“The extensive international exposure, with more than 40 selections for prestigious festivals, together with a worldwide theatrical release, planned to start in October 2018, in more than 35 countries, where the film travels together with its key protagonists, offers a solid platform to fully develop this active dialogue with the international audiences”, Romanian producer Bianca Oana told FNE.
The film has been thought as a platform for dialogue and it is the first work in a more complex structure. “The international exposure is creating the right context which will expand the self-reflective, transformative process the film initiates, by taking the discussions beyond the cinema space, offering the audience the chance of a direct exchange with the protagonists, within an open debate format called: TOUCH ME NOT - The Politics of Intimacy. We've already had several intense encounters with the audience within this format at several key festivals, such as Karlovy Vary IFF, New Horizons IFF and Transilvania IFF (TIFF), and we're already planning upcoming debates for the French, UK, German, Dutch, Austrian cinema releases scheduled for this autumn”, Oana also said.
Touch Me Not / Nu mă atinge-mă tackles the theme of intimacy through several characters played by professional and non-professional actors from the UK, Germany, Iceland, Bulgaria and Romania (Pintilie herself), and it was produced by Romania’s Manekino Film in coproduction with RohFilm Productions (Germany), PINK from the Czech Republic, Bulgaria’s Agitprop Ltd and France’s Les Films de l'Étranger.
The project received production support from the Romanian Film Centre, EURIMAGES, Torino Film Lab, MDM (Mitteldeutsche Medienförderung) Germany, the Bulgarian National Film Center, the Czech Film Fund and Strasbourg Urban Community. It also received an ARTE award at Cinemart 2011 and MEDIA development support, and was selected for Atelier Cinéfondation of Cannes Film Festival 2012, Binger FilmLab, Torino Film Lab and Sarajevo Work in Progress 2016.
The film was awarded the Golden Bear and the GWFF Best First Feature Award at the 2018 Berlin IFF.
