Directors Michel Gondry, Tudor Giurgiu open Amateur Film Factory on first day of TIFF 2019

The Amateur Film Factory, the project of renowned French director, screenwriter and producer Michel Gondry, landed in Cluj Napoca on the occasion of the 18th edition of the Transylvania International Film Festival (TIFF), and will stay here for two and a half months. The concept created by the Michel Gondry offers people from the public the chance to produce their own short film in a few hours, providing them with props, equipment and all the necessary resources. The project is organized under the auspices of the 2019 Romania - France Season, and will be open May 31 through July 31. Michel Gondry and TIFF president Tudor Giurgiu inaugurated on Friday the Amateur Film Factory, which will be hosted by the Regional Center for Creative Industries (CREIC), a 12.3 ml euro worth of site which was recently completed with European funding. "Two years ago I had an intuition of or heard the first thoughts about this Romanian - French cultural season and on a Facebook page I found the project of director Michel Gondry, a project I didn't know much about. I saw that he has traveled the entire world, it seemed to me an extraordinary idea that fits well with what we are trying to do in Cluj, to set in place, besides the festival, a production center where children and youth should enjoy themselves and make movies under civilized conditions. Back then bringing the Factory to Cluj was just a dream," said director Tudor Giurgiu. The 15 sets mounted at CREIC will be made available for the development of projects for those who want to learn the tricks of moviemaking. Claudia Droc, coordinator of the Romania - France Season at TIFF, said that the Amateur Film Factory also offers shooting equipment as well as training sessions or script writing support. In his turn, Michel Gondry said that the sets were designed so as to capture the local color of Cluj. The Amateur Film Factory will be open in Cluj-Napoca from May 31 to July 31 at the Regional Center for Creative Industries, and is a project organized under the banner of the 2019 Romania - France Season, with the support of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Institut Français and Groupama Insurance.AGERPRES(RO - author: Elena Stanciu, editor: Marius Frăţila; EN - author: Simona Klodnischi, editor: Maria Voican)