NexT 2016: Competition’s national and international shorts

     The NexT International Film Festival (7-11 April) announced the films selected for its 10th Edition national and international competition section.

     Thus, 27 short films are part of the international section, two of them being Romanian – Te mai uiți și la om (Second Look) (directed by Ana-Maria Comănescu) and Dispozitiv 0068 (0068 Sniper's Nest) (directed by Radu Bărbulescu). They were selected out of over 2000 short films enlisted for the competition this year, the selectors being Irina Trocan, Massimiliano Nardulli and Oana Ghera.
     About this year's shorts, Irina Trocan stated: „The one thing all NexT competitions over the years had in common was the desire to find, out of the many films received, the ones that the viewers (and us, too) are bound to remember – films that may display beginner's awkwardness and are most of the time demanding, but they have always had something to offer. The approximately twenty-five competitors present each year in the NexT competition are directors to be followed, and those who were here in the past have already begun to be known in wider and wider circles.”
     The shorts Second Look and 0068 Sniper's Nest were also included in the national competition, together with 8 other shorts: Lampioane chinezești (Chinese Lantern) (directed by Bogdan Theodor Olteanu), Rețea indisponibilă (Network Unavailable) (directed by Adina Dulcu), Apartament interbelic, în zonă superbă, ultracentrală (Old Luxurious Flat Located in an Ultra-Central, Desirable Neighborhood) (directed by Sebastian Mihăilescu), Paper Bag (directed by Roxana Bențu), Plan B (directed by Simona Sava), Prăjitorul de pâine (Toaster) (directed by Cristian Pop), Vera (directed by Dorian Boguță) and Vacanță la țară (Summer Break) (directed by Andrei Tănase).
     The jury panel to decide on the award-winners in the International Competition Section will be made up by: the American Kevin B. Lee (freelancer at The New York Times, Sight & Sound, Slate and Indiewire, author of over 250 video essays), the French Selim Azzazi (sound editor and sound designer, who worked with Jean-Pierre Jeunet, Radu Mihăileanu, Jean-Jacques Annaud, Oliver Stone, Michel Hazanavicius and Luc Besson), the Finn Jukka-Pekka Laakso (artistic manager of Tampere International Film Festival) and the Romanian Tudor Jurgiu, director of Câinele japonez (The Japanese Dog).
The Romanian shorts are to be decided upon by a jury made up of three NexT award-winners: Andrea Jublin (winner of NexT Trophy in 2007, with Il Supplente), Elad Keidan (winner of NexT Trophy in 2009, with Hymnon) and Nicolae Constantin Tănase (winner of Villa Kult Award in 2010, with Outrageously Disco).