Monday, October 20, 2008

Despite being saddled with a rather goofy name, the Eh! U European Film Festival is worthy of being included in your film cal­endar for a number of reasons:

• Participation from 24 European coun­tries might make this the most com­pre­hensive local survey of European film apart from TIFF
• Stretches over two full weeks in late November, when my film fest­ival schedule is oth­er­wise clear.
• Though it’s been around since 2004, it seems to be finally coming into its own, screening a com­bin­a­tion of fest­ival hits, prize win­ners and undis­covered gems.
• Best of all, all screen­ings are com­pletely FREE, thanks to the spon­sor­ship of the various con­su­lates, embassies and cul­tural institutes.

I’m par­tic­u­larly excited about the lineup this year, which has a number of high-profile films I’d missed at pre­vious fest­ivals. To wit:

• France: Entre les murs (The Class) — This Palme d’Or winner never actu­ally made it to TIFF this year, so I’m delighted it’s coming to Toronto in a free screening.
• Ireland: A Film With Me In It — The pres­ence of Dylan Moran (Black Books) is reason enough to see this black comedy.
• Poland: Katyn — From Polish master Andrzej Wajda (Ashes and Diamonds), the story of the mas­sacre of Polish intel­lec­tuals and army officers by the Red Army in 1940. Wajda, now 82, has said he’s waited many years to make this film, and only now has the polit­ical cli­mate and rela­tion­ship between Poland and Russia made it pos­sible. This is sure to be be an emo­tional screening if mem­bers of Toronto’s large Polish com­munity attend.
• Portugal: Colossal Youth (Juventude em Marcha) — Pedro Costa’s 2006 film was written about in all the film magazines but has so far been an elu­sive screening around here.
• Germany: And Along Come Tourists (Am Ende kommen Touristen) — I remember this playing TIFF in 2007. Intriguing sub­ject matter: A young German is assigned to Auschwitz to per­form his civil ser­vice and must care for an eld­erly Polish Holocaust sur­vivor who never left the camp.
• Denmark: The Art of Crying (Kunsten at græde i kor) — Another 2007 TIFF selec­tion, this film is the story of a very dys­func­tional family, seen through the eyes of 11-year-old Allan.

And those are only the films I’m already familiar with. Boasting such a strong lineup this year, and at an unbeat­able price, Eh! U looks like a can’t miss event.

Tagged as: #euff08, denmark, europeanfilmfestival, france, germany, ireland, poland, portugal

{ Comments on this entry are closed }