The European Union Film Festival is the oldest foreign film festival in Singapore. And they are back in business this year with more than 20 films., with one film from every country.
We recommend 5 films that should not be missed.
1. Insyriated
Winner of the Panorama Audience Award, Philippe van Leeuw's sophomore film Insyriated tells the gripping story of a family in war-torn Syria. Blockaded in their apartment, a mother desperately tries to keep her family and houseguests safe during an ongoing siege in this taut and absorbing thriller.
2. Custody
Winner of the Silver Lion and Best Debut, Xavier Legrand's Custody is a tense family drama of a custody battle between divorced couple Miriam and Antoine. Miriam, the mother, is seeking sole custody of her only son in an effort to protect him from an alleged abusive father and husband. The tension and suspense escalate to a climatic hostage situation in what is one of the most thrilling family drama in recent times.
3. Fukushima, mon amour
The German director of Fukushima, mon amour, Doris Dorrie, is no stranger to Japan. She has travelled to Japan more than twenty times. In 2007, she made a film there for the first time, entitled Enlightenment Guaranteed. In 2015, she returns to Japan for the third time to make Fukushima, mon amour. The film follows a young German woman Marie, who escapes to Fukushima and volunteers with the organisation Clowns4Help to bring joy to the survivors of the 2011 nuclear disaster. She meets a weird, cankerous old Satomi, and the two women, who could not be more different, must learn, in their own way, to free themselves from their own guilt.
4. The Treasure
The Treasure is Romanian filmmaker Corneliu Porumboiu's Beckettian comedy tale of two men, an unemployed literary publisher and struggling mid-level civil servant, in search for the elusive treasure. As the two men dig for treasure, they unearth more than what they expected. The film won the Un certain talent prize at the Un Certain Regard section at Cannes.
5. Perfect Strangers
Winner of Best Film Award at David di Donatello, Italy's Oscars, and of Best Screenplay at Tribeca Film Festival, filmmaker Paolo Genovese's all-star ensemble dramedy film Perfect Strangers is cannily premised on the notion that privacy are for those with something to hide. During a dinner party, seven old friends meet up and, upon a dare, decide to make all texts and calls public in an attempt to prove that they have nothing to hide. A box office hit in Italy, Perfect Strangers will have you leaving the theatre asking yourself and your close friends if you dare to put yourself through the same process.
Go ahead and buy tickets here: https://www.sistic.com.sg/events/ceuff0518