In its new home the Film Society of Lincoln Center Romanian festival will feature retrospectives of Liviu Ciulei and Radu Muntean

After five years at Tribeca Cinemas, the Annual Romanian Film Festival in New York will move to the Film Society of Lincoln Center, taking place from November 30 to December 6.

In addition to world and US premieres, the festival will also present two in-depth retrospectives celebrating the career of Liviu Ciulei (Forest Of The Hanged) and New Wave director, Radu Muntean (Tuesday, After Christmas).

Romanian Film Festival artistic director, Mihai Chirilov says, “This year’s selection of new features shows there is room for innovation and exploration beyond the already celebrated aesthetics of the recent wave of Romanian films. Joining these films are treasures from the past that deserve to be rediscovered, completing the whole picture of contemporary Romanian cinema.”

The Romanian Cultural Institute in New York and FSLC announced that the 2011 edition of the film festival will be dedicated to the memory of Romanian film critic Alex Leo Şerban.

“There’s no greater reward or recognition,” says Corina Şuteu, director of the Romanian Cultural Institute in New York, as well as the initiator and chair of the festival, “than being invited by the Film Society of Lincoln Center to partner in presenting the festival starting this year. I am confident that our consistent work around the inspiring Romanian New Wave achieved such institutional legitimacy. I also am hopeful this is only a new beginning.”

Among the highlights of the festival this year, the very first US retrospective of Ciulei’s directing career including Eruption (1957), Danube Waves (1959), while the focus on director Radu Muntean, one of the most active directors of the Romanian New Wave, will include the world premiere of his new HBO documentary Visiting Room, and an extended conversation with Film Society Associate Program Director Scott Foundas.

Opening night film will be Morgen, Marian Crişan’s Romania’s official Oscar submission while the closing night film is 2006’s The Paper Will  Be Blue (Hârtia va fi albastrã) directed by Radu Muntean and hailed as one of the most important works of the Romanian New Wave, Other films screening include US premiere’s of Adalbert’s Dream (Visul lui Adalbert) (2011) directed by Gabriel Achim; Digging For Life (Doina Groparilor) directed by Pavel Cuzuioc; Principles Of Life (Principii de viaţă) directed by Constantin Popescu, and Red Gloves (Mănuşi roşii) directed by Radu Gabrea

Topics