Young Ukrainian Directors Summed Up Their Work on the 69th Cannes Film Festival

Kyiv, Ukraine, June 18, 2016 --(PR.com)-- Among the activities, conducted by Ukrainian delegation, acknowledged as the first in the festival’s history, a business-lunch (“Meet Ukrainian producers”) that gathered together Ukrainian and foreign producers on the 12th of May and the projections of 10 Ukrainian short films under the Short Film Corner section of the Le Marché du Film.

Opening the meeting, Igor Iankovskyi outlined his hopes that such a landing party of the young Ukrainian directors in Cannes has really helped those cinema beginners to broaden their creative horizons. “Our main goal is to help them to establish useful contacts in the international cinema market and facilitate their professional and creative development. And the participation in the international film festivals with the young generation of directors is one of the best ways to strengthen the Ukrainian position on the international level!” noted Igor Iankovskyi.

The Head of the Ukrainian State Film Agency, Philip Illienko, in his turn, described the significance of those activities to the Ukrainian cinema industry: “At some point of its development, Ukrainian cinema has been left out from the global cinema process. And those are not the quantity of the prizes awarded that matters the most, but the participation on the festivals itself, the constant and consistent dialogue with foreign colleagues on prospective projects and co-production of movies. Due to the support provided by the NGO 'The Initiative for the Future' and Igor Iankovskyi personally, this year we seized the opportunity to make a statement on Ukrainian cinema on the biggest cinema gathering, where the first in the history of our cinema business-lunch «Meet Ukrainian producers» took place. It really helped us to establish a fruitful dialogue with foreign producers.”

Director Nariman Aliiev presented in Cannes his movie “Without You” ("Sensiz") that already took part in the Berlin’s Film Festival program Generation+, supported as well by Igor Iankovskyi. He also envisaged his new project to the foreign producers. “The participation in the world-biggest film festival was of the great importance not only for me personally, but for the whole Ukrainian cinema. Not only the opportunity to present our projects to the international community, but also the participation in a great number of creative, interesting and professionally important activities and master-classes, meet our colleagues and cinema professionals from other countries,” said Nariman Aliiev, and added, that after Cannes he has already entered into negotiations with a French producer on the realization of his future projects in co-production.

Nikon Romanchenko, who took part in the Cannes Film Festival for the second time, this year has been presenting his movie “Carousel” along with the new project, gave his advice to the future festival’s participants: “It is really easy to lose your head from those amount of people and events flooding the festival every day. It is useful to prepare yourself in advance, choose and prioritize the events.” Talking about the outcomes of the festival, he noted all that preparatory work conducted by the NGOs “Contemporary Ukrainian Cinema” and “Initiative for the Future,” with the help of the specialists of the Oleksandr Dovzhenko National Center.

“The most important thing is that the Cannes Film Festival has inspired shooting new movies in order to return there for the participation in the contest program,” noted Rita Kuzmina, one more meeting participant. Director Pavlo Ostrikov has revealed that before the trip to Cannes he could never finish one of his scenarios, and after the return he already wrote two new ones. Maryana Lytvynova, Anna Borysova and Solomiya Tomashchuk pointed their impressions from workshops and master-classes, Philip Sotnychenko outlined his experience of interaction with movie critics and selectors, due to which he has drawn the promotion plan for his movies.

Summing up this year’s activities on the 69th Cannes Film Festival, the young directors have agreed on the crucial importance of the participation in such big festivals for the competitive, powerful and modern Ukrainian cinema industry, getting acquainted with modern trends. Furthermore, international cinema forums are made for the professionals to establish new contacts with their foreign colleagues, selectors and producers, which will blossom into the joint projects, large-scale movies that will help to introduce Ukrainian culture to the broader audience.

The projections of the short films by the young Ukrainian directors under the Short Film Corner section of the Le Marché du Film took place on the 18th and 19th of May. This project, entitled “In short, Cannes,” is aimed to introduce the young generation of Ukrainian directors to the global professional environment and teach them to fully grasp the opportunities, and provided by the international festivals, for their professional development. In terms of the project, the organizing committee has selected 10 (ten) young Ukrainian directors, who had already proven themselves during national and international film festivals. Due to the financial and organizational support of the NGO “Initiative for the Future,” they received an opportunity to visit France and take part in the 69th Cannes Film Festival, to present their movies personally.