Films about “gro­wing up” have moved LUCAS sin­ce the very begin­ning. We have always fol­lo­wed cha­rac­ters at an age with the grea­test leaps in deve­lo­p­ment, with exci­ting and frigh­tening chan­ges in body and mind, whe­ther in child­ren’s sto­ries or coming-of-age tales. It’s high time that the »Young European Cinephiles« dealt with a topic that stron­gly affects them. 

“Through emo­tio­nal jour­neys, film cap­tures the spi­rit of what it is to grow. It gives a chan­ce to both crea­tors and audi­en­ces to reflect on who they are and who they want to be,” says Spyros from Greece. “Regardless of the emo­ti­on, we grow along­side it,” adds Radoslava from Bulgaria. 

Since spring, they have been fine-tuning their spe­ci­al­ly cura­ted film series with the help of inten­si­ve rese­arch and online work­shops. The aim is to express their inter­pre­ta­ti­on and per­spec­ti­ve in a high-qua­li­ty sel­ec­tion. It is par­ti­cu­lar­ly important to the »YECs« to put les­ser-known works in the spot­light and to cover dif­fe­rent facets of the topic. 

A signi­fi­cant part of her inte­rest is in cha­rac­ter deve­lo­p­ment: gro­wing from expe­ri­en­ces and lear­ning from mista­kes. “To beco­me a bet­ter per­son through life-sha­ping expe­ri­en­ces,” sum­ma­ri­zes Helena from Germany. They find sto­ries of gro­wing up out­side of social norms, of brea­king out of social cons­traints and expec­ta­ti­ons, of rebel­ling against “social ste­reo­ty­pes”, accor­ding to Fotis from Greece, more con­flic­tu­al but no less fascinating. 

They want to take a poin­ted look at per­so­na­li­ties who are oppres­sed becau­se of their con­vic­tions and show the asso­cia­ted growth of aut­ho­ri­ta­ri­an struc­tures. “Not ever­y­thing that grows is as good as we think it is, and we wan­ted to show that”, says Radoslava. But even dis­ap­point­ment can be a source of strength, says Ida from Bulgaria: “Learning how to hand­le dis­ap­point­ment and rea­li­zing that things don’t always go the way we hope.” 

Despite all the resis­tance, the group is eager to see how the audi­ence will recei­ve their sel­ec­tion — whe­ther as a new dis­co­very or a reuni­on. “It’s inte­res­t­ing to see a movie with new eyes after ten years. Films can also age!”, says Arthur from Germany.