João Canijo’s film “Mal Viver” is a candidate for a new award, the Latin American Critics’ Prize for European Films, the winner of which will be announced in June at the Guadalajara Film Festival in Mexico.
The award is an initiative of the European Film Promotion network, and the list of 23 European candidate films was announced today, including “Mal Viver”, a feature film from a diptych by João Canijo premiering in theaters in 2023.
The European network, which brings together the film institutes of 37 countries, including the Instituto do Cinema e Audiovisual (Portugal), has decided to create a Latin American critics’ award to “give more visibility and boost the circulation of European films” in that territory.
The proposed films include fiction, animation and documentaries that have been premiered at festivals or have been nominated for Oscars and European Film Academy awards.
In addition to João Canijo’s “Mal Viver”, the list includes “The Teachers’ Room” by Ilker Çatak (Germany), “Pelikan Blue” by László Csáki (Hungary), “Sweet Dreams” by Ena Sendijarevic (Netherlands) and “Layla” by Amrou Al-Khadi (United Kingdom).
The winning film will be chosen by 34 film critics and journalists from 13 Latin American countries and announced during the Guadalajara Film Festival, scheduled for June 7-15 in Mexico.
“Mal Viver” is the story of a family of several women from different generations who run a hotel and “live a life torn apart by resentment and bitterness”, shaken by the unexpected arrival of a granddaughter, as the synopsis reads.
The film, which was Portugal’s candidate for an Oscar nomination this year, is interlinked with the feature film “Viver Mal” (Living Badly) and is set in a family-run hotel.
The cast includes Rita Blanco, Anabela Moreira, Madalena Almeida, Cleia Almeida, Vera Barreto, Filipa Areosa, Leonor Silveira, Lia Carvalho, Beatriz Batarda, Leonor Vasconcelos and Carolina Amaral, as well as Nuno Lopes and Rafael Morais.
Both films premiered at the Berlin Film Festival in 2023, with João Canijo receiving the Silver Bear of the Jury Prize for “Mal Viver”.
