28 films, six days: Be Film Festival is one big Belgian cinema party

A wonderful end-of-year treat, the 13th edition of the Be Film Festival is here with the best Belgian movies of 2017. The week before Christmas is an opportunity to catch up on those films you missed - with 28 films scheduled in total.

"This festival is a great place to meet the casts, the crews, the directors, and other film fans, to get into the spirit of the season and to make a party around Belgian cinema," says festival co-creator and organiser Céline Masset. "The teams of each film, both the retrospectives and the premières, will be there to present their work, to answer a Q&A, but especially to meet the public."

Highlights this year include Abel & Gordon’s Paris Pieds Nus, a winsome comedy that allows them to dazzle us with their special brand of finely tuned physical comedy - a true poetry of motion.

Michael Roskam’s Le Fidèle stars Matthias Schoenaerts in top form, as a man whose secret could doom everything.

New directors François Troukens and Jean-François Hensgens’ Tueurs is a last heist caper that turns into a deep state machination.

There are also the premières, such as Bernard Declercq’s Méprises, a powerfully chilling cautionary tale about infidelity brilliantly interpreted. The opening night features another première, Samuel Tilman’s Une Part d’Ombre, as well as the traditional reception, but to really make it festive there will also be a live musical happening created by the film’s music composer Vincent Liben and Belgian singer Saule, who is also in the cast, and featuring surprise guests.

Fien Troch, the heralded director for her films concerning youth and adolescence, is presenting her film Home but she has also accepted to be the festival’s ambassador and will be giving a master class during which we will get a behind-the-scenes look at her cinema.

To honour the 50th anniversary of francophone Belgian cinema, the festival is screening two blasts from the past, Lucas Belvaux’s La Raison du Plus Faible from 2006 and anarchist Jan Bucquoy’s La Vie Sexuelle des Belges which caused quite a stir back in 1994 as the semi-autobiography of the first 28 years of his life. Meanwhile, on the shortest day of the year the festival presents five short films under the title All About Sex.

For those living outside Brussels, the festival offers a city-trip package consisting of two nights in a four-star hotel, spa facilities, VIP party and a festival full-access pass.

The festival ends on Christmas Eve morning with a family screening of Bigfoot Junior, followed by some hot chocolate and a visit by Father Christmas.

Be Film Festival, 19-24 December, Bozar and Cinematek. The entry deadline for our prize giveaway has now passed and the competition is closed.