MÄRZ 2026
ein Film von Laurent Cantet; Regie: Robin Campillo
FR/BE/IT 2025, 102 Minuten, OmdU
Mo 9.3., 20.00, Votivkino Wien
Mi, 11.3., 20.40, KIZ Royal Kino, Graz
D0 19.3., 20.10, Volkskino Klagenfurt
Do 26.3., 20.30 Cinematograph Innsbruck
Mirella
At 2025, 97 min, dir. Oliver Bruck
Born on a vast farmstead in Kenya to a former Italian cavalry officer and a student of Rodin, lovers who abandoned their marriages to create a new life, Mirella Ricciardi grew up steeped in the contradictions and reckless optimism of empire. Ricciardi captured her world, photographing East African communities in what would become the iconic Vanishing Africa, and became famous overnight. Celebrated for its intimacy and craft, the work also bears the imprint of the colonial gaze, its aesthetics of disappearance raising ambiguities around authorship, representation, and power.
A striking figure both in front of and behind the camera, she found herself in the artistic elite of 1960s Rome, where she was admired, photographed, and often exoticized her colonial origins and arresting beauty fuelling a fascination that was not entirely her own. She even played herself in Antonioni's L'Eclisse, embodying a version of herself shaped as much by others' gaze as by her own. Now in her nineties, Ricciardi chooses not to have her face filmed. Her presence lingers only through her voice and the images she allows, as she attempts to guide director Oliver Bruck with an elusive but forceful hand. The result is a portrait defined as much by absence as appearance.
MIRELLA is a meditation on power, beauty, and loss. At its core lies a woman who, in her life, negotiates the tension between authorship, visibility, and erasure, shaped by a colonial world she once embodied but that no longer exists.
festivals
Internationale Hofer Filmtage 2025, DE
pictures
© Oliver Bruck
© Vanishing Africa Ltd / Carlo Bavagnoli / Courtesy of Mirella Ricciardi Archive
© Oliver Bruck
© Vanishing Africa Ltd / Courtesy of Mirella Ricciardi Archive
© Vanishing Africa Ltd / Mirella Ricciardi / Courtesy of Mirella Ricciardi Archive
© Vanishing Africa Ltd / Courtesy of Mirella Ricciardi Archive
© Vanishing Africa Ltd / Courtesy of Mirella Ricciardi Archive
© Vanishing Africa Ltd / Sofia Brignone / Courtesy of Mirella Ricciardi Archive
QUEERFILMNACHT
NEWS
JETZT IM KINO:
RENATE
Ein Film von Martin Nguyen
Wien:
Topkino OmenglUT
09.,16., 22., 29.4.2026 Lungauer Kulturverein
Special Screenings mit RENATE WELSH und MARTIN NGUYEN:
9.4., 18.00 ADMIRALKINO TICKETS
Moderation Anna Katharina Laggner (Autorin)
21.4., 20.00 KINO FREISTADT
5.5. CINEMA PARADISO BADEN
ORT OHNE ERINNERUNG. KAISERSTEINBRUCH, die verschwundene Geschichte
Ein Film von Reinhard Tötschinger
Fr 27.3., Sa 28.3., jeweils 18.00 KULTUR ON, Bruck/Leitha
28.3., 20.15 KINO FREISTADT Tickets
In Anwesenheit des Regisseurs Reinhard Tötschinger
21.4. MARKTGEMEINDE WAGNA, Lagerbaracke Wagna
Ab 10. APRIL im KINO:
MIRELLA
Ein Film von Oliver Bruck
Wien-Premiere:
Fr 10. April, 19.00 Metro Kinokultuhaus, Wien
Special Guests: Amina Ricciardi - Dempsey, Gus Dempsey
In Anwesenheit des Regisseurs Oliver Bruck und Team
Graz-Premiere:
Do 9. April, 18.00 KIZ Royal Kino, Graz
In Anwesenheit des Regisseurs Oliver Bruck
Wels-Premiere:
Sa 11. April, 18.15
In Anwesenheit des Regisseurs Oliver Bruck
Ab 10. April in folgenden Kinos:
Wien: Metro Kinokulturhaus
Linz: Moviemento
Wels: Programmkino Wels
Innsbruck: Leokino
Graz: KIZ Royalkino
weitere Kinos folgen
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FESTIVALS
SIRI HUSTVEDT Dance Around the Self
Highlights Section
12 March, 20.00
18 March, 12.15, 21.15
20 March, 21.00
EPOS ARTS FILM FESTIVAL, IL
4th April
ONE WORLD FF
DESERT PASSAGES
A film by Kevin Brennan, Laurence Durkin
17.3. 20.30 Worldpremiere with the directors
19.3. 17.00
DIAGONALE 2026
PORTRAIT OF NOWNESS
Ein Film von Juri Rechinsky und Mario Hainzl
19.3. 21.00 Annenhof 6 Weltpremiere
20.3. 14.00 KIZ 1
DIE KUNSTKOMPLIZEN
Ein Film von Ebba Sinzinger
20.3. 16.30 Annenhof 5 OmeU Weltpremiere
22.3. 11.00 KIZ
WHERE YOU MEET US SOON IN PERSON
18 - 22 March Diagonale