AstraFilmLab is a project development program for creative documentaries, a new lab for filmmakers to develop and strengthen their projects. AstraFilmLab is a three-day project-based intensive workshop, taking place concurrently with Astra Film Festival in Sibiu, Romania, consisting of mentoring, roundtable discussions, one-to-one meetings and a public pitch in front of an audience of industry representatives. AstraFilmLab emphasises projects and teams from the region, aiming to facilitate exchanges within Europe and beyond. The goal of this programme is to offer an auspicious platform to filmmakers currently developing internationally relevant stories that originate in this part of Europe to present their work and develop professional networks.

For more information check here.

Following the submission of projects for AstraFilmLab, we were pleased to note the quality of projects, the wide spectrum of subjects, themes, approaches and the vitality of the documentary film industry in the region.  The Astra Film Festival team aims to offer the participating projects a productive platform for the progress of the selected projects through interactions with the experts from the documentary film industry present (producers, distributors, commissioning editors, etc.).

The selected projects are:

As Far As I Can Recall/ Din câte îmi amintesc (dir. Ileana Gabriela Szasz, Romania)

Don’t Be Afraid (dir. Linda Paganelli, Germany/ Romania/ Italy)

Fragments of Ice (dir. Maria Stoianova, Ukraine)

Heavy Roots / Legături (dir. Jacopo Marzi, Italy/ Romania)

No Place for You in Our Town (dir. Nikolay Stefanov, Bulgaria)

Our Men (dir. Mirona Radu, Romania)

Telciu (dir. Vlad Petri, Romania)

The Gate Between Us (dir. Ioana Trifu, Moldova, Romania)

Touch of Love (dir. Pavel Ruzyak, Czech Republic)

Where the dog buried? (dir. Tatyana Dorodnisina, Andrii Lytvynenko, Ukraine)

About DocumentaryTank@AFF

DocumentaryTank@AFF, Astra Film Festival’s industry program, mirrors the ambitious mission of the festival to explore and understand the human condition through portrayals of culturally diverse contemporary societies and presents a favourable environment for a range of networking and project development opportunities. The aim of the program is to encourage the development and growth of Romanian and European documentary industries and of its current and future filmmakers. Since 2016 Astra Film Festival has taken a proactive role not only in presenting to audiences diverse and exciting experiences of immersive – real and virtual – reality, but also in the development of projects, and the productive encounters between filmmakers, both established and emerging, film students, producers, distributors and buyers, festival representatives, or other industry experts from Europe and beyond.

For every edition, DocumentaryTank@AFF selects and promotes projects in all stages of development, providing a platform for filmmakers to interact with industry experts and potentially find partners for their work. Besides the focus on projects in development, the program also includes a variety of talks, presentations and roundtables on current conditions of production and distribution of documentary formats.