Images and Views of Alternative Cinema Film Festival, the annual event that focusses on the presentation of research-based, avant-garde, and alternative views of international cinema, will take place from June 19 to 25 at the welcoming outdoor yard of the Hambis Municipal Printmaking Museum, in Nicosia.

Beyond discussions that deal with the form, the festival aims at redefining cinephilia in its most multidimensional aspect, and proposes a unique programme of screenings that introduce the viewer to a world born through experimentation.

Τhe festival is an initiative of the deputy ministry of culture and the non-profit organisation Brave New Culture. This year, it is dedicated to the memory of a master of cinema and French New Wave avant-garde director Jean-Luc Godard, who passed away last year at the age of 91, and will show his work.

The themes of the 2023 festival edition include the following:

Oh! (Re)voir Godard

Jean-Luc Godard, a prominent figure in the world of cinema, a ground-breaking revolutionary, and a philosopher, passed away on September 12, 2022. Paying tribute to his influence and as a homage to his memory, the festival screens four of his most emblematic films from the 60s. Films that marked in a most defining way generations of cinephiles: À Bout de Souffle, Alphaville: Une Étrange Aventure de Lemmy Caution, Masculin Féminin, Le Mépris.

Moreover, the festival will screen – in six parts – the epic and contemplative film of his later period Histoire(s) du Cinéma, which was concluded in 1998 and presents Godard’s personal view of history, cinema and its narratives.

In the framework of the tribute, the festival presents a lecture by director Tatjana Kononenko, entitled Sauve qui peut (la vie): The Political Power of Godard’s Cinema.

Cinema (Re)Load: Cine-Minimal I

In 2013, in celebration of its seventieth edition, the Venice Film Festival asked 70 directors from around the world to make a short film between one and one-and-a-half minutes long on the future of cinema. The shorts in Cinema (Re)Load: Film Miniatures have been selected from these 70 films, revolving around the central axis of the past, present and future of cinema. The selection showcases among others short films by Athina Rachel Tsangari, Yorgos Lanthimos, Claire Denis, Abbas Kiarostami, Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Shirin Neshat, Hong Sang-soo, Kim Ki-duk, Jia Zhangke, Lav Diaz, Jean-Marie Straub and Karim Aïnouz.

Andrea Arnold: The Monster of Deprivation Lies in the Kitchen Sink

One of the most influential and daring women filmmakers alive, Andrea Arnold creates raw, violent and decadent stories focussing on marginalised lives – explosively contributing to contemporary, British social realism. IVAC showcases the following films: Fish Tank (2009) – 126’, Red Road (2006) 113’, Wasp (2003) – 26’, Dog (2001) – 10’ and Milk (1998) – 10’.

Presentation by Christodoulos Panayiotou (60’) followed by the screening of Werner Schroeter’s Poussières D’amour / Love’s Debris (130’, 1996)

From the ongoing series of performances Dying on Stage, where the matter of death’s representation in theatre is explored, to meticulously staged installations that question narratives pertaining to seemingly consummate value systems, Christodoulos Panayiotou constructs multi-layered indexes of gestures that perform new sensibilities of entanglement with the world.

In his presentation ‘I can sing it but I cannot listen to it’, Panayiotou combines an array of references to mediate on including the charms and raptures of audiovisual universes, the simultaneous representation of disparate times the film affords, and the intertwining of reality and fiction, as nurtured by personal obsession and the often undeclared proximities between life and the screen.

The performance lecture is followed by a screening of Werner Schroeter’s Poussières D’amour, a film near and dear to Panayiotou, characterised by its lack of script and continuity, but with very specific constraints that provide the rules of the game, as it were: the setting – the Abbey of Royaumont – and the participant vocalists chosen, who arrive there with a companion of their choice to perform an aria chosen by the director.

Images and Views of Alternative Cinema Film Festival

Annual film festival. June 19-25. Hambis Municipal Printmaking Museum, Nicosia. Free. http://ivac.cinephilia.gr/