Nextyear's Transilvania International Film Festival (TIFF) will be held in twoRomanian cities - Cluj Napoca and Sibiu - in recognition of the latter's statusas a European Capital of Culture in 2007 along with Luxembourg.

Speakingexclusively with ScreenDaily during the Connecting Cottbus market forum,TIFF's honorary director Tudor Giurgiu explained that the sixth edition of the festivalwill be held in the regular venue of Cluj-Napoca from June 1-10 and in Sibiufrom June 4-10.

"Thefestival will be held simultaneously in both cities, with the Cluj programmebeing mirrored in Sibiu, where we are planning to have a big focus on Germanybecause half of the city is German-speaking," Giurgiu said. "We willhave a shuttle to transport the festival guests between the two cities whichare two hours apart, and the good thing is that there are direct air connectionsto Sibiu from Munich, Frankfurt and Vienna."

Inaddition to its regular awards, TIFF will be introducing a new prize for BestEuropean Act for a film in the main competition, to be presented during theclosing ceremony in Sibiu.

Giurgiualso revealed that the festival "wants to have a joint partnership withBulgaria to have their new film projects presented in Cluj [to potentialco-producers] in exchange for Romanian projects being pitched beforehand at theSofia International Film Festival in March." In his official function asdirector general TVR Romanian Television, Giurgiu is considering thepossibility of hosting a discussion forum at the festival with leading Europeanbroadcasters about "what public television means in Europe and how it fundsthe film industry."