Kaunas Film Festival introduces the biggest European debut This October, Kaunas International Film Festival will screen British director's Steve McQueen's Hunger - the film that has been acknowledged the greatest discovery of 2008. The filmmaker's first full feature film combining violence and beauty has been praised by the celebrities of the European film industry.

This year, Kaunas International Film Festival will take place in venues dear to film October 1-18, Kaunas International Film Festival will infuse two exclusive Vilnius and Kaunas movie theatres with magic film spirit. In its home city, after a one year break, the festival will return to the legendary “Romuva“ cinema, which has been closed to the city residents most of the time. Meanwhile in the capital, the festival films will be screened October 12-18 in the new “Pasaka“ cinema.

This weekend in Vilnius - films reflecting the real America On Friday, “Redux: Independent American Film Cycle“ arrives at Vilnius cinemas. Films created by independent American filmmakers little known in Lithuania grabbed Kaunas audiences and this weekend will be screened in “Skalvija“ and “Forum Cinemas Vingis“ theatres in Vilnius. The Oscar award winning Milk with Sean Penn will be shown twice in Vilnius to give the cineastes more opportunities to see the film.

Sean Penn's role is full of exuberance and joy Jonathan Romney

Funny, there must be something in the air in America: suddenly, there's exuberance where you wouldn't expect to find it.

You don't often see a smile cracking the features of Sean Penn, who usually looks as if he's grappling with the very conscience of a nation. But in Milk, his face is creased with euphoric mischief throughout. And look at director Gus Van Sant. His last three films - Elephant, Last Days, Paranoid Park - were introspective, formalist essays on youth and sudden death. By contrast, Milk is convivial - about an energetic, articulate social creature - and brimming with political optimism. Like last week's inauguration ceremony, Milk is that rarity, a big affirmative American statement that you don't have to feel embarrassed about being carried along by.

Frisco Bay Blues: 'Medicine for Melancholy' The first in a planned trilogy about San Francisco, writer/director Barry Jenkins' first feature-length film, Medicine for Melancholy, is a love/hate story. The movie opens with Micah (Wyatt Cenac) and Joanne (Tracey Heggins), hung over, in a stranger's bathroom, brushing their teeth with their fingers. The subsequent awkward post-one-night-stand breakfast is tempered by Joanne's distress over her infidelity to her boyfriend. She's beautiful, but she's callous. She's black, as is Micah, and living in a city where African-Americans make up about 7% of the population, and a rise in gentrification is forcing out those who make less than $100,000 a year; Micah is desperate to latch onto what he thinks is the heart of his identity.