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New Europe Film Festival |
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Bringing films from Eastern Europe to the UK. |
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The 2008 Edition of the New Europe Film Festival brings you films from the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Poland, Lithuania, Slovenia and Romania. This year again we tried to show the Eastern and Central Europe through the eyes of young people and children – the world seen by the generation of new Europeans is bizarre, confusing and sometimes scary. In this reality, they try to keep their ideals about morality, love and friendship and often confront their parents in order to stay truthful to themselves. I'm sure their problems will seem closer to you than you think. |
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Festival Programme |
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California Dreaming (Nesfarsit), dir. Cristian Nemescu, Romania 2007, 155 min. Romantic comedy with a bitter aftertaste from C. Nemescu, who died tragically in a car crash before finishing the film. When a NATO transport is detained at a rural Romanian train station the locals indulge in a pro-western craze. |
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Paper Will be Blue (Hîrtia va fi albastrã) Radu Muntean, Romania 2006, 1h 35min, 35mm, Romanian with English subtitles, Cast: Paul Ipate, Adi Carauleanu, Dragos Bucur On the night of the Romanian revolution, when Bucharest is ruled by chaos and scarce information reached few, a young militia officer deserts his post to join the revolutionists. His commander commences a search but finds it difficult to find his way around the city where everybody fights everybody. With slow, documentary-like narration “Paper” brings the best elements of the New Romanian Wave together and leaves you in confusion and amazement. |
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Teah Hanna Slak, Slovenia/Poland 2007, 1h 27min, 35mm, Slovenian with English subtitles or dubbed into English, Cast: Pina Bitenc, Nikolaj Burger A family adventure and a fairy tale about friendship and human fight for preserving innocence, hopes and dreams. Teah, the little refugee meets a boy Martin who knows the secret life of tress and feels at home in the forest. Martin, who up to now lived in the peaceful home of his eccentric but loving family, and under the protection of the magic forest, is suddenly confronted with a cruel true story of refugees, war and the deep wounds it leaves on people. A humorous story about friendship carrying the universal message is taking place in the fairy beauty of ancient forests. Fiction and reality are inseparable in the forest, where small people fight for their place on the earth. |
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Reserve (Rezerwat) Lukasz Palkowski, Poland 2007, 1h 40min, 35mm, Polish with English subtitles, Cast: Marcin Kwasny, Sonia Bohosiewicz, Grzegorz Palkowski Young photographer Marcin moves into a run-down area notorious for being the most dangerous district of Warsaw and tries to fit in with the locals. As he takes pictures of the neighbourhood and explores this pathological environment, through his friendship with a local hairdresser and a boy fascinated by photography, he discovers the charm of this old, historical part of town and the beauty hidden deep inside its inhabitants. Made on a shoestring budget and outside the traditional production circle, Reserve was a hit in Poland last year winning the Audience award at the Polish Film Festival in Gdynia. |
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You am I Kristijonas Vildziunas, Lithuania 2006, 1h 27min, 35mm, Lithuanian with English subtitles, Cast: Andrius Bialobzeskis, Jurga Jutaite, Saulius Bagaliunas “You Am I” follows an architect who builds a tree house high in a forest to be alone, but finds himself drawn to a pretty girl nearby. His meditating existence among nature is portrayed in a series of long shots contemplating nature and human body and soul. As he descends regularly to wander around he occasionally meets half-naked, dreadlocked spirit of the forest. |
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Twists of fate (Korowod) Jerzy Stuhr, Poland 2007, 1h 52min, 35mm, Polish with English subtitles, Cast: Kamil Mackowiak, Karolina Gorczyca, Katarzyna Maciag, Jan Frycz Jerzy Stuhr’s take on the controversial subject of lustration and the life of former Polish secret agens after the fall of communism. Bartek makes a living by writing and plagiarising dissertations for fellow students. When one day he sees a man, who fakes his own death and runs away with a large sum of money, he begins his own investigation to discover the truth and sell the story to a tabloid newspaper. When he confronts the man in the wilderness of the Polish Highlands and hears a shameful story from his past he faces a moral dilemma. At the same time Bartek’s own life complicates when he gets involved in an affair with another girl and his lies affect another sphere of his life – his relationship. Brilliant dialogues originating from the generational clash and brilliant observations of the Polish reality make this film a comedy treat. |
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Wednesday, Thursday Morning (Sroda Czwartek Rano), Grzegorz Pacek, Poland 2007, 1h 11 min, 35mm, Polish with English subtitles, Cast: Joanna Kulig, Pawel Tomaszewski, Jadwiga Jankowska-Cieslak One Wednesday evening Teresa enters Tomek’s world without an invitation and turns it upside down. Their youthful love adventure lasts only one night but it’s enough for the director, Grzegorz Pacek to show the world of the modern rebels. Inspired by the French New Wave this film is a fresh look at Polish youth in modern Warsaw. The plot unwinds slowly and pans across the multigenerational city with a tragic history and a bright future. How would you spend a day if it was to be your last? How would you love if it was your last chance to experience it? |
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Taxidermia, dir. György Pálfi, Hungary 2006, 91min Taxidermia is a crazy, surreal story compared to Jeunet’s “Delicatessen”. Generational comedy about human obsessions about |