EUNIC is the European network of cultural institutes and embassies engaging in cultural relations, bringing to life cultural collaborations in more than 100 countries worldwide with a network of 136 clusters.
The EUNIC Malta Cluster was launched in July 2021. The Cluster’s mission is to contribute towards the Sustainable Development Goals and to reflect and give value to the diversity of European cultures and common values through joint European events and projects. One of those events is the annual EUNIC European film festival. This year marks the fifth edition of the event. Across six days, from the 23rd to 28th of September, the film festival will offer eleven screenings, celebrating diversity in all its forms.
Eleven members and partners are taking part in the event: the embassies of the Czech Republic, Germany, Hungary, the Netherlands, Poland, France and Spain, as well as the Alliance Française, Arts Council Malta, the European Commission Representation, the Istituto Italiano di Cultura and the Australian High Commission.
THE ITALIAN MOVIE
Saturday, 27 September at 7:30pm
U.S. PALMESE
Directed by the Manetti Bros. [2024, 122′]
Italian with English subtitles
Free but booking is required
U.S. Palmese is a sports comedy. In Palmi, a small town in Calabria, Don Vincenzo, a brilliant and retired farmer, gets the crazy idea to revive the local football team. He organizes a bizarre fundraising campaign to recruit Etienne Morville, a Serie A player. In a desperate attempt to rebuild his reputation, the disgraced French soccer stars reluctantly accept the contract.
The film is set in the hometown of the Manetti brothers’ mother and it is where the duo spent their childhood summers. The idea for the film came from a childhood memory: an old man at an amateur football match said that if the fans raised enough money, the team could afford a star like Maradona.
Czech Republic | The Gardener’s Year
At the foot of a picturesque hill lives a gardener with his wife. They have their own garden shop. Their life is disrupted by a new owner of a nearby castle. He wants to transform the landscape according to his ideas. When gardening gets in the way of his plans, a series of bizarre events are set in motion. The new owner first builds a fence with razor wire and closes off the driveway. He gradually increases the intensity of his actions to achieve his goals. However, the gardener does not give up and tries to defend his home. When the police and the mayor drown in their own bureaucracy, the gardener decides to take his things into his own hands.
Date and time: Tuesday, 23 September 2025 @ 7:30pm
Australia | The Aegean
Life on an isolated Greek island changes for Hector (Greek Australian Costas Mandylor), a solitary widowed fisherman, when he meets Theodore, a teenage refugee desperately seeking resolution to a dire situation. United by their shared struggles, they embark on a journey across the Aegean Sea, where they discover a newfound purpose and friendship.
Join us for a short intro before the film by the Australian High Commissioner.
Date and time: Wednesday, 24 September 2025 @ 6pm
Malta | Castillo
Amanda reunites with her mother after her father’s death. Her mother admits killing two men in revenge for her sister K.Penza’s 1986 assassination. Amanda uncovers her family’s dark history involving these past events.
Date and time: Wednesday, 24 September 2025 @ 8:30pm
Hungary | We Started Together
’We Started Together’ dramatizes the conflicts of the 2020’s youth through the stories of a group of highschool classmates: Marci, Franciska, Ádi, Juli, Renátó, Benett, Geri, Gigi and Nóri.
At their high school prom they promise each other to keep in touch, but life leads them to separate ways. Ten years later two of them are getting married and the gang meets up again at their wedding. Each guest carries their own secrets. Marci and Franciska are still looking for a goal in their life, Nóri and Benett got stuck in a bad relationship, Ádi became an addict and still bullies Geri, Juli is keeping her pregnancy a secret from the father of the baby: Renátó. At first, the wedding starts as a masquerade, where all participants are trying to put on a perfect show, but when one of the friends suffers a near fatal accident, they realize, they all need to stop the act and reveal their real selves.
Date and time: Thursday, 25 September 2025 @ 6pm
Poland | Bread and Salt
Inspired by true events, played by non-professionals. Tymek, a young, talented pianist (plays himself) – student of the Warsaw Academy of Music, returns to his small hometown for a vacation, a place where time has stood still. The central meeting point for local youth is the newly created kebab bar. Tymek witnesses a growing conflict between Arab kebab workers and his colleagues from the neighborhood. A conflict that will turn out to be tragic.
Date and time: Thursday, 25 September 2025 @ 8:30pm
European Commission | Three Kilometres to the End of the World
Adi, aged 17, is spending the summer in his home village in the Danube Delta. One night he is brutally attacked on the street, the next day his world is turned upside-down. His parents no longer look at him as they did, and the seeming tranquillity of the village starts to crack.
Date and time: Friday, 26 September 2025 @ 6pm
Germany | Two To One
After the fall of the Berlin Wall, a communist family discovers a bunker full of money soon to be worthless. With the help of their neighbors, they embark on a race against time to enter the capitalist world in style.
Join us before the film for a short intro by the German ambassador!
Date and time: Friday, 26 September 2025 @ 8:30
Netherlands | Jippie No More
Jaap Peter, a lively 16-year-old boy, eagerly prepares for his older sister’s wedding at their beloved grandfather’s country house. As the whole family rallies together to create the perfect celebration, Jaap Peter falls in love for the first time. But when the girl of his dreams is smitten with his younger sister Joe instead, Jaap Peter is disheartened. Through the chaos and tender moments, Jaap Peter learns that his presence and the unbreakable bond of his family are vital in ensuring the wedding’s success.
Date and time: Saturday, 27 September 2025 @ 5pm
France | llusions perdues
Lucien is a young, unknown poet in 19th century France who leaves his native province to try his luck in Paris. Soon left to his own devices in this city, the young man discovers the backstage of a world devoted to the law of profit.
Date and time: Sunday, 28 September 2025 @ 4pm
Spain | To Steal From A Thief
A group of thieves led by a man called El Uruguayo stalk a bank in Valencia to steal as many safety boxes as possible and later flee through a dug tunnel that communicates the building with an abandoned subway station. However, the press officer of the Prime Minister discovers what the thieves are actually after: they want to get their hands on box 314, property of Gonzalo Soriano, a former member of the government who slipped into a coma after a severe accident, left documents with compromising information. The gang’s plans start to go awry when the tunnel is flooded by heavy rain, leaving them with no escape, plus to discover that the box really doesn’t contains documents, but an external hard drive full of data about important names in all levels of the Spanish politic.
Date and time: Sunday, 28 September 2025 @ 7:30pm