As a film critic and film programmer, Beatrice Fiorentino looks back on intense collaborations with a number of prestigious Italian publications. A year after winning the 2014 Akai Prize as best film critic at the 71st Venice Film Festival, she became part of the “Film della Critica” panel of the National Union of Italian Film Critics and, just the next year, of the selection committee for the Venice International Film Critics’ Week. For more than half a decade, she has shaped the independent section focused on debut features into a space of artistic discovery and topical timeliness in the position of its artistic director. At the Lido’s Casa della Critica, Fiorentino speaks with Lidanoir about this year’s contentious political climate, diversity within the Settimana della Critica and beyond, and why she believes in the persistence of film festivals.

Five years after premiering his spiritual drama Luzifer at Locarno’s Concorso Internazionale, Peter Brunner returns to the festival's Piazza Grande with an uncompromisingly realist exploration of homelessness in the US. Co-scriptwriter Caleb Landry Jones, who happened to share the prize for the best lead performance at Sitges 2021 with Lucifer’s Franz Rogowski, stars in Down thr Arm of God as an idealistic pastor facing resistance from his Texas small-town congregation as he tries to help the local unhoused people. Just a few hours before the premiere, the Austrian director, Jones, and the actors India Marie Cross, John P.W. Jones, Bart Guthrie, Kip Lee Billups, and Christopher Israel talk with Lidanoir about collaborating with actual homeless individuals, the challenges of portraying their experiences realistically, and the devastating consequences of a dysfunctional system.

Locarno is already familiar ground for Vincent Grashaw. His indigenous drama Keep Quiet debuted in 2025 Out of Competition at the Swiss Film Festival, after presenting in 2024 his fictional boxer biopic Bang Bang in the same section. Now he returns with Bruton, combining comedy, crime and drama in a story closely based on real events. After celebrating the international premiere at Piazza Grande, the US director found some time for an interview with Lidanoir about meeting the real Brian Bruton, navigating the film shoot in three active prisons, and finding humanity in outcast characters.

His roles in Sons of Anarchy and Luke Cage made Theo Rossi a standout presence on the TV screen. After bagging an Independent Spirit Award for his performance in Emily the Criminal, the American actor continues his rise by impersonating notorious prison breakout Brian Bruton in Vincent Grashaw’s tragicomic crime drama. After Bruton’s premiere the previous night at Locarno’s Piazza Grande, Theo Rossi talks in an interview with Lidanoir about shooting in three actual prisons, meeting the real-life character his role is based on, and the many issues with the US prison system.

With his broad spectrum of films, ranging from experimental to anthologie and genre, Denis Côté i a regular at the most renowened international film festivals. So it comes at no surprise that hi newest work - the first after a life-saving kidney transplant - runs in Locarno' prestigious Concorso Internazionale. On site at the Festival, the Canadian filmmaker spoke with Lidanoir about Nobody's Violence and its controversial themes of assistant dying and end-of-live, finding a new perspective after his transplant, and being even less occupied with cinematic convention.

Since his debut feature If I Want to Whistle, I Whistle earned him a nomination for best foreign film at the Oscars, Florin Serban has made a name for his intimate perspective on social, political and family issues. All of them intersect in You Don’t Belong Here, which premiered earlier this week at Locarno’s Concorso Internazionale. On site at the festival, the Romanian director sat down with Lidanoir to talk about the real-life elements of his harsh father-son story, the rift between Romania’s young and older generations, and outdated ideas of masculinity in neo-conservative times.

Das schwierige Gleichgewicht persönlicher Bedürfnisse und der moralischen Erwartungen des äußeren Umfelds ist ein konstantes Thema Isabelle Stevers filmischen Schaffens, das auch ihren Beitrag zum Wettbewerb prägte. I Rarely Wake Up Dreaming begleitet ein queeres unkrainisches Paar in der sensiblen Zeit der Transition, als unvermittelt die russische Invasion beginnt. In Locarno, wo das intime Drama im Wettbewerb Premiere feiert, sprachen die Regisseurin und ihre Frau und Drehbuchautorin Anna Melikova im Interview mit Lidanoir über die persönliche Inspiration der Handlung, den Dreh in Kiev, und den diffizielen dramaturgischen Umgang mit Gender Rollen.

Since the lead in Ruben Östlunds social satire The Square brought him international sucess in 2017, Claes Bang established himself as one of the most prominent actors of the European film scene. In Felix Randau's biographically inspired meditation on subjective and historical truths, Ich ist ein Anderer, the Danish actor shows once again his faible for murky characters. Premiering at Locarno's Piazza Grande, the historical investigation piece sees him in the role of the real-life impostor Felix Kersten, the massage therapist of Heinrich Himmler, who falsly claimed to have saved hundreds of thousands of people during the Nazi era. In an interview with Lidanoir, Bang talks about approaching the opaque character, the story's relevance in times of fake news and opinions, and the unexpected difficulties around the film's take on its notorious supporting character.

Fast zehn Jahre ist es her, dass Felix Randau sein Steinzeit-Drama Iceman auf Locarnos Piazza Grande de Pubiku präsentierte. Nun ist er zurück in der populärsten Sektion des internationalen Film Festivals mit seiner historischen Hochstapler-Story Ich ist ein Anderer. Am Tah nach der Premiere fand der deutsche Regisseur und Drehbuchautor Zeit für ein Gespräch mit Lidanoir über die Entwicklung seines Projekts, die kontroverse Recherche und die Zusammenarbeit mit Hauptdarsteller Claes Bang.

For the European premiere of her touching portrait of dementia and car in a US prison, Petra Volpe carefully chose the one most renowened for the quality of its independent and arthouse productions. After it's celebrated premiere at Sundance earlier this year, Frank & Louis screens now at Locarno's Piazza Grande. Rob Morgan, playing on screen a convict with early-onset Alzheimer's, Johns the Swiss director for a conversation with Lidanoir about the political issues ingrained in the story, the meticulous research of characters and story and the challenges of finding US distribution.