“This globe-spanning film hits hard on many levels — visually, intellectually, emotionally. Beautifully shot in Ecuador, Mexico, Africa and Asia, Moldoványi’s film presents images that sparkle in the eye even as they punch you in the heart. Moldoványi introduces us to children in Cambodia, Ecuador, Mexico and the Democratic Republic of Congo, each of whom is struggling to survive.”
"For its masterful filmmaking and restrained approach to an extremely difficult subject, the winner uses evocative images and sound to create an emotionally powerful cinematic experience that challenges and rewards its audience."
Maysles Brothers Award Jury · 31st Starz Denver International Film Festival, 2008
“Wasteland, ruins, misery. This secular oratorio is filmed in black and white, interspersed with colour super sequences shot by the children themselves. It is a radical approach, bringing to mind great films about war-stricken childhood such as Roberto Rossellini’s Germany, Year Zero or Andrei Tarkovsky’s My Name Is Ivan.
In fact, Moldoványi has composed a harrowing and disturbing work; its images will remain imprinted in our memories, and its grave questions in our minds, for a long time to come.”
"Moldoványi has created a shattering and harrowing work; his images linger long in the memory, and his probing questions leave one unsettled. Recalls Rossellini's Germany Year Zero and Tarkovsky's Ivan's Childhood."
Bertrand Bacque · Visions du Réel
“Ferenc Moldovanyi’s remarkable film reaches beyond conventional documentary in search of what he terms ‘a soul-stirring, a more genuine reality’. His subject is Liu Zhixian, a sixty-year-old former professor and member of Budapest’s Chinese community, who fled his home country in 1990. Searching for a new life partner, he resorts to an agency and returns to Beijing to meet his intended young bride.
Deriving much of its power from the dignity of its central character, the film touches on the personal and the political, and the divisions resulting from civilisation and history. A gradual process of self-revelation is complemented by the film’s elegiac images, which take their pace and meaning from his reflections, both humorous and philosophical.”
"Az út is so perfectly photographed that its origins are almost unbelievable. Moldoványi tells the decade's strangest love story in a road movie painted on silk with Chinese ink. A wonderful, watchable film."
Andrew J. Horton · Central Europe Review / Kinoeye
"There are films that stubbornly resist being quickly forgotten. Another Planet is such a film. We admire the director for his courage and persistence — he worked for more than five years to realise this moving and disturbing masterpiece. With his artistic means and deep spirituality he transcends the boundaries of documentary film."International Jury Statement · 57th Filmfestival Mannheim-Heidelberg, 2008
Ferenc Moldoványi is a documentary filmmaker, producer, screenwriter and cinematographer, and an internationally recognized figure in contemporary documentary filmmaking. His feature-length documentaries, made for theatrical release and international circulation, were shot on four continents — often under the most difficult conditions, in post-war crisis zones including the Democratic Republic of Congo, Cambodia and Kosovo. His award-winning films — among them Another Planet, Children – Kosovo 2000 and The Way — have been screened at nearly 160 international film festivals in some 50 countries, and have won more than 40 awards, including the Maysles Brothers Award in Denver, the Special Jury Prize at the Mannheim International Film Festival, and the Grand Prize at CinemAmbiente in Turin.
His films have been broadcast by major international television channels, including the Sundance Channel, Canal+, RTBF, YLE and RTP. His work has been supported by EURIMAGES, the EU MEDIA Plus Programme and the Sundance Documentary Fund. In Budapest, he founded the Engram Film Production Office, through which he produced high-quality creative documentaries in international co-production.
His work has been honoured by UNICEF with the organization’s highest distinction, presented by the Hungarian UNICEF Committee with a personal message from Sir Roger Moore. The Human Rights Institute of the Council of Europe also recognized his work with its Grand Prize.
An American–Hungarian dual citizen, he taught film directing, documentary filmmaking and film production in the United States for more than six years as a tenured Associate Professor at the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley. His students have won numerous international awards. He has given masterclasses in Guadalajara, Tunis, Strasbourg, Tucson and Amsterdam, among other cities.
He served as a member of the EU MEDIA Plus Programme’s producers’ panel and has been a jury member at numerous prestigious international film festivals, including Visions du Réel, FIPA, DocAviv, FesTroia, Prix Europa and the Guadalajara International Film Festival. He has been a voting member of the European Film Academy since 2010. He received his DLA doctorate in 2018 from the University of Theatre and Film Arts in Budapest.
