, I’m sure Miasma will be utterly camp, bringing something fantastic and unique to the genre. ● August 22, 8.30pm, Regent Theatre NZIFFPhoto: NZIFF The Black Ball (La Bola Negra) Fresh from their Best Director triumph at Cannes, Javier Calvo and Javier Ambrossi deliver The Black Ball. This maximalist queer war drama is a sprawling triptych that weaves together the lives of three gay men across different eras, whose stories are joined by the Spanish Civil War and a lost play from leftist poet Federico García Lorca. Evident from the first frame of the trailer, the film’s ambition is matched only by its breathtaking execution — a soaring look into the inner lives of gay men during a time of heavy suppression. ● August 23, 4.30pm, Regent Theatre NZIFFPhoto: NZIFF Silent Friend International art-house star Tony Leung Chiu-wai brings his signature melancholic magnetism to this tender meditation on interspecies relationships. Cast as a neuroscientist researching plant perception, he uncovers what he believes to be a covert neural bond connecting his own mind to an ancient tree. Set in a post-Covid world, Ildiko Enyedi’s Silent Friend looks to be a haunting reflection on the curious connected network that links all living things. ● August 30, 12.30pm, Rialto Cinemas Missing from the Dunedin programme: NZIFFPhoto: NZIFF The Samurai and the Prisoner Japanese horror master Kiyoshi Kurosawa has remained prolific in the twilight of his career. His latest film, Cloud, was a contemporary internet-thriller about an online reseller and his disgruntled clients. Now, he’s turning the clock back to take a stab at the samurai film — though he couldn’t do it without his own thriller twist. In The Samurai and the Prisoner, the jidaigeki (pre-modern Japanese period drama) meets the murder mystery. Set against a backdrop of feudal tensions and shadowy murders, I am fascinated to know how Kurosawa will treat a contained pre-industrial, period piece, bringing his signature style to the classicist form. Thomas Green’s picks nziffPhoto: NZIFF All of a Sudden Japanese director Ryusuke Hamaguchi returns to the NZIFF programme (after last gracing the festival with the serene Evil Does Not Exist in 2024) with his acclaimed French-language debut All of a Sudden. It follows the friendship between a nursing home director and a terminally-ill Japanese playwright, and won joint Best Actress awards at the Cannes film festival for its two lead actresses. Promising to be as rich and profound with its quietude and exploration of the human condition as Hamaguchi’s better-known works (including the 2021 Best Picture nominee Drive My Car), this is a must-see. ● August 18, 6.30pm, Regent Theatre nziffPhoto: NZIFF Fjord Director Cristian Mungiu’s legal drama/latest Cannes Palme d’Or winner, Fjord is a topical inclusion with its exploration of thorny cultural war debate. It follows a conservative evangelical couple (played by a promising pairing of Renate Reinsve and Sebastian Stan) who move their family into a progressive Norwegian village, only to be overwhelmed by the social scrutiny they experience, as a slew of child-abuse allegations are thrown their way. Sparking mixed reactions upon its premiere, festival goers here are in the fortunate position to decide for themselves what they think of this polarising award-winner. ● August 22, 5.30pm, Regent Theatre nziffPhoto: NZIFF The Fox This Australian absurdist black comedy by director Dario Russo follows a hunter who captures a magical talking fox. In exchange for letting her live, the fox promises to transform the hunter’s partner into the perfect person. Knowing that his fiance is secretly cheating on him, the hunter takes the fox up on her offer and bizarre antics ensue. Reviews have praised the film for its magical realism and hilarity, but Kiwi audiences should be drawn in by one character listed in the supporting cast — a vulgar magpie, voiced by none other than the late Sam Neill, in one of his last film roles. ● August 21, 8pm, Regent Theatre nziffPhoto: NZIFF Rose of Nevada Two working-class fishermen (played by George Mackay and Callum Turner) are displaced from their time in this drama with a sci-fi tinge, which follows the reappearance of a fishing boat (minus its crew) that vanished three decades prior. The duo sign on for the boat’s second journey, only for the vessel to drift away back in time to 1993, the year of the original crew’s ill-fated maiden voyage. Shot on a vintage 16mm Bolex camera, the captivating murky aesthetics of the ship and the derelict town it hails from promises an immersive experience. ● August 20, 8pm, Regent Theatre nziffPhoto: NZIFF The History of Concrete I promise that this will be more riveting than the title makes it sound. Taking the subject of the mundane and twisting it into a series of wild delirious tangents, The History of Concrete finds director John Wilson trying to apply the lessons he’s taken from a workshop on how to pitch Hallmark movies, and transposing them onto selling a documentary about concrete. Nosediving into an infinite number of disparate rabbit holes while promising to tie the loose threads of this maniacal thesis together, The History of Concrete sounds mad enough to be worth hearing out. ● August 21, 3.45pm, Regent Theatre ● August 22, 3.30pm, Rialto Cinemas Missing from the Dunedin programme: nziffPhoto: NZIFF Buffet Infinity Unfortunately, many of the films showing in the festival in bigger centres are not in the Dunedin programme. Among the significant absences, one that stands out as a particular loss is Simon Glassman’s analogue horror-comedy Buffet Infinity. Presented entirely through a series of TV commercials, Buffet Infinity chronicles a small town’s descent into anarchy, a consumerist nightmare sparked by a feud between two local fast-food chains. While the absence doesn’t take away from the otherwise-excellent selection our city has on offer, it’s a massive shame that Buffet Infinity isn’t on the menu.