The Transilvania International Film Festival ended atmospherically at the National Theatre in Cluj. Special guests, press, public and staff of came to celebrate the winners of the 3rd edition of the biggest film festival in Romania.

Cluj was for nine days the Romanian capital of film: 80 titles were screened from 30 countries and more than 280 guests participated at the Festival. Attendance figures indicate a record of 20 000 viewers with open-air screenings being a huge success for the local audience. Among special events we can mention screening of Richard Linklater’s BEFORE SUNSET in the presence of actress Julie Delpy or local premieres of KILL BILL VOL. 2 or Coen Brother’s LADYKILLERS.

Cluj was also the host of the 1st CROSSINGS conference, organized by Script House from Berlin and the annually meeting of the regional representatives of the South Eastern European Cinema Network.

The Award Ceremony welcomed Special Guests like Julie Delpy, Marion Doering (European Film Academy), Renate Roginas (Eurimages), producers Cedomir Kolar, Simon Relph, director Ibolya Fekete, Margaret Von Schiller (from Berlinale’s Panorama), Ludmila Cvikova (Rotterdam IFF), casting director Shaila Rubin, Romanian actress Maia Morgenstern (Passion of the Christ), film critics, producers, journalists or international film festivals’ directors.

Closing films were the winners of the Golden Bear for Best Short and Feature at this year’s Berlinale - COFFEE AND CIGARETTES (by Cristi Puiu, Romania) and Fatih Akin’s HEAD-ON (Germany).

12 films from 11 countries competed for this year’s awards and especially for the Transilvania Trophy for Best Film. The host of the Closing Ceremony was Tudor Giurgiu, the Festival Director of TIFF 2004.

The award for Best Film (4000$), Transilvania Trophy, handed by actress Maia Morgenstern, went to DIAS DE SANTIAGO (Peru), directed by Josue Mendez. The hero of the film is Santiago, a 23rd years old soldier who comes back to Lima hoping to start a new life. But his adaptation to the real world is not as easy as he imagined.


The award for Best Director, endowed with 1500 $ was given away by Julie Delpy and went to Christoffer Boe (Denmark) for his film RECONSTRUCTION.


Best photography of a film in Competition, offered by Kodak Cinelabs Romania went to Shandar Berkeshi for the Russian film KOKTEBEL (by Boris Khlebnikov and Alexei Popogrebsky), a road movie that articulates the difficulties of reconciling family love with independence.

KOKTEBEL won yet the Best Perfomance Award (1000 USD), offered by Vitrina Advertising. Leading actors Gleb Puskepalis and Igor Chernevich received the award from the Romanian actor Dan Nutu.

Special mention of the Jury (offered by TV5) went to actress Isolde Fischer for her perfomance in WHEN THE RIGHT ONE COMES ALONG (Switzerland – Germany 2003, by Oliver Paulus & Stefan Hillebrand), where she plays a cleaning woman, leading an ordinary life, but falling in love with the Turk Mustafa, a coleague from work.

Lifetime Achievement Award of the Festival went to the famous Romanian actor Victor Rebengiuc and the Critics Award was given to BUDDY (Norway 2003, by Morten Tyldum).

Winner of the Best Romanian Short Film presented in the frame of the Romanian Days was LIVIU’S DREAM, by Cornel Porumboiu (2004) and the Jolidon Award for Debut went to director Constantin Popescu for his short film THE APARTMENT (2004).

Cinemagia jury (formed by members of www.cinemagia.ro club), award the Cinemagia Award for AALTRA (France- Belgium 2004, by Benoît Delépine and Gustave Kervern), a glorious road movie for wheelchair users, a film about friendship, life and the way it changes. The second award given by Cinemagia went to a short movie from “Shadows” section – DUMMY (UK 2003, by Paul Fuller), where a lonely man in search of a new friend responds to an advert in a magazine.

Finally, the most popular film in the Competition voted by the viewers was again AALTRA.



2005 edition of the Transilvania International Film Festival will take place between May 27-June 5.