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58th TIFF: "Invisible Hands" Tribute

58th THESSALONIKI INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL
November 2-12, 2017

 
“INVISIBLE HANDS” TRIBUTE

 

The diverse aspects of unemployment and work, as well as their impact on society and individuals are tactfully explored in the tribute “Invisible Hands” presented in the 58th Thessaloniki International Film Festival.

 

The free-admission tribute showcases 5 films of recent production that will have their Greek premiere in Thessaloniki. The films highlight the various angles of unemployment; from uncertainty and despair to resourcefulness and hope. They also provide an intriguing look on issues such as the economic crisis, modern working conditions, as well as self-management and teamwork.

 

  • David Macián’s The Invisible Hand, the film that inspires the tribute’s title, raises questions about the purpose and meaning of work in an originally subversive fashion. In a remote industrial warehouse, people from different professions perform their tasks in front of an They are forced to become more and more productive. Will they comply or rebel against their mysterious “boss”?

 

  • The impending closure of a factory urges the workers to begin hard negotiations with their employers, during which they find themselves unusually obliged to do nothing. An unpredictable film experience, Pedro Pinho’sThe Nothing Factory (FIPRESCI Award, Cannes FF 2017) is a three-hour idiosyncratic comment on contemporary labour that employs different film genres to reflect on self management and the economic crisis.

 

  • A factory also provides the backdrop for Julie and the Shoe Factory by Paul Calori and Kostia Testut, a working-class musical that blends solidarity, feminism, songs and… shoes. The film introduces us to Julie, a young woman who lands a job in a luxury shoe factory, but soon faces the management’s downsizing plans, as well as the dilemma to back off or join her colleagues’ fight to defend their jobs; a feel good modern fairytale that stresses the importance of team spirit in harsh times.

 

  • Oscillating between drama and comedy, György Kristóf’s Out looks at the peculiar Odyssey of a fifty-year-old family man who loses his job and embarks on a journey from Slovakia to the Baltic in search of a new one. He encounters disappointments, xenophobia and a handful of oddball characters and sinks deeper and deeper into a series of bizarre events.

 

  • Zhanna Issabayeva’s Sveta becomes a social examination of the consequences of unemployment in relation to human morality. The film centres on a desperate woman on the verge of losing her job. Determined as she is to save her apartment, together with her husband they come up with a controversial plan that even involves murder.  

 

All venues of the screenings of the tribute “Invisible Hands” are accessible.

 

The tribute “Invisible Hands” is implemented through the Operational Program "Human Resources Development, Education and Lifelong Learning" and is co-financed by the European Union (European Social Fund) and Greek national funds. Its co-funded projects deal mostly with the improvement of education and employment in Greece. Its main targets relate to the development and promotion of human resources skills, activities against unemployment, strengthen social cohesion and social inclusion of vulnerable social groups, improvement of the quality of education & lifelong learning, awareness on environmental education, linking education with the labor market.

 

The tribute is implemented as part of the anniversary events for the 60 years of the European Social Fund.

This is the second tribute of the Thessaloniki International Film Festival funded by the Operational Program "Human Resources Development, Education and Lifelong Learning".