The Golden Camera award will be presented to the Academy Award nominated Czech cinematographer Miroslav Ondricek and to Polish director Krzysztof Zanussi, and the Actor's Mission Award to Liv Ullmann. The festival's opening night continues with the screening of the Belgian film, Moscow, Belgium, introduced by director Christophe Van Rompaey and actor Jurgen Delnaet.

The awards continue with the Actor's Mission award going to Chiara Caselli on June 28 and to Omar Sharif on June 29. Rising and established directors from across Eastern and Central Europe attending the festival include Serbia's Zelmir Zilnik with Kenedi is Getting Married, Slovenia's Damien Kozole with Forever, Hungary's Tamas Toth with Wolf, Bosnia's Srdjan Vuletic with It's Hard to be Nice, and Slovakia' Juraj Lehotsky with Blind Loves. A special section of this year's festival is a selection of films supported over the past 20 years by the Hubert Bals Fund, named for founder of the Rotterdam film festival.

The five-member international jury includes Romanian director and screenwriter Cristian Mungiu, Macedonian actress Labina Mitevska, Slovak actor Marián Labuda. The second Holland Film Promotion's Claudia Landsberger Screen Internationalfilm critic David D'Arcy. The festival's three competition sections are the International Competition of Feature Length Film, vying for the Blue Angel and a €15,000 prize; the Eastern Panorama Award, for feature length films from Central and Eastern Europe, with a €7,000 prize; and the Competition of Shorts, with a €5,000 prize. The festival runs through July 6.