Estrellita, the latest feature by Metod Pevec, was released to Slovenian cinemas in late January with simultaneous premiere screenings at two different Ljubljana cinemas, according to the Slovenian government communications office.
A total of 131 films from Latvia screened worldwide at 230 international film events in 2007, according to the Latvian Film Centre. They included 17 fiction films, 33 documentaries and 81 animation films. Latvian films picked up 36 awards worldwide in 2007.
Shooting is under way for the new Slovenian film Transition by director Boris Palčič. The screenplay is based on the novel by Vladimir Nardin with the same title.
Digital television operator Polsat Cyfrowy posted a net profit of 122.3 million zloties (€33.9 million) during the first three quarters of 2007, or 125% above the same nine-month period in 2006, the company said in a statement Feb. 12. Revenues rose nearly 70% during the same period to 553.3 million zloties.
Two Slovenian co-productions are being screened in the "Panorama" section of the official Berlinale program. One is Love and Other Crimes by the Serbian director Stefan Arsenijević, a Serbian-German-Slovenian co-production with the Slovenian production house Arkadena. The second is the film I'm from Titov Veles by the Macedonian director Teona Mitevska.
Corridor #8 directed by Boris Despodov is the first Bulgarian film in six years to enter the official selection of the Berlin International Film Festival. The film will have its international premiere in the "Forum" section and will have five more screenings during the Berlinale, which runs through Feb. 17.
A short animated Latvian film, The New Species, by well-known Film Studio Animacijas Brigade is in the competition at the Berlinale, while a second film by Latvian director Sigme Baumane was selected for the program section "Berlin Shorts." Two feature films released in 2007 - Vogelfrei and Defenders of Riga - will be screened at the European Film Market.
The Polish Film Institute and the legendary Russian studio Mosfilm have launched a script competition for the best work dealing with bilateral events after 1991. The winner will be awarded $20,000, and the prize will be doubled if production starts.
Activities to promote Polish films abroad continue to spread. The latest development is Polishfilmclub, which will be screening Polish cinema in various cities in Ireland such as Dublin, Cork, Cavan, Naas, Limerick, Sligo and Galway. The first screening was of Feliks Falk's The Collector on Feb. 4 in Dublin.
Two Polish films will have their international premieres during the European Film Market, which runs for nine days during the Berlinale. Distributor BooBoo films (www.booboofilms.pl) will be promoting the poetic film Glass Lips by Lech Majewski and the film Paradise Too Far by Radoslaw Markiewicz.
