Online May 4: A Latvian Film Marathon

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Film
cinema, film, May 4
Online May 4: A Latvian Film Marathon

Latvian animation and especially stories about cats, film premieres and anniversaries, Latvian cultural personalities, patriotic sentiments, historical testimonies and artistic challenges – this is the broad spectrum of this year’s traditional May 4 Latvian Film Marathon, which takes place on the 35th anniversary of the Declaration of Restoration of Independence. As usual, the Marathon will take place in two parallel free formats – in person at the Splendid Palace cinema and worldwide online at www.filmas.lv.

The festival programme will be available free of charge around the globe 24/7 on the NCC portal filmas.lv. It will consist of two thematic blocks, the first of which will be a selection of Latvian animated shorts about cats (not repeating the films included in the cinema programme), with films by Vladimirs Leščovs, Nils Skapāns, Roze Stiebra, Arnolds Burovs, Jānis Cimmermanis, Reinis Kalnaellis and others.

The second thematic block consists of documentaries showing Latvia in 1990, at the time of the adoption of the Declaration of the Restoration of Independence. In this section – seven Latvian Chronicle newsreels with different subjects and themes, including the authentic and historical moment of May 4, 1990, when the deputies of the Supreme Council vote on the Declaration of Restoration of Independence of the Republic of Latvia, and two documentaries – The Day Before Independence (directed by Andrejs Apsītis), which shows Latvia on May 3, 1990, and Crossroads (directed by Juris Podnieks) – an emotional story anchored in the feelings of the Song Festival about the path to independence in all three Baltic States.

The May 4 Latvian Film Marathon is organized by the National Film Centre, supported by the Riga City Municipality, LNA State Archive of Cinematographic Documents, the Cultural Information Systems Centre (KISC) and Latvian film studios; the Jura Podnieks memorial year events are curated by the LKA Riga Film Museum.

A detailed program will follow.