The 2012 NexT Festival

The winner of the 6th NexT International Film Festivals held in Bucharest is the French short reel film “Mediteranees directed by Olivier Py. The festivals judging panel described the film as “a wide-scale cinematographic poem, based on 40-year old vid

Eugen Cojocariu, 29.04.2012, 17:34

The winner of the 6th NexT International Film Festival’s held in Bucharest is the French short reel film “Mediteranees” directed by Olivier Py. The festival’s judging panel described the film as “a wide-scale cinematographic poem, based on 40-year old video recordings of a family”.

Inaugurated in 2007, in memory of the late director Cristian Nemescu and sound designer Andrei Toncu, NexT (with a capital N for Nemescu and a capital T for Toncu) every year gathers short and medium-reel productions from around the world, inviting the audience to take part in debates and keynote events.

The “Cristian Nemescu” best director award this year went to filmmakers Julia Ducournau (for her short reel “Junior” ) and to Rudi Rosenberg (for the short reel” Aglaee”). The jury decided to equally grant the award to two films exploring the same universe in different ways, reminding one of the spirit of the films made by Andrei Toncu. ”Aglaee” captures the teenagers’ world, with its typical mischievousness, dishonesty and vulnerability, while “Junior” tells a spectacular tale of unexpected situations, daringly mixing comic thrill with the David Cronenberg-type of horror. Ada Solomon is the initiator and producer of NexT. She says that short-reels attract large audience to cinema halls.

”Each year we try to attract people to come and see the movies, to convince the next generations of the value of these films and, since cinema halls are packed withpeople, we can say we are happy. I believe people do have a taste for the short reel and given that these days everyone is in a hurry and wants to rapidly consume everything, even emotions, the short reel is extremely sought after. And at NexT you can watch a package of short reels, and you can also pass on quite rapidly from one register to another…I dare say it is a genre working well, people do like short reels, it’s just that they do not have a place to watch them. Reason enough for them to opt for coming to NexT.”

This year as well, the screening of the so-called “Oscars’ Night” was part of the NexT International Film Festival‘s program, presenting short reels nominated for the 2012 edition of the American Film Academy Awards, as well as the 2011 winner. Film lovers stepped onto the red carpet in the spotlight, rubbing shoulders with the festival’s guests. Opening the screening was “God of Love” directed by Luke Matheny, last year’s winner of the most-coveted statuette for the short films category. As happens every year, NexT brought in novelty once again. Ada Solomon presented some of the novelty items, such as NexT Dance and NexT Imaginaria:

“We have these two new sections, but the older sections are just as fresh. NexT Dance is a section where we gathered movies with both classic musical, and contemporary dance; these, however, are not contemporary dance recitals put on film. We have films with electronic beats, but also opera, some of them are extraordinary. I have a passion for dance, but I also have a passion for musicals, and I can say that this is a daring combination, musical and short film”.

This edition included, once more, the NexT Kids section for children, with short films and activities for the little ones created by special guests. Of the four Romanian films competing this year, the jury granted the best Romanian short film award to “From This Day On” by Dorian Boguta. “Hello Kitty” by Millo Simulov was the public’s favorite, getting the Audience Award for a Romanian film. Here is Ada Solomon again:

“The festival has an ever growing reputation, and people are very enthusiastic. Since I travel a lot for my job as a producer, I met filmmakers who congratulate me for NexT. A lot of young filmmakers came to Bucharest on this occasion, because out of the 27 movies that entered the competition, 21 are represented by a member of the crew, and I can say that people leave the festival with a great feeling. Also, they like very much the fact that they interact with their audience, because we have a young and talkative audience. On top of the conversations, there are the after parties, where people make friends, and even plan projects together.”

Since it isn’t just the audience that wants to come back every year at NexT, but also former guests, as part of the Festival Friends section, the organizers presented short films made by older friends of the festival, directors who have made a name for themselves, such as Tudor Giurgiu, Paul Negoescu, Nash Edgerton, Iulia Rugina and Stanca Radu. This section also presented short films made by high school students passionate about film, encouraged by NexT, in the hope that they can compete for real in the future in this competition.