A special selection of documentaries in the anniversary program Astra Film Festival (AFF) 2013 travels from Sibiu to Bucharest. The movies will be screened at the Romanian Cultural Institute (ICR) and the Romanian Peasant Museum over the upcoming couple of days at ICR each day at 6 pm.
The program opened yesterday with the movie labelled as the best documentary during the competition Central and Eastern Europe, “Anatomy of Departure” (director Oliver Tataru), a look back in time in which the director rebuilds the route of his family leaving Romania for Germany in the last years of the Communist regime. Winner of the prize for the best Romanian documentary, “In the Name of the Mayor”, directed by Anca Hirte, will be screened today, January 22. The movie is a pertinent analysis of the relation between simple folks with authority. In the last day, namely Thursday, January 23, the program includes two movies, “A Short Astra Film History” (directed by Carmen Vidu), the story of the 20 years of festival narrated by Dumitru Budrala, AFF manager, and “Tanase Affair. Playing Tag on the Mountain (directed by Ionut Teianu), winner of the special prize awarded to Romanian documentary, which recreates one of the most resounding cases of political assassination in Ceausescu period.
Over the weekend between January 24 and 26, the Museum continues to screen documentaries from the official AFF competition 2013. In the first day at 6:30 pm, the public will be able to view the movies “A Short History Astra Film” “and Matthew’s Laws” (directed by Marc Schmidt), the great winner of AFF 2013.
Saturday, January 25 at 5 pm, local delicate stories can be watched such as “My German Children” (Tom Pauer) or “Dancing Alone” (Biene Pilavci), the prize for the best documentary of the international competition, but also global interest topics, “Google and the World Brain” (Ben Lewis), a movie about the controversial projects run behind closed doors by the giant Google. Sunday, January 26 at 3 pm, “The Curse of Shale Gas” (Lech Kowalski) will be screened, one of the most acclaimed movies of 2013, which talks about a hot topic. “Songs for a Museum” (Eliza Zdru), “Hopes for Sale” (Cecilia Felmeri) and Ion (Olivier Magis).
2014 seems to be a busy year for Astra Film Sibiu, which has recently celebrated 20 years. The festival will continue to travel all around the country and will soon reach Timisoara, Cluj-Napoca, Targu-Mures and Iasi.
previous post
