24. July 2013

Opening Film

The touching drama Eastalgia is the debut film of Ukrainian film director Daria Onyshchenko. The plot is set in one night in three different cities. It tells three love stories between people from different generations and of different nationalities. Lonely Ukrainian Ruslana lives in Munich. A burst pipe has flooded her apartment. Former boxer Vladan from Serbia helps her with repairing the pipe and also regaining her courage to face life. Ruslanas son Bogdan lives in Kiew, working as a driver for spoilt pop starlet Maria. Both of them depend on the goodwill of Maria’s powerful lover Jora. On the way to a concert, Bogdan abandons Maria, whom he is secretly in love with, in the middle of a traffic jam. He quits his job and wants to go to Munich to live with his mother. Vladan’s son Zoran lives a simple but happy life in Belgrade with his girlfriend Aida. During this night the simple craftsmen witnesses an extortion in the course of which he meets Jelena, the wife of an Austrian restaurant owner. They get closer to one another, but the young mother wants to leave her native country the next day. Two excellent Austrian actors stand out in this film: Karl Markovics and Georg Friedrich.