SO, WHAT’S FREEDOM (DUTCH PREMIÉRE)
SI ATUNCI, CE E LIBERTATEA?
Romania, USA | 2020 | 133 min
Director: Andrei Zinca
This year Eastern Neighbours Film Festival will kick off the season with the Romanian film So What’s Freedom? directed by Andrei Zinca (2020).
Screening: Kino Rotterdam
Sunday, 26th September, 17:15
Tickets: HERE
Watch the trailer: HERE
A compelling historical drama depicting a story of love and survival against the background of the gruesome Romanian ’50s. When one gives up fear, one finds freedom, even when in confinement.
Inspired by historical facts and based on the short novel “Projects of the Past” by Ana Blandiana, the film takes place in 1951 when the Communist authoritarian system ordered the deportation of 40,000 people (landowners, intellectuals and different ethnic minorities) to the Baragan Fields, otherwise known as the Romanian Siberia.
During a wedding in Herculane, a history teacher is violently arrested by the communists. Alongside his wife and seven other people, they are forced to take a freight train, destination unknown, together with thousands of other scared people. The film follows the group into their solitary confinement in the middle of a wasteland for several years.
Featuring a remarkable on-screen group performance by some of the most extraordinary actors in current Romanian cinema.
CAST: Radu Iacoban, Iulia Lumanare, Cuzin Toma, Olimpia Melinte, Tunde Skovran
SCREENPLAY: Andrei Zinca, based on the novel by Ana Blandiana
CINEMATOGRAPHY: Tudorel Vladimir Panduru
FESTIVALS & AWARDS (SELECTION)
South East European Film Festival Los Angeles, 2021 – Honorable Mention, Audience Award | Sedona International Film Festival 2021 – Audience Award | Santa Monica International Film Festival, 2020 – Jury’s Honorable Mention | Transilvania International Film Festival, Cluj-Napoca, 2020 – Audience Choice Award for Best Romanian Film
DIRECTOR’S STATEMENT
“So, What’s Freedom?” was not intended to be just a Romanian story. Freedom, the lack of it, and its manipulation by all political systems has been and still is an everyday and everywhere story”.
DIRECTOR’S BIO
Romanian-born, US-based Andrei Zinca studied Film and TV Photography in Romania and moved to the U.S. in 1988, where he studied directing at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles. He established himself as a leading Director for the Hispanic U.S. and Latin American markets and starting with 2006 he started activating in the Romanian film industry.