Ukraine’s biggest cinematography event, the Odesa International Film Festival, kicked off on July 12 and is celebrating its 10th anniversary.
The annual event’s red carpet and the opening ceremony took place at Odesa National Academic Opera and Ballet Theater in the port city of 1 million people located 500 kilometers south of Kyiv.
The ceremony attracted an abundance of Ukrainian cinematography stars as well as foreign film gurus.
This year’s festival will screen over 80 fiction and documentary, feature and short films from July 12 until July 20. The program offers both competition and non-competition pictures.
The red carpet featured international guests of the festivals, such as U.S. actress Rose McGowan and English director and writer Mike Leigh.
Both McGowan and Leigh will have meet-the-artist sessions at the festival.
Leigh, who has accumulated seven Oscar nominations and multiple festival awards, has received yet another prize, the Golden Duke, which the Odesa International Film Festival presents every year for a contribution to the development of cinematography.
“This is more than a great honor to receive this award and it’s very exciting especially in the city of Odesa,” Leigh said during his speech after receiving the prize. “The city, which has a special cinematic significance.”
Leigh also expressed his support to Oleg Sentsov, Crimean-born Ukrainian director and a political prisoner jailed in Russia after being subjected to a sham trial. Sentsov has been sentenced to 20 years. On July 13, he celebrates his 43rd birthday.
Leigh said he looks forward to the presentation of the “Numbers” movie, based on a play script written by Sentsov.
“I think that of most interest to all filmmakers everywhere is Oleg Sentsov,” Leigh told the Kyiv Post. “I constantly think about him and send him goodwill and love.”
McGowan said she was thankful to be present at the festival.
“I’m honored to be here in Odesa, the birth-place to cinema and camera,” McGowan said during her speech on stage.
The U.S. actress, who has spoken out against U.S. film mogul Harvey Weinstein, accusing him of rape, joining dozens of other women who voiced his alleged sexual misconduct, used her time on stage to address the issue.
“I’m here to be a voice of truth and to say don’t be scared,” McGowan said. “One of the great things about cinema is that we can speak truth in metaphors but sometimes we don’t have time for metaphors and we need to say it as it is.”
Ukrainian Hollywood actress Ivanna Sakhno, who starred in the U.S. science fiction film “Pacific Rim: Uprising” and the comedy “The Spy Who Dumped Me,” has come to the film festival in Odesa for the first time. The actress is on the jury of the international competition program.
Despite working abroad, Sakhno says she keeps an eye on the development of Ukrainian cinematography and is excited to be here.
The stars of the Ukrainian film industry also joined in with the ceremony. Crimean-Tatar filmmaker Nariman Aliev and the director and actor Akhtem Seitablayev, who will present their recent work, the drama “Homeward,” which premiered at the 2019 Cannes Film Festival, walked the red carpet.
Filmmaker Tonia Noyabrova, who won in the Best Director category last year, director Marysia Nikitiuk, actresses Rimma Zyubina and Kateryna Molchanova also arrived at the celebration.
The president of the festival, Viktoriya Tigipko, congratulated everyone on the anniversary during her speech on the stage. She said that the festival has ambitious goals for the future at times of rapid technological development.
“We plan to actively integrate technology into the field of the cinema industry, introduce new audiovisual forms of film production,” Tigipko said. “Here and now, at the Odessa International Film Festival, a new DNA is being formed for the nation, which will be able to think out-of-box and develop creative industries.”
