The multifaceted programme has been created in cooperation with the National Film Centre of Latvia and the Embassy of Latvia to the Kingdom of Belgium.
The screenings will feature a masterpiece by Herz Frank – his Ten Minutes Older (1978) documentary short – as well as Laila Pakalniņa’s first feature film The Shoe (1998). The programme will also include several documentaries by Juris Podnieks: Constellation of Riflemen (1982), Is It Easy to Be Young? (1986), and End of an Empire (1991). Children will have the opportunity to enjoy The Three Musketeers (2005), a puppet animation film by Jānis Cimmermanis which is a coproduction between Latvia and Denmark.
Meanwhile, on 27 May the BOZAR Centre for Fine Arts in Brussels will welcome the Latvian director Dāvis Sīmanis with a screening of two of his latest documentaries. The Chronicles of the Last Temple (2012) tells about the construction of the new National Library of Latvia building and Escaping Riga (2014) is a story about the friendship between two legendary Riga-born personalities – the film-maker Sergei Eisenstein and the philosopher Isaiah Berlin.
The screening of Latvian films in Belgium is part of the Latvian Presidency cultural programme organised by the Secretariat of the Latvian EU Council Presidency.
Under the Latvian Presidency, Brussels has hosted several screenings of Latvian film programmes since January. These included presentations of Latvian films at the Anima international animation film festival, the Millenium international documentary film festival and the Brussels Short Film Festival.
