Maciej Pieprzyca's Life Feels Good at Festival Panorama Europe in Astoria, NY

European Union National Institutes for Culture Museum of the Moving Image
and Polish Cultural Institute present

MACIEJ PIEPRZYCA'S LIFE FEELS GOOD at PANORAMA EUROPE.
Sunday, April 6, 2014, 5:00 PM

Panorama Europe is a unique showcase of eighteen latest contemporary European films. Formerly known as Disappearing Act, the newly rechristened festival, now in its sixth year, continues its mission of showcasing vital European filmmaking at a time when distribution remains challenging for foreign-language films in the United States. Panorama Europe gives New York audiences what may be their only chance to see these acclaimed films from the festival circuit on the big screen. This year's festival will take place at Museum of the Moving Image in Queens and at Bohemian National Hall in Manhattan and runs from April 4 to 13. Among the 18 features presented this year will be one of the most acclaimed Polish movies of 2013: Maciej Pieprzyca's Life Feels Good.

Life Feels Good, which swept the audience and jury awards at the Montreal World Film Festival and had its NY premiere at BAMcinématek in February 2014, chronicles the life of Mateusz (Dawid Ogrodnik) who was born with cerebral palsy and was diagnosed at a very young age as mentally disabled with no ability to communicate. Now 30 years old and institutionalized, he is faced by a committee of physicians who are about to decide his future. For nearly twenty-five years he's been deemed a "vegetable" by doctors and the people surrounding him. The uplifting story, told in flashback, highlights Mateusz's struggle to prove to everyone that despite his physical handicap, he is in fact intelligent.

Brilliantly thesped by non-disabled actors playing the character as both child and grown-up, the film captures as much wonderment as frustration, and is filled with fully fleshed-out characters that defy simple categorization. - VARIETY.

Maciej Pieprzyca is a Polish screenwriter and director. He is a graduate of the Lodz and Katowice State Film Schools. Pieprzyca's 2008 debut, Splinters, was recognized at the Cairo and Houston international film festivals. Since then he has won numerous prizes and distinctions for his documentary films, including The Different, By Knock-Out, I Am a Killer (Turin, Tel Aviv, Cracow, Lodz), as well as the TV films Inferno and the Feast of St Barbara.

Life Feels Good
Poland, 2013, 107 min.
Written and Directed by Maciej Pieprzyca
Cinematography: Pawel Dyllus
Music: Bartosz Chajdecki
Cast: Dawid Ogrodnik, Kamil Tkacz, Dorota Kolak, Arkadiusz Jakubik, Helena Sujecka, Mikolaj Roznerski, Tymoteusz Marciniak, Anna Nehrebecka, Katarzyna Zawadzka, Anna Kaczmarczyk, Agnieszka Kotlarska, Janusz Chabior, Lech Dyblik

Museum of the Moving Image
36-01 35th Ave, Astoria, NY
Tickets: General admission $12
Seniors & students $9
Free for Museum members