News

The Santa Barbara International Film Festival has announced the lineup for its 35th edition, which will take place from January 15 to 25. There will be 47 world premieres and 71 U.S. premieres, with 50 countries represented overall, in addition to starry tributes that serve as an awards season stop for top Oscar contenders. Among those feted in their respective categories will be Renée Zellweger (American Riviera Award), Scarlett Johansson and Adam Driver (Outstanding Performers of the Year Award), Laura Dern (Cinema Vanguard Award), Brad Pitt (Maltin Modern Master Award), along with the winners of the Virtuosos Award: Awkwafina, Taron Egerton, Cynthia Erivo, Beanie Feldstein, Aldis Hodge, George MacKay, Florence Pugh, and Taylor Russell.

The Sbiff is also unique in its yearly celebration of below the line talent. The crafts artists who’ve won the Variety Artisans Award this year are Kristen Anderson-Lopez and Robert Lopez (“Frozen II”), Michael Giacchino (“Jojo Rabbit”), Kazu Hiro...

The Association of Slovak Cinematographers has dished out awards in recognition of the best domestic works. Slovakian DoP Denisa Buranová has received the main Camera 2019 Award for her work on the film By a Sharp Knife at the biannual gathering of domestic professionals from the Association of Slovak Cinematographers. Buranová belongs to the young generation of Slovakian cinematographers, and she also lensed Iveta Grófová’s Crystal Bear-winning Little Harbour, for which she also won the national The Sun in a Net Award for Best Cinematography (see the news), and Mira Fornay’s short film Gardeners. She has also worked with established director Peter Kerekes. Her work on Teodor Kuhn’s political thriller and family drama was singled out from among a total of 18 feature-length fiction films in contention. The runners-up were Ján Meliš for lensing Marko Škop’s drama Let There Be Light and Martin Štrba for Julius Ševčík’s period drama The.

By a Sharp Knife, a drama by up-and-coming Slovakian director Teodor Kuhn, is described by the creators as a generational film. Mainly, it's because real-life events that inspired the film impacted a whole generation, the one where the director and the producer of By a Sharp Knife belong. At the same time, the film serves as a grim memento immortalizing the incident that left one family to suffer the consequences of a wider social issue purposely ignored by authorities. In 2005, a group of 15 people attacked a group of eight people by the Danube River in the capital of Slovakia. Six people were injured, one gravely. Daniel Tupý, the 21-year old student, succumbed to eight stabbing wounds. A senseless and unmotivated act of violence...

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