PRESS RELEASE

            Sidestreets is pleased to announce the start of an exciting new film festival, the Festival of the Green Line.

            Organized by Cypriot film-maker Panicos Chrysanthou in  collaboration with Sidestreets and the Cyprus Film Archive, the festival will run from Saturday, 30 January to Friday, 5 February, and feature seven brilliant, award-winning films from Cyprus, Turkey, Greece, Germany, the Soviet Union, and the United States.

            Three of the films will be screened in the north at Sidestreets (Tel: 22 93070), three at the Goethe Center on the Green Line, and one in the south at the Pantheon Theater (29 Diagorou Street, Nicosia. Tel: 35 22675787).

            *All films will be shown at 8.00 p.m. in all venues.

            **The entrance fee for the screening of “Soul Kitchen” at the Pantheon Theater  is 8 Euros, and tickets should be purchased in advance from Sidestreets. All other screenings are 5 Euros each. As seating is limited, reservations are recommended.

FESTIVAL OF THE GREEN LINE

30 January – 5 February 2010

SOUL KITCHEN, by Fatih Akın (Germany 2009)

30. 01. 10        Saturday,        Pantheon Cinema

Young restaurant owner Zinos is down on his luck. His girlfriend Nadine has moved to Shanghai, his “Soul Kitchen” customers are boycotting the new gourmet chef, and he’s having back trouble. Things start looking up when the hip crowd embraces his revamped culinary concept, but that doesn’t mend Zinos’ broken heart. He decides to fly to China for Nadine, leaving the restaurant in the hands of his unreliable ex-con brother Ilias. Both decisions turn out disastrous: Ilias gambles away the restaurant to a shady real estate agent and Nadine has found a new lover! But brothers Zinos and Ilias might still have one last chance to get “Soul Kitchen” back if they can stop arguing and work together as a team.

Fatih Akin was born in Hamburg, Germany in 1973 to Turkish parents. A screenwriter, director and actor, his films have won awards at numerous international film festivals. In 2003 he founded the film production company Corazón International. In 2004, his film “Head On” won the German Film Award for Best Film, Direction, Screenplay, and Cinematography, the Golden Bear at Berlin, and the award for Best European Film at the European Film Awards. The “Edge of Heaven” was nominated for the Golden Palm and won the Best Screenplay and the Ecumenical Jury Prize at the Cannes IFF 2007. “Soul Kitchen” got the Special Jury Price of the Venice Film Festival 2009.

DANCING ON THE ICE, by Stavros Ioannou (Greece 2009)

31. 01. 10        Sunday, Sidestreets

New Year, 1996. After the collapse of the Eastern Bloc, a series of nationalist conflicts bring terror and disorder to the Balkans. The result: poverty and large-scale immigration. Three women from three different Eastern European countries meet in a Bulgarian border town from which they intend to cross illegally into Greece. They have no choice but to entrust their hopes in a man who inspires anything but confidence: a specialist in ferrying illegal immigrants across frontiers, he leads them along treacherous mountain paths that may or may not lead to their “Greek dream”. Utterly alone in a desolate wilderness, the women become his prey. Their desperate efforts to take their fate into their own hands will lead to dramatic adventures and to tragedy. (The screenplay is based on immigrants’ real-life narratives.)

Stavros Ioannou was born in Evia Greece and studied film at the Stavrakos Film School in Athens. He founded Filmode, a cinema production company, in 1984. He remains its managing director. He has directed many documentaries for Greek state television (ERT), the Hellenic Ministry of Culture and other public entities. He has also worked with television networks, while his work in the cinema has earned him awards in Greece (Thessaloniki IFF) and internationally: “Roadblocks”, a fiction film, competed at the Berlin IFF in 2001 and won awards at the Thessaloniki and Geneva IFFs in 2000 and 2001 respectively.

THE LONG NIGHTS JOURNEY TO THE DAY, by Deborah Hoffman and Frances Reid (USA 2000)

01. 02. 10        Monday,  Goethe

For over forty years, South Africa was governed by the most notorious form of racial domination since Nazi Germany. When it finally collapsed, those who had enforced apartheid’s rule wanted amnesty for their crimes. Their victims wanted justice. As a compromise, the Truth & Reconciliation Commission (TRC) was formed. Now, as it investigates the crimes of apartheid, the Commission is bringing together victims and perpetrators to relive South Africa’s brutal history. By revealing the past instead of burying it, the TRC hopes to pave the way to a peaceful future.
Long Night’s Journey Into Day follows several TRC cases over a two-year period. The stories in the film underscore the universal themes of conflict, forgiveness, and renewal. A white special forces officer, deeply remorseful for the crimes he committed, struggles to reach peace with the embittered wife of a black activist he killed 14 years ago. A group of mothers, after enduring years of misinformation and denials by the authorities, learn the truth about how their sons were set up, betrayed, and killed in a vicious police conspiracy. A young black activist comes to recognize the anguish he caused by killing a white California student during a mob riot, while her parents see past their pain to embrace a new, multi-racial South Africa.

Deborah Hoffmann, born 1947 in New York. Director and Film and video editor of important documentary films. Film direction since 1994. Complaints of a Dutiful Daughter (1995). Frances Reid, born 1944 in Oakland. Director, Producer und camerawoman for documentary films. Film direction since 1971. Skin Deep (1996), All God’s Children (1996).

A DETAIL IN CYPRUS, by Panicos Chrysanthou (Cyprus 1987)

02. 02. 10        Tuesday, Sidestreets

A woman visits with her small daughter a ruined village in the middle of the Cyprus flat land. Ex villagers, Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots come to the ruins and each of them narrates a personal story of war. The conflict, which took place in 1964, transformed the peaceful, mixed village to a deserted area. Only the remnants of life witness a world, which has gone away for ever.

Panicos Chrysanthou was born in Kythrea in 1951. He has directed documentaries and features, which were travelled outside Cyprus. His first documentary, A Detail in Cyprus, has been screenend in the Berlinale (Panorama 1987). He directed Our Wall for ZDF (Das Kleine Fernsehspiel, 1993) and the Parallel Trips (2003) for the Unated Nations Development Programme. The feature Akamas (2006) was presented in Venice (Orizzonti 2006).

και τworked in Cyprus as a film critic, curator of the Nicosia Film C

SOMERSAULT IN A COFFIN, by Dervis Zaim (Turkey 1996)

03. 02. 10        Wednesday, Goethe

When he can find work on Reis' fishing boat, Mahsun is able to earn just about enough to eat and drink with, but this still leaves him with the problem of finding shelter at night. Winters in Turkey can be very cold, and one of his friends, in a similar situation, died from exposure. In this tragicomedy, Mahsun, a petty thief, cannot even get himself put in jail anymore, though this would solve his shelter problems. Instead, he steals cars at night, often just so that he can sleep in them. Rather than arresting him when they catch him stealing, the police simply administer a brutal beating. The owner of a teashop, who has "advanced" him hundreds of cups of tea on credit, hires him to clean the toilets and gives him a room to sleep in. Despite this newfound security, Mahsun cannot resist the attractions of a lovely heroin addict, and because of her he loses his new job and room.

Dervis Zaim was born in Limassol, Cyprus in 1964, graduated from Warwick University in England and studied Film Production in London. In 1995, his first novel, “Ares in Wonderland”, won the prestigious Yunus Nadi literary prize in Turkey. A year later he made an auspicious debut as a director with “Somersault in a Coffin”, which won various awards, including the Thessaloniki International Film Festival 1997 (Silver Alexander), the San Francisco International Film Festival 1998 (Best Film), the D’Annonay International Film Festival 1998 (Best Film), the Ouvres International Film Festival 1998 (Best Film, Best Actor), the Turin International Film Festival 1997 (Special Jury Award, Public Award). His next films, “Elephants and Grass” (2000), Mud (2003), “Parallel Trips” (documentary, co-directed by Panicos Chrysanthou, 2003) “Waiting For Heaven” (2006) and Dot (2008) have received honors and awards in film festivals around the world.

PANDORA’S BOX, by Yesim Ustaoglu (Turkey 2008)

04. 02. 10        Thursday, Sidestreets

When three forty-something siblings in Istanbul receive a call one night that their aging mother has disappeared from her home at the western Black Sea coast of Turkey, the three set out to find her, momentarily setting aside their problems. As the siblings come together, the tensions between them quickly become apparent, like Pandora’s box spilling open. They come to realize that they know very little about each other and are forced to reflect on their own shortcomings.

Yeşim Ustaoglu was born in Sarikamis, in eastern Turkey, in 1960. After making several award-winning shorts in Turkey, she made her feature film debut with 1994’s “The Trace” which was presented at numerous international festivals. Her second feature film, “Journey to the Sun”, won the Blue Angel Award for Best European Film at the Berlin IFF and the Best Film and Best Director prizes at the Istanbul IFF in 1999. “Waiting for the Clouds” won the Special Jury Award and the Best Actress award at the Istanbul IFF and was screened at the Thessaloniki IFF 2004.

ONE OF THE EXECUTION TEAM, by Manos Zacharias (Soviet Union 1968) 05. 02. 10     Friday, Goethe

Following the military coup d’état of the Greek junta, a young man is led to the firing squad. One of the soldiers will refuse to take part in the execution and will be sent to jail. After the execution, the soldiers are given leave. We follow one of them, as he gets together with his friends, his girlfriend, and his relatives, and we observe the path he takes until he realizes the true meaning of his act.

Manos Zacharias was born in Athens and studied Chemistry at the University of Athens and Drama at the Rota-Sarantidis School. In December 1945, he won a scholarship from the French Institute to study in France. He attended Art History classes at the Sorbonne and graduated from the Institute of Higher Film Studies (IDHEC) in Paris. Between 1948-49 he took part in the Civil War, organizing the filming crew of the Republican Army. After the defeat of the communists, he went into political exile in Tashkent. There he graduated from the School of Direction of the Theatrical Institute and taught acting for two years. In 1956 he attended Mosfilm’s School for the Advanced Training of Film directors in Moscow. He went on to make ten films at Mosfilm Studios. In 1979 he returned to Greece. He served as Advisor on Film Issues to Melina Mercouri, President of the Greek Film Center and head of the Hellenic Broadcasting Corporation ERT’s European Program Office.