Euro 2008 Films & Results

Film Festival Rules & Guidelines

Final Standings of all the 4 Groups with the following format:

Country, Film: Rating out of 10

Group A:
Portugal, Bad Blood: 8
Switzerland, The Boat is Full: 8
Czech Republic, Zelary:7.5
Turkey, Harem Suare:7

Both Portugal and Switzerland earned 8 points and as per the tie breaker, Portugal takes first place by a margin of 4 (acting, direction, cinematography and production values) - 3 (acting, direction, story).

Average group rating: 7.6

Group B:
Poland, Edi: 9
Germany, Good bye Lenin: 8.5
Austria, Antares: 8
Croatia, Sorry for Kung Fu: 7

Average group rating: 8.1

Group C:
Romania, 12:08 East of Bucharest: 9
France, Angel-A: 7.5
Holland, Interview: 7
Italy, Summer Night: 5.5

Average group rating: 7.3

Group D:
Spain, Torremolinos 73: 9
Greece, Rouleman: 7
Russia, DayWatch: 6
Sweden, Thriller a Cruel Picture: 6

Both Russia and Sweden earned 6 points. As per the tie-breaker, Russia takes 3rd place over Sweden by a margin of 5-0.

Average group rating: 7

Second Round -- Quarter Finals, Semi's and Final:

As per the Euro 2008 draw, the Quarter-Finals would line up as such:

Quarter Final 1: Winner Group A vs Runner-up Group B
Quarter Final 2: Winner Group B vs Runner-up Group A
Quarter Final 3: Winner Group C vs Runner-up Group D
Quarter Final 4: Winner Group D vs Runner-up Group C

As per the group standings, the following are the film match-ups.
QF 1: Portugal (Bad Blood) vs Germany (Good bye Lenin)
QF 2: Switzerland (The Boat is Full) vs Poland (Edi)
QF 3: Romania (12:08 East of Bucharest) vs Greece (Rouleman)
QF 4: Spain (Torremolinos 73) vs France (Angel-A)

Results:
QF 1: Portugal 2 (Direction, Cinematography) - 4 Germany (Acting, Story, Direction, Cinematography)
QF 2: Switzerland 1 (Acting) - 4 Poland (Acting, Story, Direction, Cinematography)
QF 3: Romania 4 (Acting, Story, Direction, Cinematography) - 0 Greece
QF 4: Spain 4 (Acting, Story, Direction, Cinematography) - 3 France (Story, Cinematography, Production Values)

Semi-Finals:

Winner of QF 1 vs Winner of QF 2: Germany vs Poland
Winner of QF 3 vs Winner of QF4: Romania vs Spain

Results:
SF 1: Germany 2 (Acting, Story) - 4 Poland (Acting, Story, Direction, Cinematography)
SF 2: Romania 3 (Acting, Story, Direction) - 2 Spain (Story, Cinematography)

Final: Poland vs Romania

Score: Poland 3 (Acting, Story, Cinematography) - 3 Romania (Acting, Story, Direction)

This one was a tough choice. The Polish film Edi got me hooked emotionally, whereas 12:08 East of Bucharest made me laugh. In the end by a slight slight margin, I have to give the nod to the Romanian film.

Winner: Romania (12:08 East of Bucharest)

Film Selections & Comments:

With the exception of Portugal and Turkey, I got all my first picks for the films. For Portugal, I really wanted to get a Pedro Costa movie. But Pedro Costa films are hard to come by and I am not sure how much more luck I would have had in the next 2-3 months, so I went for my second pick of Bad Blood. My original Turkish pick was Climates by Nuri Bilge Ceylan but for some bizarre reason that movie is still not available for rent in Canada although it can be bought via the internet. Since I had already seen 15 of the 16 films, I decided to go with my second pick of Harem suare to complete the film festival line-up.

The average rating of all 16 films comes to 7.5/10. That is not bad considering the random nature of the film selections. I don't want to read too much into some of the low ratings as in most cases, I tried to choose unknown films. For example, the Greek film Rouleman still does not have any entry on imdb.com although the film's director Panos Karkanevatos has a few films listed on the website. As a result of the unknown picks, there were a few pleasant surprises. The Polish film Edi and the Spanish entry Torremolinos 73 were real treats. Although, I knew about about 12:08 East of Bucharest, I was still surprized at how funny it was. It was a simple and delightful film.

Also, I was pleasantly surprized by the quality of the two co-host nations films -- Austria and Switzerland. The Swiss film The Boat is Full was an interesting film and showed the Swiss might not have been 100% neutral during World War II. The Austrian film Antares is best described as a cross between the works of Ulrich Seidl (Dog Days and Import/Export) and Dekalog. In reality, I was hoping to get a film with a more upbeat vision of Austrian life than that shown in Seidl's works but as it turned out Götz Spielmann's Antares is carved from the same block as Seidl's films.

Initially, I had hoped to have completed watching all the movies closer to the start of the soccer tournament, but now I will have a better chance to focus on the games themselves and compare the soccer results with the films performances.

Only 83 days until the tournament kicks off on June 7 with the Swiss taking on Czech Republic and Portugal vs Turkey.