Screening of the film “Works in Progress” as part of the project “Smarter City 2”

Director and Producer: José Luis Guerín
Title: hrv. Radovi u tijeku / eng. Work in Progress / esp. En construcción

Where: Kinoteka, Kordunska ulica 1, Zagreb
When: December 10, 2020, at 5 PM

The film is in Spanish, Catalan, and Arabic with Croatian subtitles.
Entry to the film and lecture is free!
Up to 50 attendees! Reservations at: bacaci.sjenki@gmail.com

This year’s program “Smarter City 2,” a program focused on contemplating the city’s resourcefulness and the city as a complex space of sharing, exchange, and community, concludes with the screening of the exceptional Spanish film “Radovi u tijeku” (2001) directed by José Luis Guerín.

José Luis Guerín is quite well-known in our local film circles, and his experimental, documentary, and feature films have been screened at festivals and events across the Republic of Croatia (Film Mutations, Art Kino Croatia, Kino Europa, KIC, Human Rights Film Festival, and others).

His films “Guest,” “Sapphire of Saint Louis,” “In the City of Sylvia,” “Memories of a Morning,” “The Academy of Muses,” and others have delighted and inspired many local film enthusiasts. This film, which was screened only once at KIC in 2006, has won numerous awards (Special Jury Prize in San Sebastian, Best Film according to National Spanish Radio Critics – “Sant Jordi,” Goya Award for Best Spanish Documentary, etc.) and nominations for prestigious awards such as the European Oscar in 2002.

This film has been selected by the European network for media and film literacy – CinED – as one of those European masterpieces that, with its complexity and brilliant handling of media, has the potential to be a model and inspiration for young people across the old continent. We chose it also because of its added human and social value, as it shows how the construction of just one building in a neighborhood changes everything: all relationships, all hierarchies, all statuses. And how such a change can impact the city as a whole, like some negative (or in another example – positive) urban homeopathy.

After the film, a lecture and discussion about the film, which is part of the CinED 2.0 project for film and media literacy, are scheduled. The discussion and lecture will be moderated and conducted by Boris Bakal.

Film Synopsis: In a typical working-class neighborhood of Barcelona, under the pretext but also the threat of renovation, a residential block is being built, and the film crew spends a year and a half following this process from the very beginning. “En construcción” focuses not only on the practicalities of constructing a building but also on the impact the project has on those living in the vicinity, including a teenage couple squatting in a nearby building, an illegal immigrant seeking work for himself and his son, and a local girl who falls in love with one of the construction workers.

“Smarter City” is a multi-year project, initiative, and public event (conference, workshop, film screenings, exhibitions) produced and organized by Bacači Sjenki and associated partners (Urania, Kinoteka, DAZ, FRU, Oris – House of Architecture, Supervizualna, Greta Gallery, Project Wall Newspapers, and others) aimed at exploring various possibilities of the city’s resourcefulness through participatory and collective energy of community and exchange, comparing and contrasting opinions on what we can do today, in a situation of overall impoverishment, media saturation, and lack of social planning, to make the city, by definition a space of community and exchange, smarter, more beautiful to live in, and more useful for all citizens.

This screening as part of this year’s “Smarter City 02” program is part of the European project CinEd 2.0, co-financed by the Creative Europe / MEDIA program of the European Union.

Donations to the Smarter City program: Ministry of Culture and Media of the Republic of Croatia and the Office for Culture of the City of Zagreb.

Donations to Bacači Sjenki: National Foundation for Civil Society Development and Kultura nova Foundation.