Grossmann Fantastic Film and Wine Festival
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13 May 2016
18 May 2016
A presentation of Slovene cinematography and the Grossmann Fantastic Film and Wine Festival at the South-East European Pavillion
at the Cannes International Film Festival
Festival policy and sections
Although the Grossmann festival is a relatively young and small festival event it quickly became one of the regular meeting points for professionals and fans of genre film production in the Balkan region and broader. It's concept is fresh, original and simply charming. Namely the Grossmann festival's focus on genre film production doesn't include blockbusters and mainstream films but rather the new digital guerilla, independent and low budget films, that are meant to become cult. The official festival policy is guided by the wish to present those films that are trying to escape the "mediocrity, political correctness and pathetic desire for mass appeal" of the contemporary genre films and to bring some fresh blood and danger into it. The Grossmann festival is also regularly organising special events like the Zombie Walk, a procession of the undead (make-up is made by professionals attending the festival) through the streets of Ljutomer, concerts and the traditional festival of wine. Since the excellent wine of this region is the only official drink of the festival it is advised to bring some fresh water with.
It's programme is divided into 9 sections and three of those are competitive: the Vicious Cats section includes feature length films, the Slak's Vicious Cats short film and the Noisy Cats music documentaries. Retrospectives are one of the strongest sections since in the past years they managed to invite many cult and legendary directors like Roger Corman, Jörg Buttgereitt and Roggero Deodato. Music documentaries are screened also out of competition in the Off Noisy Cats section. The Digital Mayhem section is dedicated to films on digital support, while the Mondo Macabro Special sections includes restored forgotten classics from the wild side of world cinema published on DVD by Mondo Macabro label. The Torture Garden is meant only for the most persistent since it offers 9 hours of furious blasts of weird, rare, strange and mad films, while the Vicious Festival Harvest sections brings selected films from partner festivals (Australian A Night of Horror, Festival of Serbian Fantasy Films, Croatian Trash Film Festival).
Awards
Workshops
The main attraction of the 2007 festival was Make Your Own Damn Movie!, an intensive eight-hour masterclass on the shooting and promotion of low-budget films led by Lloyd Kaufman. Some other lectures were organised, along with book presentations (Paper Vicious Cats), exhibitions and hip hop concerts. The team of Filmska praksa PLAN 9 also created some low-budget ‘grindhouse’ movies together with Kaufman.