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CROSSING EUROPE: Filmic Forays Through Europe
Linz Film Festival with Tributes to Matteo Garrone and Priit Pärn

The program of the new Linz film festival CROSSING EUROPE (4 – 9 May 2004) is taking shape under the direction of the former artistic director of the Diagonale Christine Dollhofer. Simultaneously with the expansion of the EU, the first edition of the annual festival invites viewers to discover less familiar film landscapes. In addition to the European Competition and the European Panorama, CROSSING EUROPE offers tributes to the Italian director Matteo Garrone and the Estonian animation filmmaker Priit Pärn. Two specials are devoted to documentary film. One introduces current works by young documentary filmmakers in Czechia and Slovakia; the other deals with observations of contemporary worlds of work in the wake of the New Economy. The Atelier, reserved for Austrian film artists, presents Siegfried A. Fruhauf; the platform Local Artists is open to film and video works from Upper Austria – entries can still be submitted until February 1st.

FORAYS THROUGH EUROPE
"CROSSING EUROPE closes a gap: at last Linz has its own film festival, and it is one that is excellently suited to the city with its contemporary and young program," states Wolfgang Steininger, manager of the Linz program cinema Moviemento that is behind CROSSING EUROPE.”"Because of this and due to its European focus, the festival should be a good reference for Linz as a possible European Cultural Capital in 2009." Another reason for jubilation is that an experienced festival director with an international reputation has been found in Christine Dollhofer. Steininger: "Christine Dollhofer has not been an outstanding expert on film only since the Diagonale. Her appointments to international expert juries again and again - such as that of the Berlinale in the near future - highlight that."
With CROSSING EUROPE Christine Dollhofer intends to enter new cinematic territory: "At the time of the EU expansion, we are setting out on forays through European film landscapes with CROSSING EUROPE. As a festival we intend to concentrate on how the cultural, economic and political transformation of Europe is reflected in film; at the same time, though, we also want to be a podium and point of contact for the local film scene.

FESTIVAL DURATION AND LOCATIONS
CROSSING EUROPE opens on Tuesday, May 4th and will show around 100 programs until Sunday, May 9th, filling the screens of the cinemas Moviemento and City Kino. Festival and communication center and location for the Atelier Siegfried A. Fruhauf is the O.K Center for Contemporary Art with the Festival Lounge, which serves as meeting point and place of contact for local and international festival guests.
The festival opens up another setting at and in cooperation with the Linz cultural center Kapu. The cooperation partners for CROSSING EUROPE include the O.K Center for Contemporary Art, the Upper Austrian Chamber of Labor, Youki in Wels, the Austrian Film Museum and European partner festivals.
Promises of financial support for the festival of European cinematography are expected to be forthcoming from the Federal Province of Upper Austria, the city of Linz and from the Federal Government (Section Art in the Federal Chancellery) . The largest private partner is the HYPO Upper Austria, making the Atelier possible, among other things. HYPO marketing director Mag. Gerhard Obermüller: "As bank of the Federal Province of Upper Austria, we are pleased that there is a platform for ambitious film and video productions from Upper Austria too."

AN OVERVIEW OF THE PROGRAM
The heart of the festival are the European Cinema Competition with about ten new productions (2003/2004) mostly by younger European directors, and the Europe Panorama, which brings together outstanding feature films and documentaries - most of which will be shown for the first time in Austria. Information about the regulations is available from the festival web site www.crossingEurope.at.
The competition and panorama programs will be presented in April. In addition, CROSSING EUROPE also presents two tributes (Matteo Garrone, Priit Pärn), two specials ("Closer View", "Worlds of Work"), the atelier with Artist in Residence Siegfried A. Fruhauf, and the survey program Local Artists. Discussion events, brunches and evening parties in the Festival Lounge along with a music film series in the Kapu round out the program.

TRIBUTE TO MATTEO GARRONE …
The first festival tribute centers around the 34-year-old Italian director Matteo Garrone, who began his career as a painter and camera assistant. For the production of his debut film, he simply founded the production company "Archimede" to shoot "Terra di Mezzo", a critical investigation of the living conditions of foreigners in Rome. The documentary "Bienvenido Espirito Santo" was followed by "Ospiti" and "Estate Romana", two works significantly marked by an observing gaze. These were ultimately the basis for Garrone's reputation as the documentarist among filmmakers of his generation. With the feature film "L'Imbalsamatore", which premiered in Cannes in 2002, he also shows a work for the first time with a melancholy and erotic note. Garrone will present his most recent work "Primo Amore" in a few days at the Berlinale.

… AND TO PRIIT PÄRN
The second tribute presents the extensive oeuvre of the Estonian animation filmmaker Priit Pärn. The artist, born 1946 in Tallinn, began as a caricaturist and illustrator in the 1960s before turning to animation. Pärn's extensive oeuvre – with "Hotel E" as probably the most famous work – has been the subject of about thirty solo exhibitions in recent years in Europe and abroad. For this reason, Pärn was distinguished in 2002 with the ASIFA Life Achievement Award. The program that Otto Alder and Thomas Basgier have put together for CROSSING EUROPE also shows works by European artist colleagues and works by students that have been taught and inspired by Pärn as a teacher at film schools.

CLOSER VIEW
The special Closer View takes time for a closer look across the borders to our Eastern neighbors. The perspective of young Czech and Slovakian documentary filmmakers offer insights into the everyday life of the neo-EU member states. Curator Marek Hovorka, head of the Jihlava Documentary Film Festival (CZ), is responsible for this survey of contemporary documentary filmmaking in Czechia and Slovakia.

SPECIAL WORLDS OF WORK
The consequences that the short summer and quick end of the New Economy and the neoliberal structural transformation have had for the more or less precarious working situations of our time are shown in the special Arbeitswelten (Worlds of Work), which is also devoted to documentary film. Images from contemporary working life, assembled by the documentary film platform KINOREAL, show people and models of work, in which only one thing remains constant: permanent change.

IN THE ATELIER: SIEGFRIED A. FRUHAUF
As artist in residence at the O.K Center, the Upper Austrian avant-garde filmmaker Siegfried A. Fruhauf takes over the Atelier that is reserved to outstanding young local artists. Fruhauf, born in 1976 and a student at the Art University Linz (Experimental Visual Design), focuses on perception in his visual experiments - with a sense of the history/stories of film as well as the function of film as an entertaining spectacle. Fruhauf's works (such as "Blow Up", "Frontale") have been shown frequently at festivals at home and abroad. "Structural Filmwaste. Dissolution 1" played at the International Film Festival in Venice in 2003. Fruhauf will also design the festival trailer for CROSSING EUROPE.

THE BEST FROM UPPER AUSTRIA: LOCAL ARTISTS
With the Local Artists program CROSSING EUROPE sets up an Upper Austrian showcase. On display are film and video productions of every genre and length from directors and producers from or working in Upper Austria. Many works have already been received; it is still possible to enter submissions until February 1st. Detailed information is available from the festival web site: www.crossingEurope.at.