VLAD BUZĂIANU

Romania

Vlad Buzăianu is an emerging director, self-taught in the craft of film, with a background in Economics and Psychology. His first short film, DREAMS ON SALE, won 15 awards and had more than 80 official selections (Fajr International Film Festival, Film Festival Kitzbuhel, Kansas City Filmfest, River Bend Film Festival) and was successfully received both by the audience and the critics. He is currently working on a new short film project, WHERE NO SHIPS GO, and also writing the script of his debut feature.

DANILO CAPUTO

Italy

Born in 1984 in Taranto, Danilo Caputo studied music in San Francisco, liberal arts in Berlin and philosophy in Naples before dedicating himself to writing and directing for cinema. His short films POLVERE, BANDURYST and IL POSTO FISSO were screened and awarded in numerous European festivals. Danilo was also a participant of the Berlinale Talent Campus (2011), the Locarno Summer Accademy (2012) and the Future Screenplays seminars held by the Apulia Film Commission (2013). In 2011 he was awarded the Mattador Prize for the script of his first feature film, LATE SEASON / LA MEZZA STAGIONE, which premiered at Karlovy Vary IFF in 2014 and was later screened in festivals such as Beijing, Montreal Nouveau Cinéma and Rome Independent FF, where it won the Best Italian Film award. Danilo’s second feature project, SOW THE WIND / SEMINA IL VENTO, premiered in the Panorama section of Berlin International Film Festival 2020.

ILINCA CĂLUGĂREANU

Romania

Ilinca Călugăreanu is drawn to stranger than fiction stories and larger than life characters. Blending absurd and playful tones, her films are a breathtaking mix of fiction and documentary, that immerse audiences into worlds beyond imagination. Her debut documentary feature, “Chuck Norris vs Communism”, premiered at Sundance 2015 and went on to play in cinemas and festival around the world. Her second feature documentary, “A Cops and Robbers Story” premiered in competition at Doc NYC, 2020. Credits include VHS vs. Communism (2014, New York Times Op-Docs) and Erica: Man Made (2017, Guardian Documentaries). Currently in development with feature film “Heisenbug” and in pre-production with doc series “Celluloid Dreams”. She is a Berlinale Talents Alumi (2017), 2018 Chicken&Egg Accelerator Lab Grantee, the 2018 Sundance Institute|National Geographic Fellow and 2019 Sundance Sound and Music Labs Directing Fellow. Ilinca is one of the founders of Vernon Films, established with producer and sister Mara Adina. Vernon Films focuses on pushing the boundaries of documentary filmmaking and collaborating with creative voices who seek to devise new ways of arriving at story.

SIMONA DEACONESCU

Romania

Born in 1987, Simona Deaconescu is a Romanian choreographer and experimental filmmaker, working across genres and formats. She holds a BA and an MA in Choreography at The National University of Theatre and Film Bucharest and a BA in Film Directing at Media University Romania. Simona has been teaching dance composition and dance filmmaking for various festivals and organisations. She founded Tangaj Collective, a company that collaborates with visual artists, performers and researchers in order to understand how the body can mediate reality. She has presented her works in conventional stages, but also in unconventional spaces, galleries and museums, architectural sites, family houses and cinemas reaching audiences from Europe, Canada and the USA. Deaconescu’s hybrid aesthetic and efforts to promote symbiosis of dance, film and technology, were recognized  with The National Center for Dance Award in 2016. She has received the danceWEB scholarship in 2014, is an Aerowaves Twenty18 Artist and an Emerging Choreographer with Springboard Danse Montreal ’19. She is a resident of Moving Digits European Project for 2019 and 2020, with a research on how a technological setting can alter the memory and presence of a performer on stage.

CRISTINA GROȘAN

Romania

Cristina Groșan is a Hungarian-Romanian filmmaker and visual artist. She is active in design and visual communication in Budapest’s cultural sector, while she is directing her own fiction films. Her award-winning short HOLIDAY AT THE SEASIDE, exploring a mother-daughter relationship, screened at more than 40 festivals, was distributed in several territories and recently premiered online, amassing over 1 million views. Currently, she is in post-production with her debut feature shot in Hungary, THINGS WORTH WEEPING FOR, written with Nora Rainer-Micsinyei and produced by Judit Stalter (Laokoon Filmgroup, HU). She recently finished her short fiction, ALONG CAME A PRINCE, produced by Anda Ionescu and Anamaria Antoci (Tangaj Production, RO) in co-production with Marek Novák (Xova Film, CZ). She is developing her second feature, ORDINARY FAILURES together with Czech writer Klára Vlasákova. The film’s development is supported by the Czech Film Fund. The project won the Pop Up Residency Award at the When East Meets West co-production platform in Trieste, Italy, in 2020.

PAUL NEGOESCU

Romania

Born in 1984 in Bucharest, Paul Negoescu studied film directing at the national film school. He directed several short films that were awarded and selected in many international film festivals, including Cannes (Semaine de la Critique – 2012), Berlin (2008, 2009 and 2010), Karlovy Vary, Slamdance or Rotterdam. Two of his short films (RENOVATION and DERBY) were nominated at the European Film Academy Awards in 2009 and 2011. His first feature film, A MONTH IN THAILAND premiered at the Venice Film Festival (International Critics’ Week) in 2012 and was awarded with the FIPRESCI prize in the Sofia International Film Festival and Best Debut in Transilvania International Film Festival. His second feature film, TWO LOTTERY TICKETS, a micro-budget independent film, became one of the most successful Romanian films at the box office and it was also very well received by critics and festivals. THE STORY OF A SUMMER LOVER is his third feature film and premiered in the Official Selection of Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival 2018.

BOGDAN THEODOR OLTEANU

Romania

Without any formal education, Bogdan Theodor Olteanu followed a convoluted path to filmmaking. He was a rugby player at a top club in Romania, an investigation journalist at a leading daily newspaper, a sports marketing consultant, a political communication consultant. Meanwhile, he wrote short stories and founded a cultural magazine – SUB25. His film and theatre work deals mainly with the ever-changing landscape of urban youth. He observes generations of young people in search of identity, caught between extreme libertarian values and a Balkan background. Born and raised in Bucharest, Bogdan places all of his stories in that city, the country capital and a melting pot of Russian, Oriental and Western European influences. His first feature, SEVERAL CONVERSATIONS ABOUT A VERY TALL GIRL, received 4 GOPO – Romanian Film Industry Awards nominations: Best Debut, Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role (Silvana Mihai), Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role (Florentina Năstase), Young Talent (Tudor D. Popescu, editor).

ADRIAN SITARU

Romania

Adrian Sitaru is an established Romanian director and writer, renowned for his five successful feature films and several short films. His latest feature, THE FIXER (2016, Toronto IFF, Tokyo IFF) was Romania’s proposal for Best Foreign Film at the Academy Awards. ILLEGITIMATE (2016) won the C.I.C.A.E Award in Berlinale Forum, DOMESTIC (2012) was selected in the Official Competition of Mar del Plata IFF, BEST INTENTIONS (2011) is the winner of two Silver Leopards in Locarno, while his first feature, HOOKED (2008), was selected for Venice Days, Toronto IFF, BFI London, amongst others, achieving 10 awards and being sold in 12 territories. Amongst the shorts in Sitaru’s filmography we count WAVES (2007, Sundance, winner of the Golden Leopard at Locarno), THE CAGE (2009, gathering 27 awards, among which DAAD grant in Berlinale Shorts and certificate of excellence by BAFTA/LA), ART (2014, Venice Film Festival – Orizzonti) and COUNTERPART (2014, Clermont-Ferrand ISFF). 

ANDRA TARARA

Romania

Andra Tarara is a documentary film director, camera operator, editor, video artist, photographer and archivist. She is a UNATC graduate in Film and Television (2016) and a master’s degree graduate in Visual Anthropology from SNSPA in Bucharest (2018). She is interested in a collaborative approach of the artistic process on subjects such as personal stories pertaining to wider social, political, and historical mechanisms. A DEATH IN MY FAMILY (premiered at Transilvania International Film Festival – Romanian Days, 2018) is Andra’s first first film as a director, a short documentary filmed on 35mm + digital, which she also shot and edited. Andra is currently working as an archivist at the Romanian Peasant Museum – The Museum’s Visual Archive – and as an independent photographer and videographer. In 2020, she completed her first documentary feature, US AGAINST US (Ji.hlava IDFF) made in collaboration with her father.

ANDREI UJICĂ

Romania

With a background in literature, Ujică decides in 1990 to devote himself to cinema and creates VIDEOGRAMS OF A REVOLUTION (1992), co-directed with Harun Farocki, which becomes a landmark film on the relationship between political power and the media in Europe at the end of the Cold War. His second film, OUT OF THE PRESENT (1995), tells the story of cosmonaut Sergei Krikalev, who spent ten months aboard the space station Mir, while on earth, the Soviet Union ceased to exist. OUT OF THE PRESENT has been compared to  such emblematic titles in film history as 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY or SOLARIS, and is famous for being one of the most recognized non-fictional films of the 90’s. THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF NICOLAE CEAUȘESCU (2010), widely regarded as a monumental achievement, concludes his trilogy dedicated to the end of communism.

ALI VATANSEVER

Turkey

Ali Vatansever was born in Istanbul in 1981. After studying Industrial Product Design and Film and TV in Istanbul, he completed his MFA degree in Film Production at Rochester Institute of Technology in New York. In 2003, Ali started his film career by directing short films. He is currently pursuing his directing career with Terminal Film, a production company he co-founded. His debut feature, EL YAZISI (ONE DAY OR ANOTHER, 2012) has been screened in various international festivals and distributed in movie theatres throughout Turkey. Aside from filmmaking, Ali teaches film at Koç University and works closely with NGOs on local democracy and governance.

MLADEN ĐORĐEVIĆ

Serbia

Mladen Đorđević’s debut feature fiction film THE LIFE AND DEATH OF A PORNO GANG (2009) was presented at over 50 international festivals, winning 14 awards. Mitch Davis, a selector of the Festival Fantasia in Montreal, compared Đorđević with authors such as Gaspar Noe, Lars von Trier and Michael Haneke, writing that THE LIFE AND DEATH OF A PORNO GANG did for Serbia what CLOCKWORK ORANGE did for Great Britain. He was born in 1978 in Belgrade. He graduated Film & TV Directing at Faculty of Drama Arts in Belgrade with the feature documentary film Made in Serbia, which later premiered at Belgrade Film Festival FEST and went into cinema and DVD distribution in Serbia. He directed several short films (LIVING DEAD, HUNGER, SHAVING FOAM) and documentaries (ALI HAMAD’S STORY, STRAIGHT THROUGH THE WIND). Đorđević wrote and directed one of the stories in the omnibus film EQUALS (2014), which premiered at Sarajevo Film Festival and docudrama VIENNA HALLWAYS (2020).