The old Túria hosts every August, for twenty-seven years, the outdoor cinema of the Filmoteca Valenciana. For that, in this edition we pay tribute to him with a cycle starring rivers. Because there aren't many river cinemas, but the presence – physical and symbolic – of rivers in the cinema has given a lot of play. This cycle is the perfect summer excuse to bring together a selection of great films that cover a large part of cinema history, of 1934 fins a 2025. Atalanta, by Jean Vigo, it is chronologically the oldest of them, but it continues to be considered the cornerstone of modern cinema and a summit not only of poetic realism, but of cinematic art. With Vigo, Jean Renoir was several years ahead of film modernity in the river. The film has a classic main plot that Renoir abandons on several occasions to introduce scenes of a documentary nature that portray the life and rituals of the inhabitants on the banks of the Ganges. All this filmed in dazzling Technicolor.
Two titles from the golden age of Hollywood could not be missing, the magnificent adventure film The queen of Africa, with unforgettable performances by Katharine Hepburn and Humprey Bogart, and the cult classic Hunter's night. The only film directed by Charles Laughton is a sinister fable in which the river co-stars in one of the most memorable sequences ever filmed. Two mythical titles of the seventy that they have in common are also scheduled, in addition to the river crossing, the underlying denunciation of imperialism: Aguirre, the wrath of god, de Werner Herzog, and the last version of the monumental one Apocalypse Now by Coppola. They add to all these essential films Water, by Elena López Riera from Alicante, i strange river, by Jaume Claret Muxart, crossed by magical realism and an enigmatic atmosphere. The selection includes two short films produced in Valencia: 3/105, of Hazel Prat, i Lion, d’Alba Just.
All the programming here.
