Arūnas Matelis' film "Ten Minutes Before Icarus Flight" opened the Lithuanian documentary programme at the Uppsala Film Festival

The legendary Uppsala Short Film Festival yesterday hosted the launch of Lithuanian documentary programme "Past Within Us". The programme, curated by Mantė Valiūnaitė, consists of films by Arūnas Matelis, Audrius Stonys, Audrius Mickevičius, Deimantas Narkevičius and Emilija Škarnulytė. The programme opened with A.Matelis' film ”Ten Minutes Before Icarus Flight” (1990).

The audience, which had gathered in large numbers for the screening, greeted the film with warm applause and asked many questions to the author, sharing compliments and observations. As Matelis said: "It was at this time of the year, in late autumn 35 years ago, that Rimvydas Leipus and I started making this film, wandering around the then inhospitable and even dangerous Užupis area. Now it was very interesting to return to that world which hasn't changed much." Matelis talked about the traditions of Lithuanian documentary filmmaking, the basics of visual strength, his personal experiences, answered the audience's questions and joked that the film is much shorter than the discussion afterwards.

This first film by Matelis stood out not only in the national context. It has been hailed by film critics as a manifesto of the new generation of cinema, and won the main prize at the world's most important short film festival at the time, in Oberhausen. Interest in the film was unwavering, and it travelled to over a hundred film festivals, from Locarno to many smaller ones. The film was the basis for art history research papers and was screened at art exhibitions. In 2004, the Cannes Film Festival's Critics' Week programme included the film in the East Express list of six films from Eastern and Central Europe, dedicated to those that have had the greatest impact on the language of cinema in Eastern and Central Europe since the fall of the Berlin Wall. The film has thus resumed its tour through the world's most famous film festivals.

The Uppsala Short Film Festival is one of the most important short film festivals in the world, with winners automatically qualifying for Oscars, BAFTAs and the European Film Academy Awards. Participation of Arūnas Matelis in the presentation was supported by the Lithuanian Film Centre, and the festival's focus on Lithuania was made possible thanks to the Lithuanian Shorts agency and its director Rimantė Daugėlaitė, who organised three Lithuanian film programmes and parallel events.