Cairo Station: Tiger’s Masks
Three movie picks from the 50th edition of the Rotterdam International Film Festival, an annual rendez-vous for movie buffs and friends, that this year left us deprived of one of the most exceptional cities in Europe, where “you don’t know if you must sleep with the poet or sleep with the whore”. Make no mistake: do both.
Koozhangal (Pebbles)
Vinothraj P.S, 2021, India.
If there’s something fertile in Tamil Nadu, it’s the cinematic scene. Not so much its landscape: dry, desolate, and as vast as a camera eye can reach. In this world on the margins, a silent little boy defies the authority of his alcohol-fuelled, angry father by collecting pebbles, blowing up balloons, and wondering at the strangeness of a harsh life sweetened by the poetry of little things. Soundtrack by pop idol, Yuvan Shankar Raja.
Les Sorcières de l’Orient (The Witches of the Orient)
Julien Faraut, 2021, France.
In 1964, six working-class Japanese women made history, winning the gold medal at the Tokyo Olympics, beating the most working class of all volleyball teams: the Soviets. This ironic revenge of history is the climax of this sublime movie by Julien Faraut in which lyricism and beauty demonstrate once again that you can make a film about the Olympic Games without being a Nazi. Oh, Sorcières de l’Orient! Thank you! What would life be without Cristina D’Avena’s Mila & Shiro?
Gads Pirms Kara (The Year Before the War)
Dāvis Sīmanis, 2021, Latvia.
Imagine being a common Latvian man in 1913 and being catapulted in history. Being psychoanalysed by Freud in Vienna, being an agent of Lenin’s revolution in London, then Prague with Švejk and Paris with Mata Hari. Nothing makes sense in this spectacular flick: not art or science or politics. Definitely not the looming bloody war and its looming bloody poppies. A very strange case, Dāvis Sīmanis. A very strange case indeed.
A special episode of Cairo Station on the International Film Festival of Rotterdam will be broadcasting on Sunday the 14th February at 14.00 on Noods Radio.
You can check out more from Cairo Station and listen to his past radio show’s here.
Noods Radio is an independent radio station broadcasting from Bristol’s Stokes Croft. Founded in 2015 and born from Sunday music sessions, the station has grown to become the home of faces from around the globe. Tune in for daily shows from misfits, dancers, collectors, and selectors that make up our community. Tune in with open ears.
