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Christopher Vourlias Paul Negoescu’s fourth feature, “Men of Deeds,” which world premieres in competition Sunday at the Sarajevo Film Festival, is at first glance a departure from the Romanian director’s previous work. Set in the rural region of Bucovina, it’s a world removed from the swanky bars and bistros of his last film, the Bucharest-set “The Story of a Summer Lover.”The film follows llie (Iulian Postelnicu), a small-town police chief who hopes to settle into a modest, comfortable life. A man of low expectations and dubious morals, he sets his sights on a small plot of land that’s up for sale — an orchard in the countryside where he imagines he can make a fresh start.Nothing, however, goes according to plan.

Marta Balaga Paris-based Tomsa Films will co-produce Andrei Epure’s first feature “Don’t Let Me Die.” The company, created in 2018, is also behind Laura Samani’s acclaimed Cannes Critics’ Week premiere “Small Body” and documentary “Zaho Zay.”“Don’t Let Me Die” follows the consequences of a woman’s death in front of her apartment building. Her neighbor, Maria, is interrogated by the police and eventually takes charge of the funeral.

Slipknot have had a roaring start to their European tour, kicking off the 11-date run in Romania this week.Performing on Wednesday July 20 as part of Romexpo in Bucharest – where frontman Corey Taylor donned his new mask – the Iowa outfit’s 16-track setlist (per Blabbermouth) included some of their most revered classics: ‘Spit It Out’, ‘Psychosocial’, ‘Duality’, ‘Wait and Bleed’ and ‘The Devil In I’ among them. A two-song encore comprised of 2002’s ‘People = Shit’ and ‘Surfacing’.Check out the fan-shot video of Slipknot’s performance of last year’s single ‘The Chapeltown Rag’, ‘Sulfur’ and ‘Custer’ below:The remainder of tour will see the nu-metal legends hit up Greece, Germany, Poland and Estonia among others – more details here.

Slipknot have announced their seventh studio album, ‘The End, So Far’ with the release of a fresh new single, ‘The Dying Song (Time To Sing)’.Released on Wednesday (July 20), ‘The Dying Song (Time To Sing)’ serves as the second preview of the album following ‘The Chapeltown Rag’ late last year. ‘The Dying Song (Time To Sing)’ also comes with a music video directed by the band’s own Shawn ‘Clown’ Crahan.Watch the music video for ‘The Dying Song (Time To Sing)’ below.Slipknot’s seventh studio album, ‘The End, So Far’, will be released on September 30 via Roadrunner Records.

Christopher Vourlias After pulling off the near miraculous feat of mounting two in-person editions in the middle of a global pandemic, the organizing team of the Transilvania Film Festival had hoped for a return to normalcy this year – hopes that were quickly dashed when Russian troops invaded neighboring Ukraine on Feb. 24.The tone and tenor of this year’s event swiftly shifted gears, says TIFF founder Tudor Giurgiu, as festival leadership looked to strike a precarious balance.

Christopher Vourlias A torrid encounter between a troubled youth and the wife of the village priest is at the center of Octav Chelaru’s “A Higher Law,” which bowed at the Thessaloniki Film Festival last fall and will have its domestic premiere in the main competition at the Transilvania Film Festival.Inspired by true events, the film is a powerful exploration of religious dogma that raises larger questions about the nature of freedom and faith. The feature debut of Chelaru, a self-taught director whose previous short films, “Black Clothes” and “The Parallel State,” premiered in the Leopards of Tomorrow competition at the Locarno Film Festival, it’s produced by Radu Stancu of Bucharest-based deFilm Production, in co-production with 42film and EED Productions.

Chloe Okuno’s feature debut Watcher recorded the biggest opening weekend grosses ever for IFC Films and its IFC Midnight/Shudder label on 764 U.S. screens — also one of the distributor’s widest ever releases.

Indie distributors, grabbing a frame between Top Gun: Maverick and Jurassic World Dominion, are out with a handful of decently wide releases for the specialty space including Neon’s Cannes title Crimes of the Future (127 screes), IFC Midnight thriller Watcher (764) and Roadside Attractions’ WWI period piece Benediction (87). Sony Pictures Classics launches Phantom of the Open in four theaters in NY and LA.

Jessica Kiang It is 1972, in Bucharest. Ceaușescu has been in power for seven years, and the fabric of ordinary life has been steeped long enough in his regime’s corrosively oppressive mandate that it has begun to fray.

Britain’s Prince Charles traveled to Romania’s capital Wednesday to visit refugees, mostly women and children, from Russia’s war in Ukraine who have found safety in the neighboring Eastern European country.

A brave Scots nurse volunteering in Ukraine has told how he witnessed the wreckage of a Russian tank with its gun still pointing directly at a hospital.

Jennie Punter Conflict hot spots, war frontlines, and violent protests may seem the most obvious places for journalists to die in the line of duty, but “The Killing of a Journalist,” which recently premiered at Toronto’s Hot Docs, compellingly illustrates how investigative journalism—particular the kind that crunches numbers and sticks its nose in the shady corners where politics and organized crime intersect—is more insidiously deadly.Directed by U.S. journalist Matt Sarnecki—a senior producer for the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) and Bucharest-based since 2013—the film began as an investigation of the brutal murder of investigative journalist Ján Kuciak and his fiancée Martina Kušnírová in their home in February 2018.

Poppy Field finally has made its way to virtual cinemas everywhere, available on VOD and digital.The Romanian drama, directed by Eugen Jebeleanu, earned, among other accolades, a Torino Film Festival Best Actor prize for star Conrad Mericoffer for his dynamic performance as closeted gay gendarmerie officer Christi, who lashes out with homophobic violence in order to protect his secret life.Christi’s angry outburst places him at the center of the storm inside a film theater where he and his fellow officers are trying to keep the peace after the screening of a lesbian film is loudly interrupted by a group of anti-LGBTQ protesters.The events of the film were inspired by a real-life 2013 incident in the capital, Bucharest, where anti-LGBTQ protesters shut down a showing of The Kids Are All Right.“I was not in Bucharest at the time. I was in Paris and was working there,” Jebeleanu recalls.

Vladimir Putin once warned that he could have Russian troops in six capital cities in just 48 hours, it is claimed.

Tom Odell visited Bucharest Train Station on Friday (March 13) to perform his 2013 hit ‘Another Love’ for Ukrainian refugees.According to the UN, more than two million civilians have fled Ukraine because of the Russian invasion, with a lot of them travelling through neighbouring Romania.“Yesterday I had the honour of singing another love at Bucharest train station in the company of many Ukrainian refugees. There are thousands of refugees coming into this station every day.

Rebecca Rubin Film and Media ReporterFilmmaker Peter Greenaway has unveiled the trailer for his next film, “Walking to Paris.”The biographical drama, Greenaway’s first feature since 2015’s romantic comedy “Eisenstein in Guanajuato,” centers on modernist Romanian artist Constantin Brancusi. Set in the early 1900s, the story takes place when Brancusi was 27-year-old and follows his 18-month trek from Bucharest to Paris to reach the metropolis of world culture.

EXCLUSIVE: Gratiela Brancusi, the Romanian actress who recently found her first major role in Taylor Sheridan’s 1883, has signed with Elevate Entertainment for management in all areas.

An American woman moves to Bucharest with her partner and begins to suspect she’s being stalked in “Watcher,” a stylish, unnerving thriller that premiered Friday at the Sundance Film Festival.Starring Maika Monroe (“The Guest”), Karl Glusman (“Devs”) and Burn Gorman (“The Dark Knight Rises”), the film is one of the big acquisition titles at the festival.Though hardly the first film to have a pretty blonde looking over her shoulder everywhere she goes, “Watcher” has the distinction of having a woman behind the camera too. The director, Chloe Okuno, fought for the job.

Jessica Kiang If the camera lingered just a little more lasciviously on the opening sex scene, or if we got to ogle the bondage-clad ladies writhing in their glass booths in the underground strip club sequence longer, Chloe Okuno’s smart little feature debut might be said to herald the longed-for return of the lost, lamented erotic thriller. Without that skeevy edge, “Watcher” has to settle for a plain-vanilla “thriller” designation that doesn’t really do justice to its throwback qualities, nor to the enjoyable way it reworks its many cinematic references into an understatedly stylish commentary on modern womanhood, #NotAllMen and the latest incarnation of the concept of gaslighting.There’s a little bit of “Repulsion” here, a dash of “Rear Window,” obviously, and an airy nod to “Lost in Translation,” but mostly “Watcher” plays in a less exalted sandbox.

The shadow of Alfred Hitchcock’s 1954 murder mystery Rear Window looms large over Chloe Okuno’s nail-biting Sundance U.S. Dramatic Competition entry, Watcher — but this debut feature is much more than homage. In fact, quite a few other suspense classics get the nod in the film’s trim 95-minute running time. Still, Watcher is very much its own creation, a sustained package that delivers on so many fronts — direction, cinematography, production design, music, performance — that what could have so easily been a formulaic slasher, genuinely pushes the boundaries of its genre, toying with an unusual bleakness that will keep audiences guessing until the end.

Crain’s reported.Hammond is confident New Yorkers will respond well to Therme in the Big Apple based on what he learned establishing the High Line, noting that city dwellers want multifaceted green spaces, places that are “a park and a botanical garden and a gathering place and programming,” he told the publication.“Therme combines nature, community, well-being and art together in a similar way” as the High Line, he added.Therme first opened in 2009, and today has a location in Bucharest,

Ubisoft has announced Ghost Recon Frontline, a new 100 plus PvP free-to-play team-based shooter. Developed by Ubisoft Bucharest, the game was revealed as part of the Ghost Recon 20th anniversary showcase.

JD Linville In “Blue Moon,” young Irina dreams of University in Bucharest while her chaotic, rural family serves to undermine her future.

Christopher Vourlias An unfortunate incident involving a sick dog sparks a heated confrontation on a Bucharest subway, setting off an increasingly bizarre series of events when a cellphone video of the argument goes viral.

Christopher Vourlias Three volunteer workers set out from Bucharest in a convoy destined for the mountainous hinterlands of Romania, where they plan to distribute aid supplies to remote villages. But when their SUV breaks down after they decide to help a lonely old man on a desolate mountain road, their notions of empathy and charity get put to the test.

Christopher Vourlias A young gay police officer who’s worked hard to keep his sexuality hidden must face his inner demons when he’s forced to intervene during an anti-gay protest at a Bucharest movie theater.

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Slipknot have announced that their 2021 festival dates this summer in Russia, Ukraine and Europe have been rescheduled to 2022.Taking to social media on Friday (June 11), the metal icons shared new dates for festival shows in Moscow, Kiev, Bucharest, Plovdiv, Athens and Wacken.

BUCHAREST -- Seeing the day that her life changed forever played out on a big screen was an emotional moment for Tedy Ursuleanu.“I watched the film for the first time in this cinema," the 34-year-old told The Associated Press in an interview at Bucharest’s Elvire Popesco cinema. "The fire scenes at the beginning of the film when the pillar next to the stage starts burning — I felt the same intensity from the night I was there.

After being branded as “the enemy of the people” in recent years, both here and in some other countries, journalists may be surprised to find themselves portrayed as heroes in a number of recent documentaries, including an Oscar-contending film.

Maika Monroe (It Follows), Karl Glusman (Nocturnal Animals) and Burn Gorman (Enola Holmes) have signed on to star in psychological thriller Watcher, directed by Chloe Okuno. Set to begin shooting this month, Watcher follows young married couple Julia (Monroe) and Francis (Glusman) as they move into a new apartment in Bucharest just as a citywide panic is brewing over a possible serial killer on the loose.

Cast has been set for Chloe Okuno’s Watcher, with Maika Monroe (It Follows), Karl Glusman (Nocturnal Animals) and Burn Gorman (Enola Holmes) signing on for the phycological thriller.

Ubisoft has provided a status update for Tom Clancy’s The Division 2 , which confirms that past seasons will be rerun whilst the next update is being developed.Ubisoft Massive will lead the development of the new content update for Division 2 alongside Ubisoft Bucharest.

When documentary maker Alexander Nanau started filming a team of investigative journalists in the aftermath of a tragic fire, no one knew the staggering level of corruption they would uncover. The blaze at Bucharest’s Colectiv club in 2015 left 27 dead and 180 injured. When more burn victims began dying in hospitals from wounds that were not life-threatening, the Romanian newspaper Sports Gazette started probing into the health service.

An expose about government corruption around a Bucharest nightclub fire, a look into the extent of the FBI’s surveillance of Martin Luther King Jr.