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SENTIMENTAL STORIES

Xandra Popescu
Germany, 2023
16 min.

An almost deserted diner in the middle of the port. The owner, Violeta, dreams of a life that could have been different. She employs her niece, Maria, a radical passivist who steers away from any drive or ambition. Between chores and cigarette breaks, they talk about the future. As the day passes, they witness one love story dying out while another is trying to be born.

On-screen, the small German port town from Sentimental Stories looks like the world’s smallest and most unextraordinary — one of those towns where nothing happens. And nothing specific happens during the film either, because the filmmaker captures precisely that fragmented state of grace when everything is about to happen. The words allude, the bodies tense up, the gazes lose themselves into the void. One summer evening, after hours, some locals feel that something is wrong with their lives: a breakup is about to happen, as is a departure to college, as is a queer idyll; the bad awaits, as does the good. It’s just that “sometimes it’s better to do nothing”.

DATE & LOCATION

Friday 29th of September | 21:00

Cinemateca Eforie, Strada Eforie 2
Cumpără bilet

AWARDS, FESTIVALS & EXHIBITIONS

Xandra Popescu

Xandra Popescu works as a writer, curator, and filmmaker. Between 2014 and 2018, together with artist Larisa Crunțeanu, she was the curator of Atelier 35, a project space in Bucharest dedicated to installation, performance, and video art. In 2016 she collaborated with director Alexandra Bălteanu on the script of Vânătoare, which premiered at the San Sebastian and won the MAX OPHÜLS prize in Saarbrücken as well as the Prize of the Ecumenical Jury. She is one of the initiators of D’EST, a video art platform that maps out artistic reflections of post-socialist transformations. Currently, she is enrolled in the directing program of the Deutsche Film- und Fernsehakademie Berlin.

  • Technical sheet
  • Production and distribution
  • CAST: Marie Tragousti, Estelle Widmaier, Artemis Chalkidou, Grego Belau, Leo Da Silva, Ezra Luke, Jesus Fernandez de Castro
  • SCENARIUWRITER: Xandra Popescu
  • CINEMATOGRAPHY: Jonathan Steil
  • EDITOR: Xandra Popescu, Lorna Hoefler Steffen
  • SOUND MIXING: Cécile Perrot
  • ON SET SOUND COORDINATION: Alex Feldman
  • SOUND DESIGN: Florentin Tudor
  • DESIGN DE PRODUCȚIE: Anna Klisetz
  • PRODUCTION DESIGNER: Jessica Diaz
  • MAKE-UP & HAIR: Miriam Kellmann
  • VFX: Killian Pohl
  • PRODUCED BY: Die Deutsche Film -und Fernsehakademie Berlin (DFFB)
  • PRODUCERS: Janna Fodor, Sabrina Holzapfel

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