News | THE VERY HISTORY OF CINEMA

“I don’t believe in a film history. This collection is a jigsaw puzzle, a way of suggesting that all films, from the very first ones, are contemporary to us,” said film critic and director André S. Labarthe, one of the co-creators (with Janine Bazin, widow of the influential film scholar André Bazin) of the television series Cineastas de nuestro tiempo (filmmakers of our time), which aired on French television between 1964 and 1972, and was later repeated by German-French channel ARTE under the name Cine, de nuestro tiempo (cinema of our time)between 1984 and 2006. A generous portion of this valuable documentary material, dedicated to great directors of all times such as Jean Renoir, John Cassavetes, David Lynch and Martin Scorsese, will be showcased in one special “Focus” of this year’s BAFICI. This series of portrait films highlights the fact that filmmakers from different regions and times have achieved the same degree of reflection, interests and difficulties involved in the creative process. As a result, here is one of the most important documentary records of all times and a vindication of the film d’auteur and its forms. Another programming treat that BAFICI offers to its audience.