Let’s go East!

From 6th – 12th April 2005 the goEast – Festival of Central and Eastern European Film Takes Place in Wiesbaden / Škoda Endows the Award for the Best Film / Two New Film Sections are Included in the Programme: “Signature” and “Portrait”.

Already well established within the international culture scene, the goEast film festival is now extending its programme. In its 5th year the Wiesbaden-based festival presents two new film sections “Signature” and “Portrait”.

“Signature” serves as the platform for films from Eastern Europe, which elude our common way of interpretation. The films - often with an idiosyncratic, sometimes innovative, other times radically individual signature - challenge established viewing practices and provoke dialogue.

The “Portrait” section, on the other hand, offers the viewer an opportunity to follow the development of individual film makers, whose artistic career is shaped by the political change. goEast dedicates the first “Portrait” to the Slovakian director Martin Šulik who won prizes in Karlovy Vary, Minsk, Rotterdam, Mannheim among others. His film: THE KEY FOR DETERMINING DWARFS, OR THE LAST TRAVEL OF LEMUEL GULLIVER (Czech Republic 2002) was awarded the prize for the Best Film at the goEast film festival in 2003. In Wiesbaden this spring, Šulik will personally introduce his films.

goEast is organized by the German Film Institute (DIF – Deutsches Filminstitut) and is predominantly funded by both “hessen-media” – a state-sponsored initiative, and the state capital of Wiesbaden. The festival’s main venue is one of Germany’s most beautiful cinemas – the Caligari FilmBühne in Wiesbaden.

The goEast Competition section includes 15 current full-length feature and documentary films, which compete for three awards. This year goEast is particularly pleased to announce that its longtime partner Škoda Auto Deutschland GmbH has extended its engagement for the main prize the Škoda Award for the Best Film “Golden Lily”, which includes a prize money of 10.000 €.

Already for the fourth time, the Hertie-Foundation, main sponsor after the state and city, is endowing the 10.000 € Documentary Award which highlights the transformation process in Central and Eastern Europe. Once again the city of Wiesbaden is sponsoring the prize for the Best Direction of 7.500 €.

The film landscape Poland and its three Baltic neighbours Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania are the focus of the ongoing Symposium “Identities in Post-Communist Era” which successfully began in 2004. Scholars, script writers and directors from the East and the West are being offered the opportunity to discuss the tendencies of contemporary film making in these countries.

The Student’s section – the audience attraction of the festival – allows young, emerging directors to present themselves to the audience. This year goEast invites film academies from Belgrade, Katowice, Munich and the Rhein-Main-Area.

Between the 6th and the 12th of April 2005 the goEast film festival will present more than 100 films. Alongside a number of new discoveries from our Eastern European neighbours the festival programme offers an unique opportunity to take a closer look at the visual world beyond the new borders of the EU, and to learn more about film productions from countries such as the Ukraine, Kazakhstan or Macedonia. Numerous occasions for dialogue and particularly attractive additional events complement the braod film programme of the festival and invite both to a reflection and exchange between East and West.