The Transilvania International Film Festival has announced its competition line-up and jury for its eighth edition.

An international jury of Catalan actress Assumpta Serna, American filmmaker Jim Stark, Hungarian director Szabolcs Hajdu, Screen International critic Dan Fainaru and head of the New York Romanian Cultural Institute Corina Suteu will pick the winners of the Transilvania Trophy and also the best directing and best cinematography awards.

The 12 films in the festival’s international competition are:

  • Awakening From A Dream, dir. Freedy Mas Franqueza (Spain-Poland)
  • Bahrtalo! Good Luck!, dir. Robert Lakatos (Hungary)
  • A Complete History Of My Sexual Failures, dir. Chris Waitt (UK)
  • The Dead Girl’s Feast, dir. Matheus Nachtergaele (Brazil)
  • Everyone Else, dir. Maren Ade (Germany)
  • Hollywood, I’m Sleeping Over Tonight, dir. Antoine de Maximy (France)
  • Kabuli Kid, dir. Barmak Akram (France-Afghanistan)
  • La Nana, dir. Sebastian Silva (Chile-Mexico)
  • Machan, dir. Uberto Pasolini (Sri Lanka-Italy-Germany)
  • My Marlon And Brando, dir. Huseyin Karabey (Turkey)
  • North, dir. Rune Denstad Langlo (Norway)
  • Police, Adjective, dir. Corneliu Porumboiu (Romania)

Porumboiu’s Police, Adjective, which screened in Un Certain Regard in Cannes, will also screen in the Romanian Days selection. As previously reported, Cristian Mungiu’s Tales From The Golden Age, which also screened in Un Certain Regard, will open the festival May 29. The seven features in the Romanian Days competition are:

  • Constantin And Elena, dir. Andrei Dascalescu
  • The Happiest Girl In The World, dir. Radu Jude
  • Hooked, dir. Adrian Sitaru
  • Katalin Varga, dir. Peter Strickland
  • The Other Irina, dir. Andrei Gruzsniczki
  • Police, Adjective, dir. Corneliu Porumboiu
  • Tales From The Golden Age, dir. Ioana Uricaru, Hanno Hofer, Razvan Marculescu, Contantin Popescu, Cristian Mungiu

The festival offers audiences in Romania — where there are fewer than 100 screens — a rare opportunity to see such recent international successes as Oscar-winning documentary Man On Wire and 2008 Camera d’Or winner Hunger. The program also includes recent films from Finland, Italy, Moldova, Poland and retrospectives of Jim Jarmusch and Mika Kaurismaki.

Guests at this year’s festival include Israeli film-maker Menahem Golan. Italian actress Claudia Cardinale and Romanian actor Florin Piersic will receive Lifetime Achievement awards.

The annual event, which takes place in the northern city of Cluj Napoca, has become an important stop on the international festival circuit and has tracked the rise of the Romanian film since its first edition in 2002, when Mungiu’s feature debut Occident won the Transilvania Trophy.

Last year’s festival saw more than 50,000 admissions.

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