BIEFF 2017 experimental film festival calls to empathy and border defiance

Arrived at its seventh edition, the Bucharest International Experimental Film Festival – BIEFF- comes back to the Peasant Museum Cinema and Elvire Popesco Cinema during March 28-April 2, presenting for the first time in Romania the most innovative cinema experiments of the pas year, with a special focus on the works of the outstanding visual artists who rarely exhibit in cinema theatres.

Designed under the sign of the ancient greeting of Maya civilization IN LAK’ECH ALA K’IN/ YOU ARE ANOTHER ME, the 2017 edition of the festival is inviting the audience to join an empathy exercise, questioning our ability to transpose ourselves in our fellowmen’s shoes. A great part of the films released at BIEFF this year confront us with the personal histories hidden behind sensational and superficial news that have been assailing us lately, news that create a general atmosphere of anxiety and rejection. The film selection this year incites the audience to denying any borders, inviting the viewer to internalize the tragedy of the one close to him and to look the world through his eyes.

The international competition is thus proposing five programmes focused around five relevant topics for the contemporary society, challenging the audience to join the debate, to get involved, with a particular focus on the idea of otherness, on the acute need of empathy, tolerance and inclusion:

YOU ARE ANOTHER ME: On Exile and Shifting Borderscapes

THE POLITICS OF THE BODY: The Performative Self

SEARCHING FOR TRANSCENDENCE: Spirituality in the Digital Age

THE ALCHEMY OF THE FRAME: Deconstructing the Image

CUTTING THE CORD: Family Love and Its Discontents

Other surprises of the BIEFF 7^th edition will be revealed by March-end.

The BIEFF is organized by the Manekino Cultural Associaiton, in partnership with PRINTOR COM and Film Monitor Association. The festival is co-financed by the National Cinema Centre and the National Cultural Fund Administration and is supported by the French Embassy in Bucharest, the French Institute, Goethe Institute, the Austrian Cultural Forum, the Swedish Embassy, the Wallonie-Brussels Delegation, the Italian Cultural Institute, the Greek Cultural Foundation, Le Fresnoy-Studio National des Arts Contemporains, the National University of Theatre and Cinema Art, the National University of Arts, the Peasant Museum National Museum, MUBI.