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      Eastern Neighbours Film Festival (ENFF) began in The Netherlands in 2008 with the idea to offer Dutch and international audiences a unique glimpse into the cinema of their neighbors from Eastern and Southern Europe. This annual event presents the most recent, exciting, and thought‐provoking films, from countries with small, but often powerful film industries, that… Read more: New Talents Open Call
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Libertate

dir. TUDOR GIURGIU

DUTCH PREMIERE

Awarded for the Most Popular Romanian Film of the Transilvania IFF 2023, Tudor Giurgiu’s new film reflects on the glories of revolution that have been sung throughout history, which often rarely match the reality. 

Libertate explores the chaos and confusion left in the wake of the 1989 Romanian revolution, following the horrific events in Sibiu and the hundreds of lives destroyed not by bullets, but by lies. Police officer Viorel finds his life turned upside down after he is falsely accused of being a terrorist following the sudden and bloody revolution. Thrust into a role he had no intention of playing, he must now try and escape a system determined to make him one of many scapegoats needed to mask both its heinous cruelty and gruesome incompetence. He must face brutal charges as the world crumbles around him. When the dust of revolution settles, everyone wants answers – but who can be trusted to give them?

SHOWTIMES

Friday, 24 November – 16:35


Sunday, 26 November – 12:15

Buy Tickets Here!

LIBERTATE | 2022 | 109 min | Romania, Hungary

PRODUCTIONOana Bujgoi Giurgiu, Tudor Giurgiu – Libra Films, Mythberg Films
CASTAlex Calangiu, Catalin Herlo, Ionut Caras, Iulian Postelnicu
SCREENPLAYTudor Giurgiu, Cecilia Stefanescu
CINEMATOGRAPHYAlexandru Sterian
EDITINGReka Lemhenyi
LANGUAGERomanian
SUBTITLESEnglish

FESTIVALS & AWARDS (SELECTION) 

Sarajevo Film Festival, 2023 – C.I.C.A.E. Award for Best Film | CineFest Miskolc International Film Festival, 2023 – International Ecumenical Award for Best Film | Transilvania International Film Festival, 2023 – Award for the Most Popular Romanian Film of the Festival

DIRECTOR’S STATEMENT

The so-called “1989 Revolution” is, most likely, the biggest incompletely consumed event that our society has been through in recent history. This is one of the reasons for wanting to accurately depict the chaos and total confusion of ordinary people during those days. The truth was willingly disguised, whitewashing was cultivated to become state of the art. My generation (I was 18, in 1989) grew up with this “psychosis” of the terrorists; supposedly they were Arabs, then Russian spies, then Securitate officers and so on…

We know now, 30 years later, that these “terrorists” were fictitious, nothing but a concept fabricated inside the disinformation labs that worked flawlessly in the informational chaos of those times. The army shot at innocent civilians and served as principal force of repression against the demonstrators. “Terrorists” had to be invented, they were needed to explain the lack of coordination of the army and the decisions taken against the interest of the people.

DIRECTOR’S BIO 

Tudor Giurgiu is a Romanian filmmaker. His directorial debut feature Love Sick was selected in Panorama section of the 2006 Berlinale and awarded in several international festivals. His short Superman, Spiderman or Batman (2011) won Best European Short at the 2012 edition of the European Film Academy Awards. Tudor’s second feature, Of Snails and Men, was awarded at Warsaw IFF and Valladolid IFF. Why Me?, an unsettling legal thriller based on a real case of corruption in present-day Romania, premiered in 2015 Berlinale Panorama. Libertate is Tudor’s fifth feature film.