ALEX'S FESTIVAL HIGHLIGHTS -- ANNO 2005 WITH A MERRY X-MAS TO ALL! 1.TROMSO, January -- A fantastic place to open the festival year if you love snow and don't mind fifteen minutes of daylight, MAX ...in January. That was just a joke, folks -- by late January you get almost a whole hour of sunlight -- around eleven AM -- but really, who needs it? ...when fest topper, irrepressible Norskie-American MARTHA OTTE, is guaranteed to provide a slate of such interesting films that you'll spend th...

GDYNIA -- BLUES ON THE BALTICAlex Deleon, Sept. 15Although there are no international or Hollywood stars prancing around the premises there are enough Polish film celebrities and industry VIPs in attendance, and the 30th Jubilee mood is so high that the local papers have picked up the catch-phrase "Cannes on the Baltic". One reason for the upbeat atmosphere is the announcement by festival artistic director Maceij Karpinski, that after many years of quibbling and struggling the new Polish Cinema...

GDYNIA AT THE MIDPOINT -- LIONS UP FOR GRABSAlex Deleon, September 14, 2005The annual feature film output of Poland has been hovering about the thirty marks since the mid nineties and this year is no great exception. Somewhat over thirty features were submitted for consideration, but the festival selection committee this year felt it necessary to make a distinction between high quality productions, mostly by seasoned directors, and cheapies thrown together by younger or first time directors wor...