BNT presents: Georgi Gospodinov in the Time Shelter

Alejandra

The film tells the story of Alejandra Pizarnik: mythic Argentine poet who committed suicide at the age of 36. Her personal diaries, letters, poems, as well as accounts by close friends and family, offer us hints about the mysterious path that led her to her self-destruction. Years after its writer’s death, the poetry of Alejandra Pizarnik has been rediscovered by new generations of writers and readers, making her the most read Argentine poet in the world.

In the Rain

Euritan is a review of the narrative 'Klara eta biok', written by Itxaro Borda in 1985. Putting the author against the words of her past, it updates her view on the peripheral relationship around the Basque character.

Do Útero Ao Túmulo

Harto the Borges

A fragmented biography, inconclusive, partial, of the brilliant Argentinian writer Jorge Luis Borges, based on different testimonies: his links with Leonor de Acedevo —his mother— and María Kodama —his second wife—; his vast culture and devout dedication to literature, his and that of others; his country: the politicians and the disloyal military. Borges gradually builds his own impersonation of Borges.

Wood Mountain Poems

In this short documentary, Canadian poet Andrew Suknaski introduces us to Wood Mountain, the south central Saskatchewan village he calls home. In between musings on his poetry, which is tinged with nostalgia and the vast loneliness of the plains, the poet discusses the area’s multicultural background and Native heritage, as well as the customs and stories of these various ethnic groups.

Under the Cover of Cloud

An embittered journalist returns home to Hobart after losing his Melbourne magazine job. With nothing to do except think about his next move, he lands on the idea of writing a book about Tasmanian upper-order batsmen, and in particular the great man himself: David Boon. But soon he’s discovering there’s a lot more to his homeland than he once thought, and that everything he’s been searching for could be closer than he imagined.

Ken Bugul: Nobody Wants Her - Portait of an Author

Hermann Hesse – Superstar

Hermann Hesse, Nobel Prize winner in 1946, is not only the world’s most widely read German-language author of all time, with a total of more than 100 million books in print, but also, with Karl Marx, perhaps the most influential. The documentary follows his readers’ trail and at the same time the trail of the author who, like no other, has managed to become a role model.

Hilda Hilst Pede Contato

Documentary about the poet, writer and playwright Hilda Hilst, considered by critics as one of the most important voices of the Portuguese language of the twentieth century. Through the use of personal sound and image files, interviews, meetings and fictional interventions, we will seek the memory and the presence of Hilda Hilst in her daily life at Casa do Sol, the farm where she lived in Campinas.

Wechselspiel – Wenn Peter Stamm schreibt

Two documentary filmmakers become the plaything of writer Peter Stamm and subject of the novel whose creation they actually wanted to document.

Reading Alistair MacLeod

This feature doc profiles acclaimed writer Alistair MacLeod. Hailed internationally as a master of the short story, MacLeod also wrote a novel, No Great Mischief, which was celebrated around the world. Depicting men and women living out their lives against the haunting landscape that surrounds them, most of MacLeod's work is firmly based in Cape Breton even if his characters stray elsewhere. Focusing on the complexities and abiding mysteries at the heart of human relationships, MacLeod maps the close bonds and impassable chasms that lie between people and invokes memory and myth to celebrate the continuity of the generations. This film portrait explores the life and work of this giant of literature.

Fiasko

"The photonovel FIASKO is based on and named after Kertész’ novel. He describes his absurd attempt of a new beginning – after Auschwitz and Buchenwald – in the Budapest of the Stalin area. Our photonovel transfers Kertész’ literary method into a visual language: the joining of fragmentary elements of the past and of the present, finding a trace that links experience and remembrance. From 2008 to 2010 approximately 800 colored medium-format photos were taken. The sequential photos have been taken on the original locations. The remainders of the past systems are rendered via multiple exposures, pictures shown in their ambivalence, mirroring etc. The literary text and the photographies remain independent from one another, however they enter into a dialog and open up space for associations. The course of movement caused by the juxtaposition of multiple still images is continued when one turns the pages (see chronophotography)."

The Inspired Island: 1918

A documentary about writer and novelist Liu Yichang.

The Inspired Island: My City

Poet and author Xi Xi is one of Hong Kong's most treasured writers. Though also acclaimed in Taiwan and mainland China for seminal works like the essay Shops, her writings are firmly rooted in the spirit of Hong Kong. Leave it to Fruit Chan, another staunchly grassroots auteur, to make a documentary on Xi Xi's career. Chan sought out renowned critics and writers to discuss Xi Xi's works, starting with 1979's My City. He also juxtaposes photos of a changing Hong Kong with readings of her writings, and even playfully inserts characters from her stories into the film.

My Name Is Fleming, Ian Fleming

The man who invented James Bond: The story of Ian Fleming, real-life spy, ladies' man and sportsman, who was there at the birth of MI-5 and the CIA, and gave the world one of its most enduring and iconic heroes: Bond. James Bond.

A Secret in the Box

The life and works of Ecuadorian writer Marcelo Chiriboga, a key figure of the Latin American literature and member of the “boom” generation. Through interviews, visits to different cities, archival footage and his most important book, a puzzle is woven that blurs the boundaries between reality and fiction.

Umberto Eco: A Library of the World

A walk through the immense private library of Italian writer and thinker Umberto Eco (1932-2016).

Lunch

For the past 40 years, a group of comedy writers and directors has gathered every other Wednesday for lunch - and other nourishment. These are the fabled guys that made America funny.

They Are Here

Dangling from a high window, a young non-binary person is on the cusp of life and death. Flashes of film, literature, art (paintings) and cultural history pass them by, as if to tell a message. A postmodern treatise on connection to culture and the past.

Svetlo na konci dňa

A documentary on the "Slovak Solzhenitsyn" Rudolf Dobiáš (*1934), political prisoner during the Communist era.