01/04/2009

The second edition of Romania on the Movie Map, the round table held by the Romanian Association of Film Critics, will be organized this year during the 3rd NexT International Short & Medium Length Film Festival, beginning today in Bucharest.

Romania on the Movie Map will feature debates and discussions among important local film critics and acclaimed foreigners such as Ronald Bergan (The Guardian), Scott Foundas (LA Weekly), Dan and Edna Fainaru (Screen International), Boyd van Hoeij (Europeanfilms.net), Yoram Allon (International Film Guide) and Jay Weissberg (Variety).

Journalists will also attend press screenings of new local films likely to have an impact at this year’s film festivals, including Radu Jude’s The Happiest Girl in the World [+see also:
trailer
film profile], presented in the Panorama section of the Berlinale; Peter Strickland’s Katalin Varga [+see also:
film review
trailer
Interview Peter Strickland - Director …
film profile]; Razvan Radulescu and Melissa de Raaf’s First of All, Felicia [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Melissa de Raaf and Razvan …
film profile]; and 2006 Camera d’Or-winning director Corneliu Porumboiu’s second feature, Intermediary [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Corneliu Porumboiu
film profile]. The screenings will be followed by a meeting with local critics on Saturday.

This year’s NexT will feature 120 short and medium-length films from 32 countries. Besides the 25 shorts selected in official competition, the festival includes focuses on Serbian and Belgian cinema; special sections dedicated to Locarno’s Leopards of Tomorrow, Cannes’ Critics Week and Robert Bosch Stiftung co-productions; and films by the late director Cristian Nemescu (California Dreamin’ [+see also:
trailer
film profile]) and sound designer Andrei Toncu, to whom the festival is dedicated.

NexT runs through April 5.