 For the 250th anniversary of Mozart’s birth, the city of Vienna decided to commemorate their most illustrious resident with a festival of new productions—in the fields of music, opera, film, architecture and visual arts—to celebrate the spirit of Mozart. They tapped iconoclastic theatre director Peter Sellars, who accepted the challenge to implement it and named the festival “New Crowned Hope” after the only Masonic lodge permitted to reopen in Vienna in the aftermath of the French Revolution. This was the venue where Mozart made his last public appearance, introducing a small cantata he had written. Hope amidst repression—a ray of light in the darkness. |
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Sellars commissioned seven filmmakers from around the world and gave them free reign to create. They were not restricted to Mozart’s themes (though his influence is often apparent), and aside from a snippet of “The Magic Flute” in I Don’t Want to Sleep Alone, Mozart’s music is not heard. Rather it is Mozart’s inspiration that is felt throughout. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart lived at a pivotal period in European history, as the ideas of the Enlightenment helped to crumble long-held belief systems. It is Sellar’s intuition that we live in similar times. The filmmakers he has commissioned share that intuition. We are please to present four of the New Crowned Hope films in this two-week period— Apachatpong Weerasethakul’s Syndromes and a Century, Mahamat-Saleh Haroun’s Daratt, Bahman Ghobadi’s Half Moon, and Tsai Ming-Liang’s I Don’t Want to Sleep Alone.
Syndromes and a Century
Directed by Apichatpong Weerasethakul
July 20–26
Daily: 7:00 / Saturday & Sunday: 2:00, 7:00
Half Moon
Directed by Bahman Ghobadi
July 20–26
Daily: 9:05 / Saturday & Sunday: 4:30, 9:05
Daratt (Dry Season)
Directed by Mahamat-Saleh Haroun
July 27–August 2
Daily: 7:00 / Saturday & Sunday: 2:30, 7:00
I Don’t Want to Sleep Alone
Directed by Tsai Ming-Liang
July 27–August 2
Daily: 9:00 / Saturday & Sunday: 4:30, 9:00