Tales from the Golden Age to open Transilvania Film Festival

The eighth edition of the Transilvania IFF (May 29 – June 7, Cluj-Napoca, Romania) is beginning to shape up. Over 250 films are expected to be screened in this year’s TIFF.
The opening gala on Friday, May 29, will be highlighted by the national premiere of Cristian Mungiu’s latest film, Tales from the Golden Age, a collection of Romanian urban legends from the communist era, written by Mungiu and directed by Ioana Uricaru, Hanno Hofer, Razvan Marculescu, Constantin Popescu and Cristian Mungiu.

Unlike 4 months, 3 weeks and 2 days, Tales from the Golden Age is a comedy based on the most hilarious Romanian urban legends of the 1980s, restoring the humour which helped most of Romanians survive the communist regime. The Tales include iconic moments from the childhood and youth of the 1965-1970 generations: singing the national anthem at the beginning of every school day, shouting in the streets whenever an official car would pass by, the happiness of sharing a banana on Christmas Eve, selling empty bottles for pocket money and many other.

After 4 months, 3 weeks and 2 days and before my next auteur film, I wanted to offer the Romanian and foreign audiences a comedy. Tales from the Golden Age, an episodic and collective film, brings together five members of the same generation, who enjoyed restoring, re-using and re-conditioning their own memories from the times of their sleepless nights at parties, endless food cues and VCR get-togethers, says Cristian Mungiu, winner of the Palme d’Or in 2007.

Transilvania IFF will also showcase the other important and fresh Romanian features of the year, during the already well-known Romanian Days. Important foreign films will also be part of TIFF’s program: German feature Everyone Else – one of the revelations in the last edition of the Berlinale, where it won the Grand Jury Award for directing and the Silver Bear for the acting of Brigit Minichmayr; Terribly Happy, winner of 7 Danish Academy Awards, a Karlovy Vary Crystal Globe and two other trophies in the Valladolid film festival (Best Music & Best Screenplay); 2008 international classics such as Phillippe Claudel’s Il y a longtemps que je t’aime and Mateo Garrone’s Gomorra will also have their national premiere in the Transilvania IFF.

The seventh edition of Let’s Go Digital, the national under-18 film workshop, will bring another twenty teenagers in Cluj Napoca for ten days of hard work, discussing, writing, shooting, editing and screening their shorts in front of the festival audience


Transilvania International Film Festival (TIFF) is presented by Romanian Film Promotion, and it is the first international feature film festival in Romania. Its main host is the town of Cluj Napoca, Transylvania.

Founded in 2002, TIFF has grown rapidly to be the most important film-related event in Romania and one of the most spectacular annual events in the region. Over the years, TIFF's Lifetime Achievement Award has been presented to important figures of European and worldwide cinema, including Julie Delpy, Michael Radford, Annie Girardot, Udo Kier, Vanessa Redgrave, Nicolas Roeg or Franco Nero.

In 2007, the festival was upgraded to a new level, with then-European Capital of Culture Sibiu as a second host. Over 50,000 people have attended the screenings in the four cinemas of Cluj Napoca, eager not to miss over 100 features and almost 60 short films presented in the competitive and show-case sections of the festival. TIFF has become the traditional premiere hub for domestic features which are now landmarks of the evolution of the so-called Romanian New Wave of filmmakers: Occident (directed by Cristian Mungiu) in 2002, The Death of Mr. Lăzărescu (directed by Cristi Puiu) in 2005, 12:08 East of Bucharest (directed by Corneliu Porumboiu), The Way I Spent the End of The World (directed by Cătălin Mitulescu), The Paper Will Be Blue (directed by Radu Muntean), Love Sick (directed by Tudor Giurgiu) in 2006, and the winner of the 2007 Palme D'Or, Cristian Mungiu's 4 months, 3 weeks and 2 days have all had their first Romanian screenings in Cluj Napoca. The Festival is now a well-known brand in the region not only due to the sensational film programs screened every year, but also for the effective layout, sparking atmosphere and density of events, from seminars, workshops and panels to fabulous concerts and crazy all night long parties.

Transilvania IFF's main goal is the promotion of cinematic art by presenting some of the most innovative and spectacular films of the moment that feature both originality and independence of expression, that reflect unusual cinematic language forms or focus on current trends in youth culture.

Romanian Film Promotion was founded in 2001 and wants to promote young filmmakers, organize a feature film festival, help distribution and promotion of the European cinema, organize seminars and conferences about film production and distribution, educate young generation's taste for good film making.