How It All Begun

In 2008, when the International Film Festival Rotterdam (IFFR) initiated the Young Turkish Cinema programme, we were thinking of how to make such a specific programme like this more efficient so that a greater number of people than just the Rotterdam audiences could enjoy it. Luck was on our side, because when I mentioned the programme to Christine Dollhofer, the director of Crossing Europe Film Festival in Linz, she embraced it with enthusiasm. What’s more, her festival could even contribute financially to the booklet accompanying the programme.

The collaboration with Crossing Europe was very successful, which made us think. Why not send a special programme that has been organized by one festival to even more festivals? For any festival, organizing a special thematic programme takes a lot of research, financing and energy. If it’s only shown in one country, that’s really a pity. Another reason to try to show it to as many people as possible is that film festivals are taking their educational role very seriously. There are lots of young, enthusiastic film lovers in other parts of the world who would also like to enjoy special thematic programmes but cannot afford to travel.

When we were having discussions with our international colleagues, we realized that in these financially difficult times, this is an ideal way of collaborating. After all, this is what we all want, to be able to show good new films and old classics to our audiences. We can do it together, as we all need to economize with our finances. Three years have passed before another coinitiative could happen. This time we are joining up with three other festivals. The response to the Red Westerns programme was wonderful: in tandem with the IFFR it will be presented at Göteborg International Film Festival, in the spring it will be shown in Linz, and then in Wroclaw (Era New Horizons) and the Bratislava International Film Festival.

Thanks to the great support of Marit Kapla and Christine Dollhofer, Joanna Lapinska, Roman Gutek, Matthieu Darras and Vojtech Kabath it was possible to put it all together and print this publication. I not only would like to sincerely express my personal gratitude, but also that of the whole IFFR team. We really appreciate this broader international cooperation and we are happy that Red Westerns will reach also audiences in Sweden, Austria, Poland and Slovakia. Who knows, maybe many even more countries will join us next time!

Ludmila Cvikova