International Competition
Six Weeks ◊ jp◊
- Onsite
- 7.16 (Sun) 10:30 Convention Hall
- 7.19 (Wed) 13:50 Audio Visual Hall
- Online
- 7.22 (Sat) 10:00 - 7.26 (Wed) 23:00
* There is a maximum viewing number of online screenings for this title due to rights matters. This film will be inaccessible when the number of views reaches 500, even if it occurs during the online screening period. Your understanding is appreciated.
Highschooler Zsófi is a promising table tennis player who lives with her unstable mother, Bea, and little sister, Mesi. When Zsófi discovers she is pregnant, it’s too late for an abortion and she decides to give the child up for adoption, but Bea cannot accept her decision.
©Sparks Ltd.
Director: Noémi Veronika SZAKONYI
Cast: Katalin ROMÁN, Zsuzsa JÁRÓ, Lana SZCZAURSKI, Móni BALSAI, András MÉSZÁROS, Kitti KERESZTESI, Katalin TAKÁCS, Anna GYÖRGYI
2022 / Hungary / 96min.
In Hungary, legislation was amended in 2014 to allow a birth mother to reclaim her child from adoptive parents during a six-week period from the date of birth. Six Weeks depicts the period during which Zsófi faces various life choices, drawing the audience into her intense emotional turmoil. This sonorously excellent film is the debut feature by Noémi Veronika Szakonyi, who has directed many documentaries. After having its world premiere at Sarajevo International Film Festival Competition, the film has already gained high acclaim, including Grand-prix at Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival Just Film section. In particular, Katalin Román’s devoted performance in the role of Zsófi is remarkable. The frequent documentary-like close-up shots show that the director has full confidence in her.
Director: Noémi Veronika SZAKONYI
Szakonyi was born in 1987 in Hungary; she is a freelance film director and producer. She studied International Relations in Hungary and Germany. She started her film education on a scholarship at Beijing Film Academy. After leaving China, she applied to the University of Theatre and Film Arts in Budapest for the Directing Documentaries MA program, from which she graduated in 2015. From 2017 to 2018 she was a graduate candidate at NYU Tisch School of the Arts Filmmaking MFA program. She is currently running her Budapest-based company Match Frame Productions, focusing on social issue-driven documentaries and short films. As a director, she is working on her first long-term feature documentary Afterglow (18), and finished her first feature film Six Weeks (22). Her short film Magic Whistle (19) was nominated for Best Hungarian Short Film of the Year. Recently, she has been producing four feature documentaries and a VR project. She was a Sundance Documentary Film Program Grantee in 2015, 2019 and 2021.
Message
Society often stigmatizes these biological mothers without knowing or understanding what they are actually going through. With this film, we would like to prove society wrong and empower the many girls, women and mothers who make this tough decision, and embrace them.
