Wednesday, August 13
Despite dancing, singing, laughing and drinking until the wee hours of the morning, the film theater is filled to the last seat for the two competition screenings this morning. Icarus (Hungary 1996) by Geza Toth, a three-dimensional sand animation, visualizes mankind's ancient dream about flying. It's a bit arts-and-crafts, but convincing technically. This film would receive a certificate from the International Jury: Raoul Servais (Belgium), Igor Volchek (Byelo-Russia), Natalya Orlowa (Russia), Monique Renault (Netherlands) and Natalya Chernyshova (Ukraine). The film E=mc2, also a sand animation, by Ala Churikova from the Ukraine, tells of the birth of love, the world and self-destruction. Actually, it is the parable of two fish who meet, become involved and end up fighting each other to the death.

The KROK International Jury. Left to right: Monique Renault, Raoul Servais, Natalya Orlowa, Igor Volchek, Natalya Chernyosova. Photo © oTTo Alder.

But the highpoint of the second program for me was the film Golosa (Voices) made in 1995 by two artists from Moscow, Dimitri Rezchikov and Alexander Ratnovsky, in the classic cartoon technique. Both of these directors learned their animation craft in the Moscow Pilot Studio under Alexander Tatarsky. Then in 1994 they created their own studio under the name DEVON. The fact that Russian popular culture is virtually unknown to us must be attributed to our narrow-minded fixation on western culture. Voices is a music video for the song of the same name by the popular Russian singer Nastya Poleva. However, this studio's animated music videos, Acid Wine and Beasts, with their clear concept, far surpass technically, formally and aesthetically the often over-financed products from the West.

Thursday, August 14
The KROK guests don't seem to know anything about sleep. Once again the Festival danced until deep in the morning. The sky over the Ukraine is once again sunny and clear. KROK is docked in the port of Kherson. After the competition screening, a boat brings the entire festival to an island, where we are served a picnic, and everybody goes swimming. Cooled down from this swim, the filmmakers submit to the daily questioning of journalists and critics. At the same time the younger guests are dancing on deck to hard Techno rhythms. The "older" guests hang out in the bar where Ukrainian music is performed live. The pianist and the woman singing don't let their audience leave before five in the morning. In the cafe at the other end of the ship some play cards, others carry on heavy conversations until late that night. In another corner of the same cafe there is hearty laughter.

The 50 staff members of the ship, from Captain to cook, tend ceaselessly to the well-being of the guests day and night. Everything seems to work perfectly.

Friday, August 15
After breakfast, the festival docks in the harbor of Odessa. Paul Bush is dressed particularly elegantly today. Certainly that is a sign that his film is going to be screened in competition this morning. Paul isn't on this ship just for pleasure. He uses every free minute to work on his new film. Since he works in a scratch-directly-on-film technique, his studio (a light table, 35mm film stock and scratching tools) fits neatly in his luggage. His new project is titled The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, a visualization and interpretation of the poem written in 1820 by Samuel Taylor Coleridge. The film will be 15 minutes long, and should be finished by next year. Paul Bush still has 5,000 images to scratch out by then -- no easy task, when one considers that he often works for five hours on one single frame.

Despite beaming sunshine, dark clouds suddenly close in over KROK. One member of the jury, Igor Volchek, has stomach trouble and must be rushed to the hospital. From Moscow comes the sad news that Vadim Kurtchevsky, a brilliant director of many popular Soviet films, died last night. Many of his friends are on board. Sorrow swept over the whole ship, written on the faces of the people.