The Romania International Film Festival celebrated its 10th edition with a hot and wild new location, the famous -if not notorious party-beach resort of Vama Veche, a mile away from the border with Bulgaria.A kind of Felliniesque (think -Satyricon rather than La Dolce Vita)holiday rendezvous for the not-too-gilded youth of Central Europe its vibrant music and drinks-fuelled atmosphere makes the revels of the Karlovy Vary Festival seem like a vicars' tea-party,with the dress sense of the original Mad Max.Here all-night routs mean literally that so the screenings were restricted to four feature programmes, in 2  alfresco venues, as night descended- in the Amfiteatr La Pescarie the screen billowed against the Black Sea, and Chinese Lanterns winged high in the sky, the occasional paraglider passed in silhouetted, and many of the aficionados were high in their seats.  Somehow, the International Jury of  actor-director Mike Sarne (UK), cinematographer Doru Mitran and BBC broadcaster Yours Truly managed to present these awards in a late-night buffet party in the gardens of the  Vila Maris, a luxury enclave and boutique hotel that seemed far from the madding crowds but is only 500 metres from the balmy Black Sea Beaches.

Best Director WOMEN IN CINEMA-Laila Marrakchi for ROCK THE CASBAH(Morocco-France) for her mastery of the medium of film, revealing the paradoxes women face in their lives in Moroccan society- where man has the upper hand-and brilliantly handling an ensemble of characters (headed by Omar Sharif as a not-so-dearly departed patriarch) with great perception and welcome humour.

Best Director CINE BLACK SEA - Niki Iliev  for LIVING LEGENDS (Bulgaria) for amusingly showing how the lives of young friends took very different paths but a sudden accident brings them together for eventual fulfilment with surprising but very entertaining results.

Best Acting   The Jury unanimously agreed to share the Best Acting Award  -ex-aequo  (as Ovid, who was exiled to nearby Constanta-Ultima Thule, would have put it)- between two remarkable young actresses  MELANIE DOUTEY (in POST-PARTUM, Belgium), who brings a new face to a universal problem,  and SANY ILIEV-BORISOVA (in LIVING LEGENDS,Bulgaria), for her well-judged depiction of a daughter in search of her identity.

The Jury also congratulated the Ukrainian Cinema- in the Special Focus hors concours-for maintaining high artistic standards in the face of mounting difficulties - and the Festival will make  a donation to the EFA campaign for Oleg Sentsov-and gave an Opera Prima Trophy to Viktoria Trofimenko for her assured debut feature  BROTHERS;THE FINAL CONFESSION.

Festival Trophy for Best Film (sponsored by the perfumery Beautik) went to Ramin Matin for THE IMPECCABLES (Turkey), a film that surprises on every level, with a tale of two sisters, with their evident conficts, who can't live with or without each other,and the reason why is brilliantly revealed at the masterful conclusion of this highly original piece of blackly-humoured  Black Sea drama.

Phillip Bergson                                                                                                                  www.ro-iff.ro