08/10/2009

Kicking off today is the 5th CinePécs V. Moveast International Film Festival (October 8-11), an event intended as a launching pad for debut features from Central Europe and the Balkans.

The Hungarian event, whose previous award-winners include Jasmila Zbanic, Ágnes Kocsis and Jan Cvitkovic, is hosting a competition of 12 titles, some of which have already won acclaim and prizes at other international festivals.

Vying for honours this year are Goran Dević and Zvonimir Jurić’s Croatian film The Blacks [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Zvonimir Juric, Goran De…
film profile]; Hungarian director Áron Mátyássy’s Lost Times [+see also:
film review
film profile] (Best Film at Hungarian Film Week 2009 - see news); Zift [+see also:
trailer
film profile] by Bulgaria’s Javor Gardev; Stefan Arsenijevic’s Serbian title Love and Other Crimes [+see also:
trailer
film profile]; Vladimir Balko’s Slovakian work Soul at Peace; Polish filmmaker Maciej Pieprzyca’s Splinters (which won an award at last year’s Gdynia festival); and March by Austria’s Klaus Händl (Best Debut Film at last year’s Locarno festival).

The competition line-up also includes Bosnian director Aida Begic’s Snow [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile] (Cannes Critics’ Week Grand Prize 2008), Summer Book by Turkey’s Seyfi Teoman, Andrei Gruzsniczki’s Romanian production The Other Irina (crowned Best Domestic Film at the Transylvania Film Festival 2009), Janja Glogovac’s Slovenian film L... Like Love [+see also:
trailer
film profile] and Marbles by Czech director Olga Dabrowska.

Out of competition, the Pécs festival will also show a broad panorama of Eastern European productions, including Peter Strickland’s Katalin Varga [+see also:
film review
trailer
Interview Peter Strickland - Director …
film profile]; Romanian director Radu Jude’s The Happiest Girl in the World [+see also:
trailer
film profile] (see news); fellow Romanian George Dorobantu’s Elevator; Polish director Michal Rosa’s Scratch [+see also:
trailer
film profile] (see news); Transition by Slovenia’s Boris Palcic; Big Respect by Slovakia’s Viktor Csudai; The Shark in Me by Hungary’s Barnabás Tóth; and 1 by fellow Hungarian Pater Sparrow.

(Translated from French)