The One World International Documentary and Human Rights Film Festival
The 11th edition of the One World International Documentary and Human Rights Film runs between March 16 and 25, 2018, with the latest documentary films from all over the world screening in 8 locations around Bucharest
Corina Sabău, 24.03.2018, 15:39
This year, One World Romania visits highly debated topics. The state of justice, modernizing education, and reconsidering the family in modern terms are subjects that are intensely covered in the media, generating heated debates in Romania and abroad. For this reason, the 11th edition of the One World Romania festival will pay particular attention to them, dedicating them special sections. Here is Alexandru Solomon, director of the festival.
Alexandru Solomon: “These topics are currently of interest both in Romania and abroad. The topic of justice, though we may have grown tired of it, seems to be of even more acute interest. We thought that things had settled, but it seems that the idea of rule of law is still an open sore in Romania. The rights of the LGBTQ community is of more and more interest in society, especially following a number of ugly incidents in the last few months, when fundamentalist groups have tried to stop the screening of movies with such topics. As for education and its importance in Romanian society, there is much to say. It is clear that if we dont pay closer attention to education, we will be going nowhere.”
The 11th edition of the One World festival includes a section called Film Archive Memory, in order to help bring to light historical events, in order to shed a better light on the present. In fact, one of the constant concerns of the One World Romania Association was to recover the documentaries in the collection of the former Alexandru Sahia film studios. Here is festival co-director Andrei Rus.
Andrei Rus: “This is a wider concept. This section, Archive Memory, has several points of connection with this edition of the One World Romania, because we have paid closer attention to the ways in which the past influences the present, and implicitly the future. When we put together this section, we started off from the idea of the Centennial, but we tried to go about it avoiding sensationalism and trying to engage the public in a return to reality. Which is why the slogan of this edition is Get Real!, getting back to reality. There are several sections in which movies question various aspects of the past, and the way they influence the present. One of the biggest sections is FUTURE PAST, with 10 movies from all over the world treating various topics, starting with the influence that communism and fascism had on societies.”
The Culture of Protest, another section of this edition of the One World Romania festival, includes 5 documentaries presenting various forms of protest through stories from all over the world: Cambodia (A Cambodian Spring), Israel (Before My Feet Touch the Ground), France (The Gathering), the US (Whose Streets?), and Romania (Megaphone). Here is festival director Alexandru Solomon once again.
Alexandru Solomon: “Even though they have been going strong in the last two years, I believe that street protests in Romania are in an impasse, seeking a direction, a leader. I thought it would be interesting to debate this culture of protest around the world, through films, from Cambodia to this part of the world. In this edition of One World we have a Romanian movie on this topic, Megaphone. It seems important to me to look at other places too, to see where these protests led, if they managed to change the politics, or bring about another kind of discourse. To this end, we will be screening a movie from Hong Kong which talks about a street protest movement which subsequently turned into an organized political movement. In addition, we wanted to put things in historical perspective, a perspective on recent history, focusing on the year 1968, with movies about the protests of the 1960s and 70s in France, Czechoslovakia and Italy.”
In fact, one of the sections of the festival is 1968: 50 YEARS AFTER, reminding us that we celebrate half a century since the year 1968, which saw major protests in both the East and the West, protests that led to sweeping changes in society and collective consciousness across the world. Here is Andrei Rus, co-director.
Andrei Rus: “We will have several connected events that I care about very much. One of these is dedicated to student movements across the world 50 years ago, which were meant to change the world. With these events, we wanted to analyze the way in which these revolts managed to change society. We will be debating this topic in two discussions. One of the debates is on Saturday, at ARCUB, and the guests will be historian Lavinia Betea, Marius Deaconu, ANOSR president, and Karel Kovanda, Monika MacDonagh-Pajerova, the protagonists of the movie The Czech Student Revolt.”
The second event, 1968. Between East and West, will take place on March 25, starting at noon at the French Institute, where the audience will be able to meet famous French journalist Bernard Guetta, who will recount his own experience of Paris in 1968, and how these events influenced the world in which we live. The 11th edition of the One World International Documentary and Human Rights Film Festival will feature 12 documentary films, produced or co-produced in Romania.
