Set to return to cinemas from 2-7 November, as well as online – and open with Juho Kuosmanen’s Compartment No. 6 [+lee también:
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entrevista: Juho Kuosmanen
ficha de la película] (Finland/Germany/Estonia/Russia), already shaping up to be one of the breakout titles of the year – FilmFestival Cottbus will have 12 titles competing in its Feature Film Competition for the Main Prize of €25,000 from the Gesellschaft zur Wahrnehmung von Film-und Fernsehrechten (GWFF), the Special Prize for Best Director (€7,500, courtesy of Rundfunk Berlin-Brandenburg) and the Prize for an Outstanding Acting Performance (€5,000, courtesy of Sparkasse Spree-Neiße).

As promised by the organisers, the competition presents all of the cultural diversity of Eastern Europe. “With its artistic range between ironically fractured observation of the present, investigative reappraisal of history and contemplative family study, it shows the genre diversity of current Eastern European cinema – personal and political, hopeful and melancholic,” it was stated.

Female-centred stories will also be in the spotlight, thanks to films by Sonja Tarokić (The Staffroom [+lee también:
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entrevista: Sonja Tarokić
ficha de la película] – Croatia/France) and Zrinko Ogresta’s A Blue Flower [+lee también:
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entrevista: Zrinko Ogresta
ficha de la película] (Croatia), while in 107 Mothers [+lee también:
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entrevista: Peter Kerekes
ficha de la película] (Slovakia/Czech Republic/Ukraine), Peter Kerekes will follow a new mum into a women’s prison in Odessa. Some of the festival’s regulars, from Poland’s Jan P Matuszyński (Leave No Traces [+lee también:
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entrevista: Jan P. Matuszyński
ficha de la película]) to Ilgar Najaf (Sughra and her Sons - Azerbaijan/France/Germany), will also get some attention, joined by Alexander Hant’s In Limbo, a Russian road movie about two rebellious teenagers, Norika Sefa’s Looking for Venera [+lee también:
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entrevista: Norika Sefa
ficha de la película] (Kosovo/North Macedonia), the Tribeca winner Brighton 4^th [+lee también:
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entrevista: Levan Koguashvili
ficha de la película] by Levan Koguashvili (Georgia/Russia/Bulgaria/Monaco/USA), Saving One Who Was Dead [+lee también:
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entrevista: Václav Kadrnka
ficha de la película] by Václav Kadrnka (Czech Republic/Slovakia) and Cecília Felméri’s Spiral [+lee también:
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ficha de la película] (Hungary/Romania). Matevž Luzar’s Orchestra [+lee también:
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ficha de la película] (Slovenia), showing a culture clash and generational conflict during a visit by a Slovenian brass band to Austria, will celebrate its world premiere during the event.

In the Short Film Competition, 11 films are competing for the main prize, with seven movies selected for the U18 Youth Film Competition and thus in the running for the title of Best Youth Film, endowed with €5,000 by the City of Cottbus. “The films describe very different aspects of the 'coming-of-age process': from fragile friendships, via bullying problems, to the struggle with the algorithms that increasingly penetrate our everyday life, thus giving an overview of the different and yet so similar lives and worlds of young people in different countries in Eastern Europe,” the festival team shared in the statement.

Dennis Stormer’s Youth Topia [+lee también:
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entrevista: Dennis Stormer, Marisa Meier
ficha de la película] (Switzerland/Germany), the Audience Award winner at Zurich, will show a world in which an algorithm calculates who you are and what you are allowed to do, while Dawid Nickel’s Love Tasting [+lee también:
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ficha de la película] (Poland) will explore a closeted gay existence in an “LGBT-free zone” in Poland. Two best friends will drift apart in Dina Duma’s Sisterhood [+lee también:
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entrevista: Dina Duma, Antonia Belazel…
ficha de la película] (North Macedonia/Kosovo/Montenegro), and in Mariya Tumova’s Leave the Group (Russia), an internet mob incites a teenager to commit murder. Çağil Bocut’s Geranium (Turkey/Germany), Christian Schäfer’s In Trube Wolken (Germany) and Jan Foukal’s Two Ships [+lee también:
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entrevista: Jan Foukal
ficha de la película] (Czech Republic/Norway), about “a romance under pressure”, will round off the selection.

This year’s edition will also highlight Slovakian cinema, the Turkish film landscape and the transformation processes after the collapse of the Soviet Union with separate sections, entitled Spotlight Slovensko, Close Up Turkey and Much New in the East.