COTTBUS: Romania in 1985 was in the grips of the worst of Ceausescu’s excesses, and ordinary Romanians paid the price. Director Bogdan Muresanu takes this emotionally laden era as the title of his film, 1985, which was pitched at the recent Connecting Cottbus.

COTTBUS: Slovak director/producer Ivan Ostrochovsky tackles a new topic in Slovak film: the infiltration of the Catholic Church by the communist regime in his film The Disciple which was pitched at Connecting Cottbus.

PRAGUE: Principal photography has started on Pustina / Wasteland, an eight-part original drama series written for HBO Europe by Stepan Hulik, writer of the acclaimed HBO miniseries Burning Bush directed by Agnieszka Holland.

COTTBUS: After winning the film critics and the best script prizes at the Sochi Film Festival, Vasiliy Sigarev’s comedy The Land of Oz had its international premiere in the main competition of the Cottbus Film Festival.

SEVILLE: Only four films and filmmakers from CEE received nominations for the European Film Awards which will be announced on 12 December 2015 in Berlin.

COTTBUS: Tank, a dramatic thriller directed by Max Ksjonda and produced by the Ukrainian company Noosphere Films, won the Best Pitch award at Connecting Cottbus on 5 November 2015.

COTTBUS: Robert Balinski of the Polish Film Institute and Oliver Oliver Rittweger MDM (Mitteldeutsch Medienforderung) used the Connecting Cottbus panel on film funding to announce the signing of the Polish German Film Fund, which will have its first call for funding in early December with results announced in Berlin in February.

COTTBUS: Bosnia and Herzegovina teams up with Croatia and funding from Macedonia for director Ines Tanovic’s contemporary Sarajevo tale The Son presented at Connecting Cottbus.

COTTBUS: Cyprus arrives at Connecting Cottbus for the first time, pitching the black comedy/drama thriller Menopause from director/producer Tonia Mishiali.

COTTBUS: Georgian writer/director/producer Rusudan Chkonia’s lingering problems with purchasing a new flat inspire her black comedy Venice, which was pitched at Connecting Cottbus on 5 November 2015. The project won the CoCo Post Pitch Award.