Viennale

An elegy to time and life, condensing Terence Davies' profoundly humane poetics into little more than one minute, enveloping the viewer in an atmosphere of light and (Davies’ own) words.

Every year the Viennale invites a famous director to produce a short film as the festival trailer. In 2014 the choice has fallen on the 105-year old Manoel de Oliveira.

In 2010, Klaus Wyborny filmed the world premiere of his cinematic work STUDIEN ZUM UNTERGANG DES ABENDLANDES (STUDIES FOR THE DECAY OF THE WEST), 2010 in Vienna’s (meanwhile closed) Stadtkino at Schwarzenbergplatz. He liked the images from the dark movie theater, only partly lit by the film, so much that he did the same at later screenings, presented between Portugal and the United States, in order to weave these images into a fabric of places and times – into a vision of cinema gliding over continents through the light of the projector.What’s celebrated here is a practice that has to be defended for its inherent democratic spirit. In CINÉMA VÉRITÉ, Wyborny has now condensed this cinematic utopia into trailer length, to manifesto density. Cinema, as Wyborny understands it and as the Viennale practices it, is a constant departure into reality.

Shot on 16 mm film, this trailer for Viennale 2020 plays with the mystery of creation and the magic of light and shadow from which cinema is born. It's an invocation to the return to innocence, which is the prerequisite for every new discovery, the driving force behind the eternal cycle of life. An excerpt from Pablo Neruda's poem “Ode to the Apple”, performed by the author himself, at the same time praises the film, the precious moment of a rediscovery and a new creation.

The boy has something to do in his life, he trains himself and makes plans. Then there is a knock on the door and something pulls away and he literally stays in the rain. Lightning and thunder patter the water, devouring everything. Incredulous, the boy looks up to heaven - is this his destiny?

Viennale-Trailer 2015: Two-minute homage to Lee Kang-sheng, Xiao Kang.

The last minute of a man's life.