Friday, April 20
A humble Romanian actor in his 40’s, hardly surviving between a complicated part in a musical, a depressed and pathologically jealous wife, and the obsession of an imminent, devastating earthquake, becomes the willing victim of his manipulative father who appears in his life for the very first time. But in the end, what seems like a visit to hell turns into a path of redemption as Tony’s journey evolves. His leading role in Orpheus in the Underworld perfectly mirrors his chaotic life on the verge of collapsing. The parallel, musical world turns his apocalyptic thoughts into an explosion of sheer vitality.
2016, 1h 57min
Directed by: Nae Caranfil
Screenplay: Nae Caranfil
Cinematography: Vivi Dragan Vasile
Editing: Catalin Cristutiu
Producer: Gábor Dettre
Cast: Laurentiu Banescu, Maria Obretin, Teodor Corban, Simona Arsu
Directed by: Paul Negoescu
Screenplay: Paul Negoescu
Cinematography: Ana Draghici
Editing: Alexandru Radu
Producer: Dragos Bucur
Cast: Dorian Boguta, Dragos Bucur, Alexandru Papadopol
Saturday, April 21 (Q&A with Mihaela Sirbu, workshop “The film as a socio-cultural radiography of Romania”)
Eastern Europe, 1835. Two riders cross a barren landscape in the middle of Wallachia. They are the gendarme Costandin and his son. Together they are searching for a gypsy slave who has run away from his nobleman master and is suspected of having an affair with the noble’s wife. While the unflappable Costandin comments on every situation with a cheery aphorism, his son takes a more contemplative view of the world. On their odyssey they encounter people of different nationalities and beliefs: Turks and Russians, Christians and Jews, Romanians and Hungarians. Each harbors prejudices against the others which have been passed down from generation to generation. And even when the slave Carfin is found, the adventure is far from over…
2015, 106 min
Directed by: Radu Jude
Screenplay: Radu Jude & Florin Lazarescu
Cinematography: Marius Panduru, RSC
Editing: Catalin Cristutiu
Producer: Ada Solomon
Cast: Teodor Corban, Mihai Comanoiu, Cuzin Toma, Alexandru Dabija, Alexandru Bindea Luminita Gheorghiu, Victor Rebengiuc, Alberto Dinache, Mihaela Sirbu
Saturday, April 21 (Q&A Constantin Puscasu)
Eastern Business is a dark comedy full of humor and absurd situations. The film tells the story of an unlikely friendship between two Moldavian men, Marian (Constantin Puscasu), a 45-year-old intellectual choir singer, and Petro (Ion Sapdaru), a 40-year-old sneak thief loser.
Confronted with poverty and lack of perspective, the two men start an exhausting journey, trying to make money to reach their dreams. Marian wishes to finally marry his fiancée, Veronica, and Petro dreams about buying a crane and earning money from its rental.
Getting acquainted in jail after a stupid fight, Marian and Petro decide to become business partners and start working towards a plan. They manage to close a deal with three Caucasian gangsters and buy a wagon full of horseshoes, but they are soon robbed and everything seems to be turning to dust. Even if they are constantly followed by bad luck, the two men don’t lose their optimism and always try different things to earn their money.
Eastern Business is a charming tragic, yet comic, film about how absurd and sarcastic sometimes life proves to be.
2016, 84 min
Directed by: Igor Cobileanski
Screenplay: Igor Cobileanski
Cinematography: Feliksas Abrukauskas
Editing: Razvan Ilinca, Eugen Kelemen
Producer: Iuliana Tarnovetchi, Dagne Vildžiunaitema
Cast: Ion Sapdaru, Constantin Puscasu, Daniel Busuioc
Sunday, April 22 (debate “Ethics in Journalism. Fake News, Fake Stories”)
Serving as a translator and general problem solver, or “fixer,” a Romanian reporter working at a French news network seizes a career-making opportunity when a sex scandal breaks and two underage Romanian prostitutes are repatriated from France. He’s willing to do whatever it takes to interview one of them—up to the point where he must ask himself if, as a journalist, he can live with the consequences, and if, as a father, he’s setting a good example for his son.
2016, 1h 40min
Directed by: Adrian Sitaru
Screenplay: Claudia Silisteanu, Adrian Silisteanu
Cinematography: Adrian Silisteanu
Editing: Mircea Olteanu
Producer: Adrian Silisteanu, Anamaria Antoci
Cast: Tudor Aaron Istodor, Mehdi Nebbou, Nicolas Wanczycki, Diana Spatarescu, Adrian Titieni
Saturday, April 21
Outside a maternity ward, a Roma family is announced their underage daughter has just had a baby girl. Pardică (50) doesn’t seem to celebrate the moment; he is very displeased with this early pregnancy, for which he blames his wife. However, things become even tenser when a hospital employee asks them to sign some papers and discovers issues related to their IDs and their status as parents of the underage new mother. The imminent danger of state authorities separating them from their daughter determines Pardică to take action.
2016, 20 min
Directed by: Adrian Silisteanu
Screenplay: Claudia Silisteanu
Cinematography: Adrian Silisteanu
Editing: Mircea Olteanu, Costi Zaharia
Producer: Anamaria Antoci, Adrian Silisteanu
Cast: Sorin Mihai, Alina Șerban, Elena Ursaru, Claudiu Dumitru, Teodora Sandu, Raisa Mihai, Claudia Silisteanu
Sunday, April 22 (Q&A with Laurentiu Damian)
”Muzeon may be the very island that I have been searching for a long time, in the midst of which there is the labyrinth, the space of an assumed exile” – it is the mode to be of a metaphorical locus, invented and inhabited by the post-modern artist Ştefan Râmniceanu that the artist finds himself, as a mirrored reflexion at the end of the labyrint. A portrait of the artist as an eternally young man through his art, the film is a double invitation: inside the artist’s baroque island full to the brink of forms, chimeras, and colours, but also towards an infinity of rythms and pulsations of Nature, in which the spectator might discover his own possible island, breathing and freedom.
2016, 55 min
Directed by: Laurentiu Damian
Screenplay: Acad. Razvan Theodorescu
Cinematography: Ana Draghici
Editing: Victor Vuicin, Danut Padure, Millo Simulov
Producer: Marilena Iliesiu
Saturday, April 21 (Q&A with Bogdan Mirica)
Roman returns to the land near the border with Ukraine he has just inherited from his grandfather. Fully decided to sell this vast but desolate property, he is warned by the local cop that his grandfather was a local crime lord and his men will not let go of the land – and their smuggling business – without a fight.
2016, 104 min
Directed by: Bogdan Mirica
Screenplay: Bogdan Mirica
Cinematography: Andrei Butică
Editing: Roxana Szel
Producer: Elie Meirovitz, Marcela Ursu
Cast: Dragos Bucur, Gheorghe Visu & Vlad Ivanov
Directed by: Hadrian Gavriluţiu
Screenplay: Hadrian Gavriluţiu
Cinematography: Mişu Ionescu
Editing: Andrei Sibişan
Producer: Marilena Ilieșiu
Saturday, April 21
Vaslui, Neamt and Botosani. Three eastern Romanians counties. Three different childhoods united by the same goal: becoming a famous musician. Giani, Sebi and Raul are three children growing up in different parts of Romania, learning traditional shindy music. The film is following their day-to-day life, their family stories, their struggles and their dreams.
2017, 75 min
Directed by: Andrei Nicolae Teodorescu
Cinematography: Tudor Vladimir Panduru
Editing: Andrei Păcuraru, Răzvan Ilinca
Producer: Marilena Ilieșiu
Sunday, April 22
This is one of the last and greatest untold stories of the Second World War, revealed by King Michael I of Romania. “We took the train to Berlin to see the other side of the coin and we had lunch with Hitler. It wasn’t an enjoyable meeting.” It is the story of a King’s decision who, in a critical moment of the Second World War, relinquished Germany’s support, guiding Romania towards the Allies, thus bringing about a quicker end to the war. It is a story of palatial intrigues. And a story of deceptions. From Buckingham Palace to Bucharest. From Moscow to Washington. Lost diplomatic signals, aristocrat spies and blackmail at gun point. And the courage of a young king who dared. Romania, at the outbreak of the Second World War, was a very young nation, with an age of only 20 years.
2016, 47 min
Directed by: Trevor Poots
Producer: John Florescu
Cast: Lucian Birsan, Marcel Iures (voice)