SEE Fest Individual Movie Tickets Available

Great news! SEE Fest followers and readers can now buy SEE Fest tickets on-line at ItsMySeat and for the first time, it is arranged to sell tickets for each screening individually. However, the ticketing site does not have much room to describe the films, so it’s best to review the lineup on the SEE Fest program page and then go to ItsMySeat to purchase tickets and avoid lines at the Festival. The ticket processing charge is only $1 instead of the regular $2, so take advantage and come to one (or all) of our spectacular screenings. With choices ranging from Romanian romantic comedy and festival opener HELLO! HOW ARE YOU?, Slovakian and Roma CIGARETTES AND SONGS, to Greek documentary STREET SPECTACLES as well as Turkish short film-compilation DO NOT FORGET ME ISTANBUL, among so many others, SEE Fest will have a film for everyone’s liking!

 South East European Film Festival: 2012 Trailer

Zhena Folk Chorus: Singing for the Earth

The music which plays in the trailer for SEE Film Fest is Zeljko Marasovich's  "Mi Idemo Ljeljo" from Slavonske Kraljice, sung by the ZHENA FOLK CHORUS. Grand and moving, it sums up the unique beauty of the SEE Fest films. Zhena is based here in Los Angeles and their concert this past weekend for Earth Day was a feast for the heart, eyes and ears. Lovely voices, exotic harmonies, and beautiful women in a small venue in downtown San Pedro on a Sunday afternoon. A rare treat!

 Eve Pericich, Artistic Director of Zhena, made a point of detailing the richness of each costume worn by the singers. She also gave wonderful background and history about each song. For those of us who did not understand the lyrics, it was still delightful, though, truly, you did not need to understand the lyrics to have this music touch your heart.

Remarkable is the fact that one of the singers is half Mexican and half Japanese. Her voice had rung out like a gorgeous bell, richly evocative of the South East European singers. If that truly is not crossing cultures, then I don't know what is!

Look for Zhena Folk Chorus’s next concert and you will be transported.

There is even a mini-documentary on Zhena...check it out!

-Sabra Chili

South East European Film Festival

Special Free Screening Tonight!

Winner of 2011 Silverdocs BEST DOCUMENTARY, U.S./Swiss/Romanian OUR SCHOOL (Scoala Noastra) with director Mona Nicoara in person. This award-winning documentary takes a wry but wistful look at the experience of three Roma children in rural Romania, caught up in political gamesmanship over whether and how to integrate public schools. Free Admission!

 Billy Wilder Theater

 April 25th, 2012- 7:30 PM

UCLA Film & TV Archive in collaboration with the UCLA Center for European and Eurasian Studies and UCLA International Institute's Human Rights Film Series, SEEFest and the Consulate General of Switzerland in Los Angeles.

SEEFest 2012 Highlight of the Day

HELLO! HOW ARE YOU? (Buna! Ce face?)

Directed by Alexandru Maftei

Buna! Ce face?

Gabriel and Gabriela have been happily married for 20 years but the physical attraction is no longer there. Is this all life has to offer? After independently of one another they discover the same internet chat room and begin a secret romance online, they both fall in love … not knowing they have actually found each other. As things get more passionate and exciting, these two basically decent people struggle with a major guilt trip. Even more confused is their adolescent and sexually very active son Vladimir, when he finds out that his parents also have desires. One day an encounter of the virtual lovers becomes inevitable…Alissa Simon of Variety notes that the film is the “antithesis of the grim naturalism of the best-known new Romanian cinema” and “feels like a breath of fresh air, proving that even more commercial films can deliver emotional epiphanies”.

SEEFest Program Up!

We've started posting the SEEFest Program! First two days are up!

You can purchase tickets at: http://www.itsmyseat.com/SEEFEST.html

*SEE FILM FESTIVAL PROGRAM 2012*

2009 SEE Fest Winner "ELEVATOR" on American Television This Week

George Dorobantu

George Dorobantu's ELEVATOR will have a national audience when it screens on American public television stations this week.

Part of Vanguard International Cinema's film showcase on the MHz Networks channel found with many PBS affiliates, the SEE Fest 2009 Audience Award and Best First Film Award winner will appear on Los Angeles' "KCET Worldview" channel.

George Dorobantu at SEEFEST- May 4, 2009

Airings are on Thursday April 19 at 10 p.m. and again on Friday April 20 at 1 a.m.

Check your TV listings for KCET Worldview or keyword search "Elevator" on your DVR to record and playback "Elevator" again and again!

Check the MhZ Networks website for additional program information on Elevator!

Just Begun: SEE FEST 2012 Retrospective in Austin, Texas

Fuse

The Austin Film Society marked the opening of the 7- week long retrospective of films from the South East European Film Festival (SEEFest) of Los Angeles with last night's screening of dark comedy FUSE.The program is part of ESSENTIAL CINEMA series, the brainchild of Austin Film Society’s legendary director of programming and one of Society’s founding members, Chale Nafus. SEEFest’s artistic director and curator of the retrospective, Vera Mijojlic, will attend the May 15th and May 22nd screenings, at the famed Alamo Drafthouse Theatre on South Lamar.

Vesna

Check out some of the articles on the program for more info on movies, dates, and tickets:

Slackerwood 

Cinema Without Borders 

Essential Cinema