Following today's Bonus-Track at the Urania cinema, the Viennale 2004 has come to a happy and exceptionally successful conclusion. With a growth of almost 6400 visitors compared to 2003, the festival could increase the number of visitors by nearly ten percent. In total, 81,600 spectators attended the festival this year. Within the main program, the elaborate selection of documentaries enjoyed exceptional popularity. As a result, for the first time in the festival's history more tickets for documentaries than for feature films were sold. This means a great support for the vital interest the Viennale has had in documentary filmmaking for years.
Besides the extensive program of new films, particularly the two tributes dedicated to the mediator of modern film Amos Vogel and the legendary actress Lauren Bacall, received great attention. The presence of Lauren Bacall as
guest of the festival and the gala audition of her classic feature The Big Sleep were definitely highlights of the Viennale 2004 for the audience as well as media representatives.
One result of the Viennale's constant confrontation with Japanese cinema was the special program showing works by Koreeda Hirokazu. Further filmic discoveries could be made with, to name a few, Los Muertos by Lisandro Alonso, Trona by David Fenster, Dandelion by Mark Milgard, Bu Jian (The Missing) by Lee Kang Sheng, or the shorts by Bill Morrison. Memorable moments of this year's Viennale were sold-out screenings of some documentaries in the Gartenbau cinema, including Hakoah Lischot (Watermarks) by Yaron Zilberman, Darwin's Nightmare by Hubert Sauper, Salvador Allende by Patricio Guzmán, Dieses Jahr in Czernowitz by Volker Koepp and Guerilla: The Taking of Patty Hearst by Robert Stone.
The retrospective The Grapes of Wrath and Tenderness, a collaboration with the Austrian Filmmuseum, was dedicated to the filmmaking of Jean-Marie Straub and Danièle Huillet. In this context, a rare selection of works by John Ford was presented. In the past month, this program has reached more than 5,000 interested visitors.
In its second year of existence, the festival's meeting point Viennale Zentrale on the top floor of the Urania cinema proved to be a very popular place for concerts, parties, discussions about film and the new Viennale line-up Working Class with lectures by Jean Pierre Gorin.
For the first time this year, the Viennale was host for a talent-project of the International Federation of Film Critics Fipresci. Under the title of "Fipresci Talent Daily" and the guidance of the Dutch film critic Dana Linssen, young journalists accompanied the festival with daily coverage. Visit www.viennale.at or fipresci.org for the texts.
The Viennale-Special Cameron Jamie & The Melvins, which will take place in the Gartenbau theater on November 10th, was sold-out after a few days. An additional performance of the legendary US band The Melvins together with the screening of videos by Cameron Jamie was arranged for the same evening.