Cameron Bailey, Artistic Director of the Toronto International Film Festival, and Dimitri Eipides, International Programmer for the Festival, announced today that the city of Athens, Greece will be the focus of the 2013 City to City programme at the 38th Toronto International Film Festival®.
“City to City looks for cinematic hot spots around the world,” said Bailey. “We want to introduce our audience to new generations of filmmakers unafraid to rewrite the rules. When we started thinking about the startlingly original films emerging recently from this ancient and contemporary city, the perfect choice for us this year was Athens.”
“After a long period of hibernation, Greek cinema has finally found its way back to the forefront. A number of young filmmakers — most of them fresh out of film school or, at best, with a couple of shorts to their name — turned things around. Where others saw devastation, they saw inspiration,” said Eipides.
“Working with minimal means, often exchanging services on each other’s productions,
they churned out films which gained attention around the world. Hopefully this new wave of international exposure will give Greek cinema the confidence to communicate its message from a position where national boundaries will no longer matter.”
This is the fifth year for the City to City series which showcases filmmakers living and working in a selected city, regardless of where their films are set. Cities featured in past programmes include Tel Aviv, Istanbul, Buenos Aires and Mumbai.
The announcement of the City to City lineup will be made in July.
The 38th Toronto International Film Festival runs from September 5 to 15, 2013.
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