04/07/2005

As the saying goes, 'if you build it they will come' (Field of Dreams, Ray Kinsella, 1989). And so they did. Countries from the so-called former Eastern Europe "built" an initiative called "East of the West Panel" and presented it to people who matter in the industry during the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival, on July 3. Their hope is that it might finally give them the edge over successfully promoting or selling more of their productions abroad.

The Panel is in fact a presentation of twenty two new feature films from Central and Eastern Europe, excluding Russia, which are in the postproduction phase or have just been completed. They have been presented to international distributors as well as sales agents and festival representatives.
The national premieres of all said films are expected to be screened through summer 2005 and the end of 2006. While news about possible deals is hard to assess yet the initiative seems to have gone down well even with those who are always skeptical about the use of yet another panel gathering.
"I think it is a good idea that, because it's new, needs more time to bear fruits", said Jana Cernik of the Czech Film Center, an organization that helps promote Czech cinema abroad, which was the initiator of the Panel, assisted by the Film Industry office in Karlovy Vary.

Czech and Poland with seven and six films respectively had the lion’s share of films in the Panel while Hungary had three. They were the ones that responded best to the call of the Panel. Others were less enthusiastic if not to say doubtful of this new idea but the Panel can still claim to have six more countries (Lithuania, Estonia, Latvia, Bulgaria, Serbia & Montenegro and Slovenia) on board, albeit only with one film each.