The 43^rd edition of International Film Festival Rotterdam puts the spotlight on two remarkable auteurs of European cinema. Danish filmmaker Nils Malmros will be honored with an extensive focus on his films, drawing much from his own life and depicting growing up and living in his hometown Ȧrhus. Signals: Regained, IFFR’s returning section dedicated to the memory of film from a particular and contemporary viewpoint, includes highlights of the documentary series Architecture as Autobiography by German experimental filmmaker and artist Heinz Emigholz.

Nils Malmros retrospective

IFFR 2014 honors Danish film auteur Nils Malmros (1944) with an extensive retrospective of his films. With films such as Lars Ole 5.c, Boys and Tree of Knowledge, he is considered the ‘father of Danish cinema realism’. He has consistently worked on an oeuvre that draws from his own life and that of his relatives, and is a graceful chronicler of growing up and living in his home town Ȧrhus. Highly regarded at home, he is the winner of four Bodil Awards for best film in Denmark. His timeless cinema is unflinchingly honest, but stears far from hip provocations; an international reappraisal of his cinema is long overdue.

Nils Malmros was trained as a doctor and is autodidact as a filmmaker. His father Richard Malmros, a famous neurosurgeon, was the inspiration for Facing the Truth (2002). Lead actor Jacob Cedergren will join Malmros in presenting his latest film, Sorrow and Joy, that deals with Malmros’ greatest personal tragedy.