02/06/2014 - Young German Cinema is the star of one of the festival’s Focus sidebars

The 13^th edition of the Transilvania International Film Festival (30 May-8 June) kicked off last Friday in Cluj-Napoca, Romania, with approximately 200 features in selection. Some of them are grouped under the three umbrellas of the festival’s traditional Focus sidebars, which showcase the freshest and best-received productions from certain countries. For the first time in years, all three Focuses are celebrating European cinema, and in addition to the sidebars dedicated to Irish and Czech films, the specialised Young German Cinema Focus introduces audiences to films by young German directors, the majority of them first or second features.

Anton Gonopolski is expected in Cluj-Napoca to introduce his graduation feature 28 ½, produced by his own production company, Gonopolski und Guddat Filmproduktionen, together with the Deutsche Film und Fernsehakademie in Berlin. The film tells the story of a Greek immigrant in Berlin who goes to Russia to discover the identity of his previously unknown son.

After directing two documentaries, Frauke Finsterwalder presents a darker side of a surreal Germany in her debut fiction feature, Finsterworld [+see also:
trailer
film profile], produced by Walker + Worm Film, while Jakob Lass explores a special love story in his second feature, Love Steaks [+see also:
trailer
film profile], produced by Hochschule für Film & Fernsehen "Konrad Wolf" and winner of several awards at the Munich International Film Festival in 2013. Katrin Gebbe is also coming to Cluj-Napoca with her first feature, Nothing Bad Can Happen [+see also:
trailer
film profile], produced by Junafilm and selected last year in the Un Certain Regard sidebar at Cannes. 

Also forming part of the selection are Bastian Günther’s second feature, Houston [+see also:
trailer
film profile], Nico Sommer’s Silvi [+see also:
trailer
film profile] and David Wnendt’s Wetlands [+see also:
trailer
interview: David Wnendt
film profile].

The entire section was put together with the help of German Films Service + Marketing Gmbh, the information and advisory centre for the promotion of German cinema worldwide.