„Everyone wants to change the world whenever they make the effort to do something. I don’t think I ever believed the world could be changed in the literal sense of the phrase. I thought the world could be described.”
(Krzysztof Kieślowski, from an interview with Stanisław Zawiśliński)
ABOUT SCRIPTEAST, WHY SCRIPTEAST
ScripTeast is a project-based training program, designed specifically for scriptwriters from Eastern and Central Europe. The Independent Film Foundation founded ScripTeast because of a huge undeveloped potential in scriptwriting in this part of the world. There are lots of talented scriptwriters here, but their films are not seen outside their countries. ScripTeast is meant to help them overcome the barriers they encounter. Our aim is to select the best Eastern and Central European scripts and their authors, and help them achieve worldwide recognition. ScripTeast will not teach how to write a script. It is meant to enhance the best scripts’ competitiveness. ScripTeast does not stop at making scripts better. The program is also designed to aid in the projects’ promotion in cooperation with the network of ACE producers and with the Producers Network. The program is modeled on the best examples of similar initiatives and had been prepared on the basis of the Independent Film Foundation’s experience in cooperating with the Sundance Institute. ScripTeast is unique, because it addresses specific problems professional scriptwriters from Eastern Europe struggle with. They often need to subject their talent to low budgets and the limits of their countries’ film industries. Our program is meant to assist them, so that their ideas and films can have an impact reaching far beyond their own countries. This can be a significant step to bring much more films produced in Eastern and Central Europe to viewers in the rest of Europe and the world. ScripTeast starts with one-on-one meetings of internationally acclaimed scriptwriters, directors and producers with authors of 10 – 12 selected scripts from Eastern and Central Europe during a 7-day workshop. Afterwards, ScripTeast provides its participants with an opportunity to write new versions of their scripts with the support and guidance of a chosen Creative Advisor, as well as one of the Heads of Studies.