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Lithuania / Romania / Bulgaria / Greece / Egypt / South Africa

Mirona Radu • Director, Film O’Clock International Festival

“The main mission is to cultivate a love for cinema around the world by using meridians as a tool to hold synchronised screenings in cinemas”

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- During our chat, we spoke about the innovative concept of the festival, its line-up and its industry initiatives, among other topics

Mirona Radu • Director, Film O’Clock International Festival
(© Claudia Ciocan)

We took the opportunity to chat with Mirona Radu, director of the Film O’Clock International Festival. The second edition of the gathering, unspooling this year from 1-6 March, will take place simultaneously in six different countries: Lithuania, Romania, Bulgaria, Greece, Egypt and South Africa. During our conversation, we spoke about the innovative concept of Film O’Clock, its two main strands, its industry initiatives and the festival’s future plans.

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Cineuropa: Could you talk us through Film O’Clock International Festival’s concept? What is your main mission?
Mirona Radu: The backbone of Film O’Clock is the film-industry collaboration between countries that share the same time zone. The main mission is to cultivate a love for cinema around the world by using meridians as a tool to hold synchronised screenings in cinemas and online Q&A sessions with special guests while building strong connections between the different local film industries. The festival also aims to provide audiences with a platform to discuss their country’s issues by seeing it in the mirror of another. We want to connect people through films, and to challenge the preconception that differences keep us apart. The festival believes in our common humanity. We share both the asset of time and a love for cinema. By emphasising how valuable our time with each other is through film screenings, we can foster a culture of solidarity and tolerance that will not only enrich us, but also instil a sense of empathy.

What type of films will you showcase? How do you select them?
The festival aims to bring together both classic titles that will bring audiences the creations of the past, but also fresh short films that present the bold and modern perspectives of young professionals. In this year’s Classic Cinema Section, we have included: Devil’s Bride, the first Lithuanian musical; Water Like a Black Buffalo, a collective Romanian essay documentary made in 1970; the satire The Tied Up Balloon, made by the first woman to direct a feature film in Bulgaria and one of the few women directors of the 1950s, Binka Zhelyazkova; the outstanding debut by Pantelis Voulgaris, Anna’s Engagement; Four Women of Egypt, a documentary that chronicles the friendship between four Egyptian women from different religions; and Come Back, Africa, the perfect marriage between art, race and politics. All of these titles were curated by the festival board. As for the Short Film Competition, it includes 12 bold shorts, selected by the same committee from among 97 submissions hailing from the six participating countries.

How will this year’s edition be structured?
This year, the participating countries are Lithuania, Romania, Bulgaria, Greece, Egypt and South Africa. We have decided to focus on in-person screenings, as we so missed this human connection and really want to support the cinemas in their struggle to bring the audience back. For us, it is very important to have the dialogue that is inspired by watching films; therefore, we are keeping the Q&A sessions after each screening, but the discussion will be held online and streamed in the venues. Besides the screenings, the festival will offer an online master class on film journalism, two online conferences for professionals and one online networking event called the “Intercultural Cocktail”.

Could you elaborate on this year’s industry talks?
One of the main objectives of Film O’Clock is to promote cultural awareness through films. Therefore, we are organising a dedicated online discussion about heritage cinema. The first industry talk, titled “Unveiling Cinematic Heritage”, will take place on Wednesday 2 March from 17:00-18:30 (GMT +2). The second industry talk, “Opportunities on 25th Meridian Est”, will take place on Friday 4 March from 17:00-18:30 (GMT +2). We wish to set up a space for creative collaborations among film-industry professionals from the festival scene. We will explore the benefits and the challenges when it comes to presenting a film project in a country that you don’t know, a place that is culturally far away from everything you have experienced before.

Where will the screenings take place?
We are very happy that the simultaneous screenings will take place in five beautiful, historical arthouse cinemas across Europe and Africa – Cinema Skalvija in Vilnius, Cinema Muzeul Țăranului in Bucharest, Dom na kinoto in Sofia, Studio New Star Art Cinema in Athens and the Labia Theatre in Cape Town, along with an important cultural centre, the Tahrir Cultural Center, a venue that is part of the American University in Cairo.

What are Film O’Clock’s future plans?
We are looking forward to developing a whole ecosystem under the Film O’Clock umbrella. We are preparing to launch the Film O’Clock Podcast to keep the dialogue with our audience active throughout the year, and to build the Film O’Clock Participatory Museum, a place where our community’s co-creators can share memories, archives and stories about cinemagoing, and materials that will be translated into video works made by the young professionals from the participating countries. Of course, we aim to develop and organise the festival in other meridians and time zones, but this will take time. Good things require time, as well as more money, and more collaborators and partners getting involved.

Outside of your work as a festival director, what are your other main activities? How did these help you create Film O’Clock?
I am a film director and producer, and I am now preparing my next short film, after a long break. Having worked for more than 15 years in the field of international festivals, distribution and exhibition, I think it is time to start listening carefully to my heart again and to dare to be vulnerable through my own films, because I think I have a lot to say.

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