I am delighted to welcome all the participants and guests of the Ninth Annual Russian Film Week in New York. For those of us organizing, this Film Week is a special event, as this year marks the tenth anniversary of our agency, Global Advertising Strategies. For the past ten years we have completed hundreds of projects for companies in 26 different countries, with Russia being one of the most important, each directed specifically at bridging the gap between diverse cultures. The fact that, regardless of the tough economic situation we all face today, we were able to organize this wonderful celebration of Russian cinema and bring the best works of Russian filmmakers to New York is a great reward for a decade of hard work.

This year we significantly expanded the goals and mission of Film Week. In addition to screening the best pictures at the city’s most prestigious venues, the program of Film Week has foreseen meetings between members of the Russian delegation and important United States officials, public figures and cultural workers, as well as professional discussions at some of the best colleges and universities of New York, such as Columbia University, the School of Visual Arts, New York Film Academy and New York University.

The art of film certainly plays an important role in our everyday lives, especially here, in multicultural America, where film has always served as a link to one’s native culture and history. Film not only entertains us - it educates us, and allows us to preserve traditions. Furthermore, it is a mirror for modern life and the state of creative self-determination in a country. We have tried to reflect these and other aspects of cinematography in the program of Film Week, offering our demanding and professional audience an opportunity to explore Russian cinema, new Russia and the prospects of international cultural cooperation between our two countries.

From the bottom of my heart, I wish all participants and guests of Film Week pleasant viewings and unexpected professional discoveries.

Givi Topchishvilli
President and CEO Global Advertising Strategies

New York is the only city where you never feel alone no matter how long you’ve lived here, be it your whole life or just one day. No one really pays attention to you, not on Broadway, at the Metropolitan Museum, nor at a movie theatre, and so there’s a kind of anonymity and privacy even in the most crowded and public of places. This is why, in my opinion, it is so easy and yet so difficult to live in New York, and why it’s so hard to get the public’s attention.
For this precise reason, Russian Film Week is a risk for us, the organizers, as well as for the artists. Their films are not like those we’re used to, but creators of such films as Everybody Dies but Me, Tale in the Darkness, Buben, Baraban and Once Upon a Time in the Province, aren’t trying to conform to the standards of the film industry. For this they have already earned the recognition of their audiences, and I am certain they will find acceptance in New York as well. And if we speak about film experts… there’s Sergey Solovyev’s Anna Karenina, with the captivating Tatiana Drubich throwing herself under the train and into the hands of fate. There’s the tragedy of Ivan the Terrible in contrast with metropolitan Fillip in Pavel Lungin’s Tsar. All are tests for these famous film directors, as well as for their audiences. We, the organizers of Film Week, are impatiently awaiting these encounters ourselves. Otherwise, why would we plan such an event at all?
A master is always progressing from private to public, from just one pair of eyes to those of an entire audience. Givi Topchishvilli and I, with our companies Global Advertising Strategies and Clotho-Plus, respectively, both organizers of Film Week this year, have done everything in our power to make these encounters between the artist and the viewer possible. The responsibility is divided between them equally. And what will be the end result? Clotho means “fate”. Let us trust it.

V. Sinelnikov
General Director of Clotho-Plus