14/09/2017 - The storied Romanian gathering has also announced the edition’s five competitions

One of Romania’s oldest film festivals, the Astra Film Festival, has now reached its 24^th edition, set to be held in the city of Sibiu between 16 and 22 October. Approximately 100 documentary films will be screened in the event’s seven venues.

Besides traditional sidebars and special programmes, the gathering is preparing an “immersive experience” for its audience: the second edition of the Future Is Now sidebar offers new forms of cinema, including full-dome and VR productions. The “Post Truth Tools” programme, comprising three films, a debate and a master class, will analyse fake news, but also the trustworthiness of documentary cinema.

The titles announced in the International Competition are All That Passes by Through a Window That Doesn’t Open by Martin DiCicco (USA/Qatar), Another Year by Shengze Zhu (China), Burma Storybook [+see also:
trailer
film profile] by Petr Lom and Corinne van Egerat (Netherlands/Norway), Calabria [+see also:
film review
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film profile] by Pierre-François Sauter (Switzerland), City of Ghosts by Matthew Heineman (USA), Liberami [+see also:
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film profile] by Federica Di Giacomo (Italy/France), Taste of Cement [+see also:
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film profile] by Ziad Kalthoum (Germany/Lebanon/Syria/UAE/Qatar), The Bad Kids by Keith Fulton and Louis Pepe (USA), and The Challenge [+see also:
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film profile] by Yuri Ancarani (France/Italy).

Meanwhile, the Central & Eastern European Competition comprises Batusha’s House [+see also:
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film profile] by Tino Glimmann and Jan Gollob (Kosovo/Switzerland), City of the Sun [+see also:
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film profile] by Rati Oneli (Georgia/Netherlands/USA/Qatar), Communion [+see also:
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film profile] by Anna Zamecka (Poland), Convictions by Tatiana Chistova (Russia/Poland), Deportation Class by Hauke Wendler and Carsten Rau (Germany), Gora by Stefan Malesevic (Bosnia/Serbia), Long Echo by Lukasz Lakomy and Veronika Glasunowa (Germany), Soul Exodus by Csaba Bereczki (Hungary), Tarzan’s Testicles [+see also:
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interview: Alexandru Solomon
film profile] by Alexandru Solomon (Romania/France), and The Beast Is Still Alive [+see also:
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film profile] by Mina Mileva and Vesela Kazakova (Bulgaria/UK).

Finally, the Romanian Competition includes A Film Less Happy, More Sad, Poetical and Wise by Cornel Mihalache, Erwin Mayor by Mihai Nanu, I Am Hercules by Marius Iacob, Phoenixxx by Mihai Gavril Dragolea, Planet Petrila [+see also:
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film profile] by Andrei Dăscălescu, Shindy Music by Andrei-Nicolae Teodorescu, The Brotherhood by Cătălin Farcaş, The Last Kalderash by Cosmin Bumbuţ and Elena Stancu, The Side Street of Europe by Ermese Ambrus and The Trial [+see also:
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film profile] by Claudiu Mitcu. 

The festival also boasts two short-film competitions – one of them, Docschool, dedicated to student films.