All Romanians are vampires

“If you don’t win a prize, no one looks at you”, said Florin Serban in an interview shortly after his return from the 2010 Berlin film festival, where he won the Silver Bear, the Grand Jury Prize and the Alfred Bauer Prize for cinematographic innovation.

Wrong.

Even if you win a prize, but it is not the big one, no one looks at you. The entire media has all its cannons on Florin Serban, obviously for good reasons. Unfortunately, media seems to have no cannons left for Adrian Sitaru, another Romanian director who won a prize at the Berlinale – the DAAD (German Cultural Exchange Institute) prize for short film. Heck, even I forgot to mention him in the previous article about Florin Serban!

Apologies.

The movie is called “Colivia”, “The Birdcage”, and the jury said the following:

“A perfectly paced miniature, a chamber piece inside a Romanian tower block. Funny, heartfelt, with a wonderful rhythm. The director needs only 17 minutes to portray the three characters involved.”

Here’s a scene:

Unlike Florin Serban, Adrian Sitaru is not at his debut. He has made some well-received movies so far (imdb says 8 wins and 3 nominations. Make that 9 wins).

An interview with Mr. Sitaru from last year about his 2008 film “Hooked”, here.

And the promoreel to “Hooked”, below.

CONGRATULATIONS!