2nd Odessa International Film Festival


The second Odessa International Film Festival took place in Odessa from 15 to 23 July 2011.
71 films were screened at the festival, and the total number of audience members was tallied at over 70 thousand. Over 5 thousand guests were accredited at the festival along with over 450 journalists and other members of the press from Ukraine, Russia, Germany, the United States, Romania, Italy and other countries. A total of 175 hotel rooms were reserved for the guests of the festival in 5 central Odessa hotels. The opening ceremonies, which were broadcast live by the Ukrainian TV channel “Inter”, were watched by over 2 million viewers. In addition, nearly 7 thousand followed the online broadcasts of the festival through the official Festival site.
14 new films from France, the UK, Belgium, Sweden, Germany, Hong Kong, Ukraine, Poland, Finland, Italy, Bulgaria, Russia, Israel, and Uruguay were part of the competition.
The international film Jury was headed by the well-known Polish actor and rector of the Kraków Film Academy Jerzy Stuhr, who has a bond with Odessa with his role in Juliusz Machulski’s film “Dejа Vu” filmed in 1988.
A list of guests of the festival included Hollywood star John Malkovich, directors Nikita Mihalkov, Otar Iosseliani, Vadim Perelman, Sergei Solovyov, Nana Jorjadze, Yuri Kara, Alexander Mitta, Valery Todorovsky, Fyodor Bondarchuk, actors Bogdan Stupka, Maria de Medeiros, Ada Rogovtseva, Gosha Kutsenko, Dmitriy Dyuzhev, and others. At the Opening ceremony in the Odessa Opera Theater, an honored guest of the festival – John Malkovich, awarded a special prize, the “Crystal Crystal” to his Russian colleague Nikita Mihalkov. This prize was awarded for input into the cinematographic development of Odessa. Weeks earlier, Mihakov presented a Lifetime Achievement Award to Malkovich at the Moscow Film Festival.
The opening film of the Festival was Michel Hazanavicius’s “The Artist” which received the award for the best male role at Cannes Film Festival-2011. The closing ceremony served as the venue for the world premiere of Alexander Gordon’s Russian film “Brothel Lights.” This film was filmed in Odessa.
The festival employed three main screening venues. “Rodina” movie theater served as the festival center and two more theaters were added for afternoon and evening screenings – “Cinema City” and “U-cinema.” The “Cinema-City” venue also became the place for the “film-market.” At the other end of the downtown area, “U-cinema” theatre at the Odessa Film Studio once again served as the central location for the “Summer Film School.” Master classes this year were taught by many guests of the festival including John Malkovich, Otar Iosseliani, Vadim Perelman, Sergei Solovyov, Nana Jorjadze, Alexander Mitta, Valeriy Todorovskiy, Jerzy Stuhr, Maria de Medeiros, American screen-writing and directing consultant Mark Travis, and others. In the second year of the festival, a project called “Screen-writers Workshop” was added to the Summer Film School. This project included intensive and highly personalized seminars for a select group of screenwriters whose works were selected in a screen-play contest. The second Odessa Film Festival also included two new professionally geared events – The Film-market and the pitching of film projects.
The Grand Prix of the festival went to the French Film -"Tomboy" written and directed by Celine Sciamma. At the closing ceremony, The Golden Duke statue was accepted on behalf of the filmmaker by Sophie Cattani who played one of the lead roles in the film.
On the very last day of the festival it received the great honor of being recognized by a well-known, international journalistic association – the Hollywood Foreign Press Association who are responsible for awarding the Golden Globes. Hollywood Foreign Press member Gabriel Lerman presented the festival with a sign of this recognition.

Jury

Main Jury of the Odessa Film Festival:
International Federation of Film societes Jury:
Ukrainian Laboratory Jury:
Jury of Ukrainian critics:
Jury of projects pitching:
Competition program Odessa IFF 2011
The non-competitive program included a line-up of favorites from the year's world festival circuit – the Festival of festivals, a retrospective of Monty Python, two retrospectives – “Made in Odessa” and “Ukrainian Comedies” as well as two national programs – “The French Panorama” and “New Russian cinema.”
Special screenings included the CIS premiere of Sebastian Dehnhardt’s documentary film Klitschko, Lars von Trier's Melancholia, Wim Wenders's Pina, and Tom Hanks's Larry Crown. Ukrainian premieres included Le Havre, Three,"Life in a Day, Habemus Papam, A Distant Neighborhood

Special events

For the first time, the festival program was enriched with a new event called “KINO_LIVE,” - a series of film-concerts held in an outdoor venue. In this new screening space – the steps of the Langeronovskiy Descent, masterworks of film were presented with live musical accompaniment. Such works included the films of Georges Melies, which were presented to the audiences by the filmmaker’s great granddaughter and great great grandson. Esteban Sapir's Avant-garde Argentinean film Antenna was screened accompanied by the Ukrainian rock group “Еsthetic Education”.
As it was with the first Odessa Film Festival, one of the most awe-inspiring events of the week was the outdoor screening on the Potemkin Stairs. On the 16th of July, this famous staircase became a theater for over two thousand viewers who gathered together to watch Fritz Lang’s 1927 classic Metropolis with the accompaniment of a full symphonic orchestra.

Winners

Winners of the 2nd Odessa International Film Festival-2010
On 23 July 2011, at the closing ceremony in the Opera House, the jury announced the winners of the 2nd Odessa International Film Festival:
Parallel Jury Prizes: