IN THE PALACE Day2

IN THE PALACE

International Short Film Festival

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Day 2

Programme:

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25.6 Stone Hall 10:00

FILMER FORGE Speaker: FaisalAzamQureshi, UK

15:00 - 16:30

3ed International Competition Q&A Session & Discussions

17:00 - 18:30

4th International Competition Q&A Session & Discussions

19:00 - 20:30

1st National Competition Q&A Session & Discussions

Open air 18.30 - 24:00 Radio Nula IN THE PALACE official party vol. 2 DJ Adrian Bijan 00.00 - 1.30 Focus

1st European Film Awards On

Movie screenings

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BEAUTIFUL, Italy, 2015 BON VOYAGE, Switzerland, 2016 NORIAKI, Norway, 2016 LOVE IS A STING CELLO, Bulgaria, 2016 I STILL BLEED INSIDE, Brazil, 2016 YOU ARE BEAUTIFUL, Bulgaria, 2015 SAMIRA, Germany, 2016 THE BOY IN THE OCEAN, Denmark, 2016 TOUCH, Canada, 2016 ARE YOU HAPPY, France, 2016 LOST AND FOUND 33 MICROLITER, Germany, 2015 GETTING FAT IN AN HEALTHY WAY FOR EVA

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IN THE PALACE​ - DAY TWO The waiting is over - the 14th In the Palace International Short Film Festival has finally started. We survived the long, hot and busy day, but the night was even longer.

The day started at 11 o’clock with a short press conference at the beautiful gardens by the Stone Hall. After we saw the first five films we discussed and talked about some questions that the films brought up.

The day continued with International Competition vol.2. In the second part of the screening, we watched 7 short films: Strings, Journey Birds, The Sled, Child Dream, Faith, Pedro and Last Act of a Dying Horse.

My favourite film from the second part was Strings, a Spanish animation. It was a very sweet and heart-warming film. The other films very a lot more serious and there were a number of different topics that were explored by the filmmakers, such as rape culture, migration and relationships between different family members. They were a mix between animation, documentary and fiction.

After the screenings, we had a discussion and we tried to find some connection between all the films and to see some similarities.

Once all the hard work was done we went to the party in the gardens on an open air stage. We are very lucky because Radio Nula will be in charge of the musical program during the whole festival.

The first night we had the opportunity to meet two great DJ’s. The first one was DJ WOO-D, who is Slovenian bar, club & a bboy battle DJ. And the second one was young Croatian DJ called DJ Bijan.

I think we all had a great time in a beautiful location with funky music and in great company.

It was a great first day; I’m excited to see what else is waiting for us over the next seven!

6 33 microliter, Germany, 2015 Lilium inter spinas, litteraly a lily among thorns, is the best way to describe this short work of art that in only two minutes sums up flashes of a life and manages to capture its meaning. Nature speaks through numbers and numbers are the infinite pieces of a beautiful puzzle, bulit around and inside every living being.

The director uses just a narrating voice and some fast sequences to create the atmosphere: it might look like a documentary in the first place, but the story moves very soon to a personal monologue and that’s where it becomes bright and soulful.

Two minutes of wonder are just a moment lost in time, but a moment to remember, a bittersweet moment that hits us by surprise like a thunder, like a kiss.

Beautiful, Italy, 2015 Is today´s society obsessed with the appearence and beauty? And what does it actually mean? Those questions are the core of the short, 12 minutes movie „Beautiful“ by the italian director Alessandro Capitani.

Beauty - relative term which means for everybody something different.

The appearance - something which we can´t fully influence - the figure, color of our eyes or skin. The myth that appearence matters. But also the fact that beauty is relative and everybody perceives it differently. The film is concentrated around abovementioned thoughts.

Touching movie “Beautiful“, with the main character Veronica (Giusy Lodi), forces to think about the contemporary values and what is important for men when it comes to women.

Excellent camera, detailed slow motion with music in the background are raising the tension and emotions. Good performance of the main actors but in the first place the message that appearance does (not) matter. Those are the powers of the movie “Beautiful“.

Bon Voyage, Switzerland, 2015 Imagine you are on a beautiful summer holiday trip via the Mediterranean Sea. You are on a yacht enjoying your time with your loved one, surrounded by calming waves and a warming sun. Everything is going just great, but then the dark night comes. The night thatis going to change your life. Everything happens when two boats cross each other.

This sounds like a quite normal situation, right? It might not be in these days. This dramatic short movie gives us a very unique point of view on Europe´s current refugee crisis as it is experienced through the eyes of a sailor. The questions the sailors have to ask themselves are not different from the ones we all should ask ourselves.

7 The boy in the ocean , Denmark, 2016 The gentle and constant murmur of the waves accompanies 12 yearsold Mathias in the discovery of his first sexual needs. Despite the topic being widely addressed, there’s nothing usual about the way The boy in the ocean depicts this delicate phase of growing up.

The ocean could be seen as a metaphor of the undefined and powerful emotions intrinsic in the prepuberty phase. Stuck between the boat and the land, Mathias is struggling between childhood and adolescence.

Whereas his parents still treat him like a child, the family dimension, represented by the boat, is the one he turns to when he feels demotivated by life disappointments. At the same time, the land, seen as a place to reach for experiencing new relations, keeps attracting him. In the middle, there’s the ocean.

Touch, Canada, 2016 In extreme situations, when we feel alone and trapped, it can happen that a good angel will appear. Someone who would care for us and help when everybody showed us their backs. Anybody might become one, also those from whom we wouldn´t expect it at all and they are still able to touch our souls.

Bad economic situation in the Canadian small town is shown on the example of a man threatened because he is not able to pay his debt on time and a single mother without an employment who would like to give to their kids everything but she doesn´t have much. Those are quite typical cases trapped in a vicious circle of our times and problems: who will take care of the kids when the mother needs to go to the newly offered position? Will she leave them with a stranger? And what will happen when suddenly everybody is turning their backs and refusing to help? In the story all these topics are interconnected in an interesting and captivating way and the answers to those questions manage to surprise us.

Are you happy, France, 2016 Paolo Cedolin Petrini’s vision is lucid, minimalist and essential. He focuses on expressive details with elegance and balance to build the storytelling: a spoon filled with soup, a brush softly combing hair, an embarrassed smile and an unanswered question, gently left to the audience: Are you happy? The title has no question mark, making it an affirmation with an imperative touch, the same that Caroline has with her son Daniel. Their calm and austere daily routine, the soft diegetic light of the house and their silence hides an uneasiness, a repressed breath of life, of happiness. Something is missing in this household, not only Daniels’s father but some fundamental notes Despite being a novice, Arnaud Jouan, actor and cowriter of the film, shows a solid performance just like Gabrielle Lazure, practiced Hollywood actress with more than 40 years experience.

8 Noriaki, Norway, 2016 Some heroes are born, some are forged in the fire of a moment. Noriaki Kasai seems to be both. He is a Japanese ski-jumper born 6th of June 1972, a living legend of his discipline – when so many retired at the pick of their success, supernovas on the pages of sport’s history, he is still there.

The picture was shot in 2015 when Noriaki set his lifetime best flight of 240,5m in Vikersund. His words, his philosophy is like a zen applied to the sport. It doesn’t matter that during a year he is making maybe one perfect jump. Zen-ish is also Bratberg’s approach to the storytelling.

Together with his crew he build a timeless structure of a film. They have blended together black and white images with those filled with colours, grainy frames with super-sharp ones, and all that spiced up with proper music. Effective, and affective, perfectly matching the main character.

Love is a sting, Ireland, 2015 If there is a one thing many people have in common, is our everlasting hate for mosquitos.

However, the film Love is a Sting by Irish director Vincent Gallagher decided to play with audience expectations about this usually short hate relationship and gives us a …. Love story.

The movie is split into two thematically different parts. After a few scenes of a typical human vs. mosquito interaction, the story changes.

It’s no longer a one man show about an artist trying to kill insect terrorizing his house. It becomes a relationship story. Despite the unusual topic, the film remains humorous and doesn’t try to take itself too seriously.

Love is a sting is a film carried by its theme. It offers what it promises, funny love/relationship story with a mosquito. Not more, not less. The film definitely portrays unusual type of love. It may not be love for everyone, but we can’t deny, it’s love that grabs your attention.

For Eva, Bulgaria, 2016 Often people do not appreciate what they have and take it for granted.

For Eva reveals the touching story of a young woman, who gets a serious injury in an accident that completely changes her life. She is fated to suffer from a rare form of amnesia and to forget everything on the next day. The only thing that encourages her to move on is the letter she writes to herself every evening.

Eva meets a complete stranger, who shows the willingness to get to know her. The audience gets very impatient to find out if this is Eva’s last chance to find love and someone who would be with her despite her curse.

However, the influence of the unexpected plot twist is amazing and adds something important to the movie, along with the face that the question at the end remains open to the audience’s interpretation.

9 Samira, Germany, 2016 Samira tells the story of a mother that does anything to keep her child alive. Even if that means not to see her anymore.

The director of this film creates the perfect environment to give us food for thoughts: we are observers of the film, as we are of the refugee crisis.

The film gives us the idea that we can always do something for someone, but, to do it, we must stop being selfish and get out of our comfort zone.

With a brilliant script and a marvellous photography, the film catches us from the very first moment, suffering with the heart-breaking twist of the movie and empathising with all the characters.

Besides, in the background, the director touches the problem of homosexual families trying to adopt children, but she doesn’t treat this topic deeply.

Samira will make us enjoy, think and act.

You are beautiful, Bulgaria, 2015 Sixteen and just starting to figure out who you are: this is a feeling we all can relate with, but also something we tend to forget while we grow up. Things can get ever harder at school because, let’s admit it, teenagers can be awfully mean and stupid, sometimes or most of the times.

The young main character is just looking for his identity, his space in the world. Maybe he’s not looking in the right place, as on the other side of a computer there might be danger, there might even be love but this time what the boy finds will change his life forever.

A delicate, clever short story like this truly deserves to take its space in everyone’s day: it balances a smart plot with a simple sincere acting, allowing the audience to relate to the situation and the characters.

In brief, definitely a gem among stones.

Getting fat in a healthy way, Bulgaria, 2015 A cheerful family is having a picnic on a sunny day when something weird happens: objects start flying up into space. Not everybody though, only the those who weigh less than 120 kilos. That’s how what seemed to be a perfect day turns into a nightmare. Through a unique and picturesque composition that sees the 3-member family forming a sort of stairs going towards the sky, the mother, who is being held down by her husband and son, eventually loses the grip and flies away. Appeased so far, his need to go out becomes increasingly powerful leading him to try all sorts of remedies. With a sweet and touching final scene, the viewer discovers that even in this dystopian post-communist world a happy ending is possible as, for how drastic the changes caused by political powers can be, humans feelings and relations are what keeps us alive.

10 I still bleed inside, Brazil, 2016 The director of I still bleed inside, Carlos Segundo, is a fan of some unusual cinematic techniques, so while watching the film, the viewer will need to use their imagination to fully get into the meaning. The plot revolves around the unfortunate fate of a woman, called Dora, who works as a cashier in a supermarket.

The idea of the film is summarised in the sentence “There’re some pains that ache in your body and no eyes can see it”. The conversation between Dora and a man who she has just met reveals much about her past and the deep dark secret she is keeping. The man is an owner of a gun and agrees to help Dora buy one. However, she never explains how she is planning to use it. The twist ending of the film is very surprising and thought-provoking.

The viewer is intrigued by the many symbolic images and signs used. The pain and the bleeding of Dora are both real and metaphoric.

Cello, Bulgaria, 2016 A lonely young musician is playing cello all alone in his living room when a beautiful young girl moves in the flat nextdoor. They meet each other almost by chance: he is shy and makes a great effort to expose himself to life, she is the opposite, sunny and outgoing. It could be the perfect beginning of a love story but… it’s not.

The authors make us travel into the mind of an introvert, problematic artist who turns out to be not exactly what we might expect in the beginning. It is never very clear what there is inside or outside his mind, how much his desires become truth and how much anxiety there is behind them. Fantasies of an artist or dreams of an insane man are very hard to separate when everything becomes an obsession.

Surly, nothing we expected from this short movie actually happens, but on the other way surprise and suspense don’t give us any rest.

Lost and Found,Germany, 2015 Lost and Found is a movie about rediscovering and finding yourself.

Neil, an old American writer, meets a young Estonian guy in the airport.

The young Estonian man is on his way to travel to New York as well as Neil, but both of them have personal issues. The plot is focused on decisions, “about people coming and going, deciding to leave, deciding to stay.”, as Claudia Seibl, the creative director states. Tallinn airport is the best metaphor for these existential doubts, when it comes to decisions: deciding to leave or deciding to stay. Also, “Lost and Found” is a typical airport term – we all lose and win/find something/ourselves when we leave to another country. In the end, it’s all about doing what you really want and to sacrificing your personal goals for your family and finding your way even when you think you are lost.

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European Film Awards - VOL.1 Founded in 1988, the European Film Academy (EFA) now unites more than 3000 European film professionals with the common aim of promoting European film culture. Throughout the years, the EFA initiates and participates in a series of activities dealing with film politics as well as economic, artistic and training aspects. The programme includes conferences, seminars, workshops whose common goal is to build a bridge between creativity and the industry. These activities culminate in the annual presentation of the European Film Awards in Berlin.

In the Palace International Short Film Festival is glad to present the nominated short movies from EFA’s 29th edition in its ON FOCUS programme for three days of screenings starting tonight, June 25th, at MIDNIGHT in the beautiful Open Air Stage area.

Here’s the films that will be on tonight: -THE WALL (Belgium, 2015, 8’) by Samuel Lampaert Hongkong. A multitude of concrete skyscrapers without personality. Inside, cramped studios where the anonymous live among themselves. Until the day when bachelor Chung decides to hang up a picture…

-AMALIMBO (Estonia/Sweden, 2016, 15’) by Pablo Libossat This is the story of Tipuana, a five year-old girl who experiences the limbo when she tries to pass to ”the other side” in her desperate urge to meet again with her recently deceased father. It is a short story that happens in an undefined place, and also in an undefined future.

-HOME (Republic of Kosovo, 2016, 20’) by Daniel Mulloy Thousands of men, women and children struggle to get into Europe as a comfortable English family sets out on what appears to be a holiday -I’M NOT FROM HERE (Chile/Denmark/Lithuania, 2016, 26’) by Giedre Žickyte and Maite Alberdi An 88-year-old Basque native, Josebe, lives in a nursing home in Chile. She’s obsessed with finding out where the rest of the elder people she lives with comes from. Everyone tells her that they are Chilean, not Spanish as she is. Josebe insists on thinking about her youth in the Basque Country. After a full year living in that house, she struggles to remember that she is living in a nursing home. After 70 years in Chile, she still lively remembers her homeland.

-90 DEGREES NORTH (Germany, 2015, 21’) by Detsky Graffam It’s a fact: good Germans wait at red traffic lights. But what do you do when the green man simply won’t appear? Taking place almost entirely on the most pernicious traffic island imaginable, 90 DEGREES NORTH is a humorous, fantastical parable offering an extreme take on the notion of following the rules of a civil society.

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DJ Adrian Bijan – RADIO NULA

WHEN: 25 JUNE AT 18.30 WHERE: IN THE PALACE Open Air

The International Short Film Festival is not only about movies: art is a huge unique melting pot of different forms of expression and music is one of them, one of the most ancient and also one of the most international… That is why, along with the film program, there will be a very busy MUSIC program lead by the popular RADIO NULA. So, after the screenings, save some energy for the evening because nobody here in Balchik especially the volunteers working on the project - likes wasting a great chance to party!!!

For the great opening of the Festival Radio Nula - that will be in charge of the musical program EVERY DAY SINCE 18.30 until MIDNIGHT in the Open Air area – and Dj Adrian Bijan will entertain all the guests and the people who will join them!

Don’t miss this extraordinary appointment and let the sound of jazz, hip-hop, soul, funk and disco guide you to an amazing evening!

For tonight’s party we will be entertained by Dj Adrian Bijan, from Croatia, Zagreb. He is a young funk activist which he is been playing for hip hop jams & club parties since 2010. He is known for his funky style and for his music selection, coming all from vinyl’s. In Zagreb is Adrian Bijan also known for organizing funk/jazz/hip hop parties & chill outs. He is a member of the well-known Croatian Funk Delegation (Hrvatska Funk Delegacija).

Stay tuned and don’t miss the fun!

НАЦИОНАЛЕН ИНСТИТУТ ЗА КУЛТУРНИ ИЗСЛЕДВАНИЯ И ПОЛИТИКИ

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