Petzold's Phoenix will be shown as part of Great 5 program presenting films from five major European cinematographies: France, Italy, Germany, UK and Spain. This year it includes Abel Ferrara's Pasolini, a film that tries to recreate the last days of the murdered filmmaker, Jealousy by Philippe Garrel, X+Y by Morgan Matthews, and Living Is Easy With Eyes Closed by David Trueba (the latter one having won numerous Spanish awards).
The Great 5 program also includes Phoenix by the acclaimed German director Christian Petzold. It won acclaim of both critics and audience after its Toronto premiere. Nelly, a disfigured victim of Holocaust, returns to her hometown after a series of plastic surgeries and tries to recover, both mentally and physically, while also trying to find out was it her own husband who had denounced her and sent her to a concentration camp.
"The fact that Germans do not make movies about their own country and about 'coming home' has to do with something that took place after 1945, after Holocaust and after World War II. And homecoming stories are the most important film stories there are", said Petzold for Večernji List daily just before the Zagreb premiere of his film.