Actors Anna Széles and Dan Nuțu to be celebrated at TIFF 2018

Actor Ana Széles, whose career in cinema spans over half of a century, was born in 1942 in Oradea, and went on to attend the Târgu Mureș Theater Institute. From her graduation in 1965 until she emigrated in Hungary in 1989, Széles worked with the Cluj-Napoca Hungarian Theater. She made her film debut during her freshman year in 1962 with Vacanță la mare / Seaside Vacation. In her junior year as a student at the Theater Institute, she had the extraordinary opportunity to be cast as Ilona in Liviu Ciulei’s adaptation of Liviu Rebreanu’s eponymous novel Pădurea spânzuraților / Forest of the Hanged (1965)—which still stands as one of the best Romanian films of all times and a career highlight for Széles. “She is not just a promise and an attractive vision, but also, already, an actress of great talent,” said at the time Liviu Ciulei, who went to receive the Best Director at Cannes for this film. About her role in Gaudeamus Igitur, which was shot in Cluj in the 1960s, writer Gheorge Tomozei said: “Thanks to an innate talent dominated by deep emotion, Anna Széles manages to suggest a vital authenticity. Her delicate coyness is doubled by melancholy humor, and the desperation bought on by a failed exam is a fine parody of actual melodrama.” These two films, to be shown at TIFF this year, are joined in Széles’s filmography by Meandre / Detours (1966), Vin cicliștii / Cyclists Are Coming (1968), Balul de sâmbătă seară / Saturday Night Ball (1968), or Tinerețe fără bătrânețe / Youth Eternal (1969). Together with legendary leading man Florin Piersic, who was her life and work partner for ten years, Széles also played in Ștefan cel Mare - Vaslui 1475 / Stephen the Great - Vaslui 1475 (1975), Elixirul tinereții / Youth Potion (1975), or Masca de argint / The Silver Mask (1985).

Dan Nuțu, who will receive the Excellence Award presented by Mercedes Benz, is now best known for the documentaries that come out of the Aristoteles Workshop, which he founded in 2006, but also for his memorable roles in Duminică la ora 6 / Sunday at 6 (1965), Meandre / Detours (1966), Diminețile unui băiat cuminte / The Mornings of a Good Boy (1966), 100 de lei / 100 Lei (1973), and Dincolo de nisipuri / Beyond the Sands (1974). This last film will be screened at TIFF in an uncensored version, in honor of late  director Radu Gabrea.

Nuțu was born in Bucharest in 1944 and made a brilliant debut alongside Irina Petrescu in Lucian Pintilie’s first film Duminică la ora 6 / Sunday at 6. His takes on unconventional youths turned him into the “vulnerable tough guy of the 1960s,” as Tudor Caranfil called him. “No one can say quite like him, with just one look, how complicated adolescence can be,” said film reviewer Eva Sârbu. A rebel often compared to James Dean or Tom Courtenay, Nuțu suddenly halted his career to emigrate in the US, but came back in a surprise appearance at TIFF in 2005. In 2006, together with his partner, producer Cristina Hoffman, he founded the Aristoteles Workshop, which gave birth to over 40 documentary films, many of which were selected and awarded in prestigious film festivals like Cannes, Locarno, Leipzig, Nyon, IDFA Amsterdam, Namur, Montpellier, Sarajevo, Warsaw, etc. One of the most important Aristoteles productions, launched in 2007 at Locarno, is Nu te supără, dar… / Don’t Get Me Wrong, directed by Adina Pintilie, who this year received the Golden Bear at the Berlinale for her feature debut Nu mă atinge-mă / Touch Me Not—a film which is also included in the TIFF official competition.

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The Transilvania International Film Festival is organized by the Association for the Promotion of Romanian Film and the Association for the Transilvania Film Festival.

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Support from: Ministry of Culture and National Identity, National Center for Cinematography, Cluj City Hall and Local Council, Romanian Cultural Institute, Cluj County Council, Creative Europe-MEDIA program of the European Union

Presented by: Staropramen

Principal sponsor: Banca Transilvania

Principal partner: Mastercard

Official car: Mercedes-Benz

Sponsors: Orange, HBO, MOL România, Lidl, Nespresso, Tenaris Silcotub,  Avon

Official coffee: Nespresso

Official logistical partner: DHL

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