After being awarded in Cannes every year since 2004, the new Romanian cinema now has a film in the Official Competition of the Berlinale, a feature by Romanian director Florin Åžerban. If I Want to Whistle, I Whistle, the debut of 35 year old director Åžerban, is a Romanian-Swedish co-production between the Romanian Strada Film (www.stradafilm.ro) and the Swedish Film I Väst (http://www.filmivast.se/) and The Chimney Pot (www.thechimneypot.com).

Founded by filmmaker Cătălin Mitulescu, Strada Film has previously produced The Way I Spent The End Of The World, the first feature of Cătălin Mitulescu - awarded with Best Actress Award for Dorotheea Petre in "Un Certain Regard" section at Cannes Film Festival 2006, Ryna,  the first feature of Ruxandra Zenide - awarded with 16 prizes, Trafic by Cătălin Mitulescu - Palme d'Or for short film in 2004 and A Good Day For A Swim by Bogdan Mustaţă - Golden Bear for short film in 2008.

If I Want to Whistle, I Whistle/Eu cand vreau sa fluier, fluier  is a  heart stopping thriller focusing on a teenage prisoner who after being visited by his mother develops a crush on a sociology student and tries to escape five days before his release. The script is based on a play written by Andreea Vălean and staged successfully a several years ago. Cătălin Mitulescu and Florin Åžerban wrote the script.

The shooting took place last year in Romania, where the crew transformed a farm by the Danube river into a prison. Inspired by Robert Bresson's oeuvre and his own education at Columbia University (where he studied filmmaking after graduating from the National University of Drama and Film Bucharest), Florin Åžerban planned from the beginning not to use professional actors. After three months of casting in Romanian prisons, he chose 14 prisoners (some of them imprisoned for murder) which he trained in a two month acting workshop. For the main parts he eventually also cast two first timers; George PiÅŸtereanu (a highschool senior) and Ada Condeescu (an acting student). Except for two professional actors, Clara Vodă and Mihai Constantin, the rest of the cast is played by non-professional actors - prisoners and guards, who were heavily encouraged to improvise. Florin Serban told FNE that working with prisoners made him understand that society has rigid expectations of them. "I guess my weapon was my competence. Once they realize I know where I want to take them, they let themselves go."

With If I Want to Whistle, I Whistle, the producers are facing a new challenge. After the awards Romanian films have received at festivals in recent years, the challenge is now to win the audience. "The Romanian market has improved a lot lately, and it's very important for us to make films not only for festivals, but also for the audience," says producer Daniel Mitulescu.  The year 2009 was a record-breaking year in Romania, with admissions growing 43% compared to 2008. The first sign of recovery was in 2008 after 18 years of steady decline. Most of the box office - 95% , went in 2009 to the 15 multiplexes that wiped out 38 old communist era cinemas. Two more multiplexes with 15 cinemas will open in 2010.

 If I Want to Whistle, I Whistle is supported by the Romanian National Centre for Cinema (www.cncinema.abt.ro), the Swedish Film Institute (www.sfi.se) and Post Republic Berlin (www.post-republic.com), and has been pre-sold to the Romanian Television (www.tvr.ro). The project won The Magic Box Service Award at CineLink, during the 2008 Sarajevo IFF (www.sff.ba), and also the CineLink Work in Progress Award at Sarajevo IFF in August 2009. The project also received the Hubert Bals Fund Award for Development at the Rotterdam International Film Festival.

According to Daniel Mitulescu (who is producing together with his brother, Cătălin Mitulescu) the film will have its Romanian premiere right after the Berlinale. Celluloid Dreams (www.celluloid-dreams.com) is managing the international sales.

Florin Åžerban and Strada Film are also participating in Rotterdam-Berlinale Express section of the Berlinale Co-production Market with their new feature project, the thriller El Rumano, the story of a Romanian returning from Spain with a bloody assignment.

SPONSORED BY STRADA FILM

Screening Times

13th February

Berlin

9.00 Press Screening

16.30 Red Carpet at the Berlinale Palast

14th February

9.30 Friedrichstadtpalast

20.00 Urania

21st February

17.00 Babylon (Mitte)