14.9.2011
The ninth Zagreb Film Festival that is to be held from 16 to 23 October on several locations in Zagreb: Europa and Tuškanac cinema, Dokukino Croatia, Dance Center and Museum of Modern Art, was announced at the press conference held today in Europa cinema.
“In the second half of October, despite a 20 percent budget reduction, the audience will have the opportunity to watch a broad palette of films by novice authors from all around the world. The program festival, which will be one day longer this year, is to be finalized in the next couple of days and it will include about ninety titles distributed in seven program categories. In the full-length feature film category, we can announce the directorial debut of English actor Paddy Considine, the film Tyrannousaur that won World Cinema Dramatic Directing Award and Special Jury Prize for Acting at tje Sundance Festival this year. The film is the adaptation of his short film Dog Altogether. It talks about an unusual love story between and alcoholic and a Christian charity shop worker. The film Las Acacias, a debut of the Argentine director, scriptwriter and producer Pablo Gioreglli, is a film about a truck driver and his two travel companions on the 1500 km long road from Asunción in Paraguay to Buenos Aires, Argentina. The film found its road to this year's Toronto Film Festival, San Sebastián and Cannes where it was the winner of the Caméra d'Or Award, announced Boris T. Matić, the festival director.
“The documentary category includes the Croatian premiere of the film ‘Marijine’ of Željka Sukova; after the festivals in Toronto and Karlovy Vary, our audience will have a chance to see for the first time this extraordinary musical comedy about three women and their late grandmother. The film also features the popular Czech dance electro-trash band Midi lidi. The topic that is close to the domestic audience waiting for the parliamentary elections is explored by the political documentary ‘An African Election’ in which the author Jarreth J. Mertz reveals an almost carnival atmosphere in the background of the political campaign during the presidential elections in Ghana in 2008', added Boris T. Matić.
Besides the above-mentioned films, one of the most important novelties in this year's festival is the partnership with T-Com. “The sponsorship of Zagreb Film Festival rounded our sponsorship activities related to the most important Croatian film festival. As one of the leading companies in Croatia, our sponsorship activities, especially those related to the cultural events, make a contribution to the development of the Croatian society. Through our financial support to the film festivals, we invested HRK 8,600,000 in culture, and such sponsorship is a logical and natural choice for us, since our MAXtv offer includes some of the best titles. The sponsorship of the Film Revue, Filmomanija and ZagrebDox, was followed by the sponsorship of the Pula Film Festival, Vukovar Film Festival and Film Forum Zadar; and as already mentioned, our film story and this year's sponsorship of cultural events was rounded with Zagreb Film Festival. As the sponsor of ZFF we help improve the content of the festival, and the users will be able to find seven excellent films presented in the previous years during Zagreb Film Festival in our MAXtv library“, said Maja Weber, Director of the Public Relations Department of Hrvatski Telekom. Starting from 14 September, the users of MAXtv library will be able to see 'Winter's Bone', and in the next few weeks the offer will be broadened by the following titles: 'Mammoth', 'Me Too', 'North', 'Magic Silver', 'The Happiest Girl in the World', and 'The Robber', the winner of the last year's ZFF.
The films in the competition program compete for the Golden Pram award in the following categories: the best feature film, the best short feature film, the best documentary film and the best Croatian film in Checkered selection. Besides the foregoing awards, the Audience Award will be introduced for the first time this year. The Audience Award is sponsored by T-Com. The complete program and schedule of the festival will be released ten days before the beginning of ZFF.
T-Com is the general sponsor of the Festival, and the Festival is financially supported by the City Office for Education Culture and Sports of the City of Zagreb, Croatian Audiovisual Centre and MEDIA program.