Thanks to the cooperation with the Bucharest Austrian Cultural Forum (Forumul Cultural Austriac), selected films from the GREEN FILMS @AUSTRIA program offered this year by the educational film project EU Youth Cinema: Green Deal will also be presented at renowned Romanian film festivals in October: the ASTRA FILM International Film Festival in Sibiu and the LA PAS Festival in Timișoara.
Film festival highlights in Sibiu and Timișoara
At the 30th anniversary edition of ASTRA FILM International Film Festival, taking place between 15-22 October in Sibiu the film EATING DIFFERENTLY – THE EXPERIMENT (MÂNCÂND DIFERIT – EXPERIMENTUL) by Kurt Langbein and Andrea Ernst will be presented as part of the education program Astra Film Junior (see: www.astrafilm.ro/en/2023/film/eating-differently-the-experiment). Astra Film Junior is a film literacy program offered to children and teenagers in the town of Sibiu, Romania, since 2009, and focuses on documentaries made for and about them. This is how director Kurt Lagbein sums up the message of his film: „We can also decide about the future and the climate with the food we consume. Cook differently, with less meat. Eat differently, with more pleasure. Shopping differently, regionally and seasonally.”
The LA PAS Festival in Timișoara included three Austrian productions and several short films from the EU Audioviual Service into this year’s program (see: https://la-pas.cries.ro/2023-2/program-de-filme-festival-la-pas-2023). Next to EATING DIFFERENTLY – THE EXPERIMENT (MÂNCÂND DIFERIT – EXPERIMENTUL) also MATTER OUT OF PLACE (CHESTIUNE SCĂPATĂ DE SUB CONTROL) by Nikolaus Geyrhalter and GENERATION CHANGE – WHO SAVES THE WORLD (SCHIMBAREA GENERAȚIEI – CINE SALVEAZĂ LUMEA) by Vanessa Böttcher.
While in the quiet and thoughtful film MATTER OUT OF PLACE the director Nikolaus Geyrhalter follows the traces of our trash across the planet and sheds light on the endless struggle of people to gain control over the vast quantities of waste, the GENERATION CHANGE – WHO SAVES THE WORLD looks for solutions for addressing climate change. Why is there still not done enough? What can one person really achieve? Can climate change be stopped? The young environmental activist Sarah Sadeghi takes these and many other questions with her onto a train across Europe to go and meet young activists who are successfully campaigning for projects in their countries. “Each of us can make a difference that is huge if we do it all.” – that’s Sarah’s conclusion after the journey.
The successful cooperation between the EU Youth Cinema: Green Deal and both festivals wouldn’t have been possible without the networking of its project partner, the Austrian Cultural Forum Bucharest. „The Austrian Cultural Forum Bucharest has been honored, from the very beginning, to support the EU Youth Cinema: Green Deal, which is very successful in the Romanian pilot cities Sibiu and Bucharest, and will extend its collaboration with the organizers to promote this program in as many places as possible in Romania, because the climate emergency concerns us all.” – so Andrei Popov, deputy director Austrian Cultural Forum Bucharest.
EU Youth Cinema: Green Deal has been an active project since March 2022, spanning across Romania, Austria, Croatia, North Macedonia, and Slovenia. It is overseen by the Austrian association LET’S CEE Film Festival in collaboration with local coordinators EPEKA (Slovenia) and Go Green (North Macedonia). PR activities are handled in all countries by the Chapter 4 agency. The program consists of screening over 30 European films both in theaters and online. Educational materials and a transnational marketing campaign complete the innovative concept. The full program version is available for free to all enrolled school classes (registration: www.youth-cinema.eu/ro) from the five countries. More films can be viewed for free by anyone interested through www.euyc.green/ro.
Andrei Popov: „EU Youth Cinema: Green Deal is a program that is making a difference not only in the field of cinema but especially in the field of education. Thanks to the discussions that accompany all screenings of selected documentaries, as well as the pedagogical materials provided to teachers and students, attending EU Youth Cinema: Green Deal screenings in the cinema or in the classroom becomes a truly formative experience of civic spirit and social involvement.”
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