In this fifth episode, family bonds are discussed from a political and cinematic perspective.Ana Katz is an Argentine actress, screenwriter, director, and producer. In films such as Musical Chairs (2002), Florianópolis Dream (2018), My Friend from the Park (2015), and The Dog Who Wouldn't Be Quiet (2021), she resorts to unstable and deeply uncomfortable characters to examine, with unpredictable humor, the concept of family. Pablo Stoll is a screenwriter, director, producer, and editor from Uruguay. With Juan Pablo Rebella, he directed two works that have become major landmarks of the latest Latin American cinema boom: 25 Watts (2001) and Whisky (2004), films with minimalist narratives through which he has explored other faces of friendship, family and romantic love.After collaborating together on Whisky, Ana and Pablo have formed a long-standing friendship and in this episode they discuss their respective filmographies to confirm a common element: that private life can also be political. Listen to the fifth...
- 4/27/2022
- MUBI
Nominees for the 12thAnnual Indie Series Awards were revealed Wednesday during a special episode of Serial Scoop Now hosted by actor and entertainer Jo Weil.
Anacostia and The Bay led the pack with 15 nominations each. They are joined in the Best Drama Series category by Arthur, Capital Roar, For the Record, Incompleteness, My Pride and Purgatory.
The comedies were led by The Amazing Gayl Pile: Last Resort with 14 nominations. They are joined in the Best Comedy Series category by Aidy Kane (Really Wants You to Love Him), Cady Did, Cam_Girlfriend, Claire-ity, The Communist's Daughter, Reality Sets In and Searching for Sylvie.
The growing audio fiction genre was added to the ceremony this year. The nominees for Best Audio Series are Around the Sun, Clutch: Chapter 3, Earth Eclipsed, Jack and Lou: A Gangster Love Story, The Ol' Timey Spectral Hour and Silva Lining's Care Plan.
A record number of submissions...
Anacostia and The Bay led the pack with 15 nominations each. They are joined in the Best Drama Series category by Arthur, Capital Roar, For the Record, Incompleteness, My Pride and Purgatory.
The comedies were led by The Amazing Gayl Pile: Last Resort with 14 nominations. They are joined in the Best Comedy Series category by Aidy Kane (Really Wants You to Love Him), Cady Did, Cam_Girlfriend, Claire-ity, The Communist's Daughter, Reality Sets In and Searching for Sylvie.
The growing audio fiction genre was added to the ceremony this year. The nominees for Best Audio Series are Around the Sun, Clutch: Chapter 3, Earth Eclipsed, Jack and Lou: A Gangster Love Story, The Ol' Timey Spectral Hour and Silva Lining's Care Plan.
A record number of submissions...
- 3/12/2022
- by Unknown
- We Love Soaps
After a multi-year hiatus, Pablo Stoll, who broke out with directing partner Juan Pablo Rebella on such hits as “25 Watts” and “Whisky,” is back in the director’s seat, albeit on his own, with “Summer Hit” (“El Tema del Verano”), a zombie pic now shooting on the beaches of Uruguay.
Presented at last year’s Cannes Producers Network, film is co-produced by Temperamento Films (Uruguay), Ice End Content (Chile) and La Unión de los Ríos (Argentina) in association with Nadador Cine (Uruguay).
Ice End Content is the new production shingle formed by Chile’s Florencia Larrea, producer of “My Tender Matador,” and Rodrigo Susarte, director of “The Monster Within,” who are pitching their dark comedy series, “Frankie,” at Sanfic Industria.
Stoll’s fifth feature film starts out as a post-pandemic summer romantic comedy but transforms into a scam film and finally one about the living dead. “Is it possible to...
Presented at last year’s Cannes Producers Network, film is co-produced by Temperamento Films (Uruguay), Ice End Content (Chile) and La Unión de los Ríos (Argentina) in association with Nadador Cine (Uruguay).
Ice End Content is the new production shingle formed by Chile’s Florencia Larrea, producer of “My Tender Matador,” and Rodrigo Susarte, director of “The Monster Within,” who are pitching their dark comedy series, “Frankie,” at Sanfic Industria.
Stoll’s fifth feature film starts out as a post-pandemic summer romantic comedy but transforms into a scam film and finally one about the living dead. “Is it possible to...
- 10/27/2021
- by Anna Marie de la Fuente
- Variety Film + TV
Director of 2017 Cannes Critics’ Week short film winner “The Disinherited,” Laura Ferrés will direct her awaited feature debut “The Permanent Picture,” which is a co-production between Barcelona-based Fasten Films and Le Bureau, based out of Paris and London.
International sales will be handled by The Bureau Sales, the sales arm of the French-British label.
A sort of “depressing comedy” – according to Ferrés – “The Permanent Picture” follows middle-aged Carmen, a casting director whose world collapses when her boss retires and the production company she works for takes a dramatic turn. Carmen will be forced to participate in a campaign for a corrupted party.
Selected by Variety as a Spanish talent to track, Ferrés studied at Barcelona’s prestigious Escac film school. She developed her feature debut script at the Next Step Program, a workshop created by Cannes’ Critics’ Week, The TorinoFilmLab and the Moulin d’Ande screenwriting support program.
“The feature...
International sales will be handled by The Bureau Sales, the sales arm of the French-British label.
A sort of “depressing comedy” – according to Ferrés – “The Permanent Picture” follows middle-aged Carmen, a casting director whose world collapses when her boss retires and the production company she works for takes a dramatic turn. Carmen will be forced to participate in a campaign for a corrupted party.
Selected by Variety as a Spanish talent to track, Ferrés studied at Barcelona’s prestigious Escac film school. She developed her feature debut script at the Next Step Program, a workshop created by Cannes’ Critics’ Week, The TorinoFilmLab and the Moulin d’Ande screenwriting support program.
“The feature...
- 9/22/2020
- by Emilio Mayorga
- Variety Film + TV
Latin America’s Movistar, a label of telecom giant Telefonica, has closed a worldwide sales deal with Madrid-based Onza Distribution on the first four Movistar original series.
The deal excludes Latin America where Movistar has aired the series on Movistar Play, the burgeoning Ott services of pay TV unit Movistar TV, from September 2019. Onza Distribution will present the series virtually at MipChina, which runs July 28-31.
Representing the latest work of some of Latin America’s best-regarded film directors, who have won prizes at the Cannes, Sundance, Locarno and San Sebastian film festivals, the series take in comedies “Adulting,” “Capital Roar” and “Survival Guide,” and melodrama “My Lucky Day.”
The deal represents a major new fiction addition to the sales slate of Onza Distribution, a producer on Amazon Prime Video-aired “Little Coincidences” and a producer and co-sales agent on Spanish pubcaster Rtve’s “The Department of Time.”
Addressing different age groups,...
The deal excludes Latin America where Movistar has aired the series on Movistar Play, the burgeoning Ott services of pay TV unit Movistar TV, from September 2019. Onza Distribution will present the series virtually at MipChina, which runs July 28-31.
Representing the latest work of some of Latin America’s best-regarded film directors, who have won prizes at the Cannes, Sundance, Locarno and San Sebastian film festivals, the series take in comedies “Adulting,” “Capital Roar” and “Survival Guide,” and melodrama “My Lucky Day.”
The deal represents a major new fiction addition to the sales slate of Onza Distribution, a producer on Amazon Prime Video-aired “Little Coincidences” and a producer and co-sales agent on Spanish pubcaster Rtve’s “The Department of Time.”
Addressing different age groups,...
- 7/13/2020
- by John Hopewell
- Variety Film + TV
Pablo Stoll’s “Summer Hit,” Matías Lucchessi’s “Las rojas,” Joaquín Peñagaricano and Pablo Abdala’s “Mateína” are some of the Uruguayan projects at different stages participating in a spotlight at Cannes’ Producers Network on the Marché du Film’s digital platform on Tuesday 23.
Five Uruguayan companies, Tarkiofilm, Cimarrón, Montelona, Nadador and Salado, have been selected by the country’s national film body Icau to pitch their production slates at the new format French market.
Recently appointed general director at Icau, Uruguay’s film-tv agency, Roberto Blatt told Variety that Uruguay shows a “maturity in its cinema, backed by a great diversity of formats, genres and styles, and the high creative and technical levels of our professionals.” He went on to say, “That was made evident by the success of titles made free through Vera TV [Uruguayan broadcaster Antel’s digital platform] during the pandemic.”
Blatt pointed out that the Uruguayan public...
Five Uruguayan companies, Tarkiofilm, Cimarrón, Montelona, Nadador and Salado, have been selected by the country’s national film body Icau to pitch their production slates at the new format French market.
Recently appointed general director at Icau, Uruguay’s film-tv agency, Roberto Blatt told Variety that Uruguay shows a “maturity in its cinema, backed by a great diversity of formats, genres and styles, and the high creative and technical levels of our professionals.” He went on to say, “That was made evident by the success of titles made free through Vera TV [Uruguayan broadcaster Antel’s digital platform] during the pandemic.”
Blatt pointed out that the Uruguayan public...
- 6/22/2020
- by Emilio Mayorga
- Variety Film + TV
Berlin — Slowly but surely, Madrid-based Telefonica’s original production drive is building on the other side of the Atlantic. The first Latin American series to be seen in Europe is “Ruido capital,” a Colombian six-episode series, a coming of age story that follows a group of misfit teenagers as they battle to form a rock band during the fraught period of 1990s Bogota. A show that lightheartedly manages to explore those strange years of adolescence as they unspool against a very real, very tough historical background.
The series is produced with Fidelio, an Colombian production company who has Mauricio Leiva Cock as its inhouse showrunner, a filmmaker who before his debut feature premieres has already worked as co creator of “Green Frontier” for Netflix, head writer on “Falco” for Amazon, TNT and Telemundo, and a writer on “Wild District,” again for Netflix, among others. Co directing with Argentina’s Ana Katz...
The series is produced with Fidelio, an Colombian production company who has Mauricio Leiva Cock as its inhouse showrunner, a filmmaker who before his debut feature premieres has already worked as co creator of “Green Frontier” for Netflix, head writer on “Falco” for Amazon, TNT and Telemundo, and a writer on “Wild District,” again for Netflix, among others. Co directing with Argentina’s Ana Katz...
- 2/24/2020
- by Emiliano Granada
- Variety Film + TV
Leading international sales agency-production-distribution company, FiGa Films, has snagged all worldwide rights to “This is Cristina” (“Ella es Cristina”), the directorial debut of Chilean scribe Gonzalo Maza, who has co-written four of Sebastian Lelio’s films, including his Oscar-winning “A Fantastic Woman” and Berlin Festival winner “Gloria.”
“It’s a pleasure to collaborate with Gonzalo, whose writing we’ve admired so much in the past. He’s got a great future as a director and we’re fortunate to be behind his lovely feature,” said FiGa’s Sandro Fiorin who has already sold it to China’s Beijing Hualu NewMedia.
Produced by Primate Lab, Noise Media and Maza’s Mar Humano, the black and white dramedy revolves around the titular Cristina and her best friend, played by Mariana Derderian and Paloma Salas, who are both in their 30s. After a major bust up between them, Cristina’s life spirals just...
“It’s a pleasure to collaborate with Gonzalo, whose writing we’ve admired so much in the past. He’s got a great future as a director and we’re fortunate to be behind his lovely feature,” said FiGa’s Sandro Fiorin who has already sold it to China’s Beijing Hualu NewMedia.
Produced by Primate Lab, Noise Media and Maza’s Mar Humano, the black and white dramedy revolves around the titular Cristina and her best friend, played by Mariana Derderian and Paloma Salas, who are both in their 30s. After a major bust up between them, Cristina’s life spirals just...
- 10/17/2019
- by Anna Marie de la Fuente
- Variety Film + TV
In the run-up to next month’s Cannes Festival, Cologne-based Media Luna New Films has acquired international rights to “We Had It Coming,” starring Natalie Krill and Brazil’s “The Friendly Man,” one of the standouts at Ventana Sur’s strong Copia Final showcase of near-finished Latin American movies.
MK2 Mile End will distribute “We Had It Coming” in Canada; O2 Play, the theatrical, TV and DVD distribution company of Fernando Mereilles’ O2 Filmes production house, will release “The Friendly Man,” now in advanced post-production, in Brazil.
Media Luna will introduce both titles to buyers at next month’s Cannes Film Market.
“We Had It Coming,” the English-language debut of Montreal based Paul Barbeau, and “The Friendly Man,” with Brazilian rock star Paulo Miklos as its male lead, tackle issues which are liable of becoming trending topics at this year’s Cannes Film Market: Women fighting back; men questioning their...
MK2 Mile End will distribute “We Had It Coming” in Canada; O2 Play, the theatrical, TV and DVD distribution company of Fernando Mereilles’ O2 Filmes production house, will release “The Friendly Man,” now in advanced post-production, in Brazil.
Media Luna will introduce both titles to buyers at next month’s Cannes Film Market.
“We Had It Coming,” the English-language debut of Montreal based Paul Barbeau, and “The Friendly Man,” with Brazilian rock star Paulo Miklos as its male lead, tackle issues which are liable of becoming trending topics at this year’s Cannes Film Market: Women fighting back; men questioning their...
- 4/23/2019
- by John Hopewell
- Variety Film + TV
Madrid — Women fighting back. Three of the six titles in Ventana Sur’s Copia Final this year picture women confronting outrage or tragedy – gender violence (“Do You Like Me?”), the abduction of a new born baby (“Song Without a Name”) or the death of a husband (“Venezia”) – and reacting, in multifarious fashions.
“Do You Like Me?” has a thriller edge. Three more, underscoring Latin American cinema’s current broad range, show Latin American filmmakers enrolling mainstream beats to appeal beyond traditional arthouse audiences in more accessible titles, whether in an unusual immigration drama (“Marionette”), or via empathy with a challenged protagonist (“The Friendly Man”) or a straight-up coming of age tale (“This Is Not Berlin”).
Set in Buenos Aires’ housing projects, “Do You Like Me?” starts as a crime thriller, then bucks generic commonplaces as it delivers a numbing gender violence and revenge drama. Authentic in setting, observance of daily...
“Do You Like Me?” has a thriller edge. Three more, underscoring Latin American cinema’s current broad range, show Latin American filmmakers enrolling mainstream beats to appeal beyond traditional arthouse audiences in more accessible titles, whether in an unusual immigration drama (“Marionette”), or via empathy with a challenged protagonist (“The Friendly Man”) or a straight-up coming of age tale (“This Is Not Berlin”).
Set in Buenos Aires’ housing projects, “Do You Like Me?” starts as a crime thriller, then bucks generic commonplaces as it delivers a numbing gender violence and revenge drama. Authentic in setting, observance of daily...
- 11/26/2018
- by John Hopewell
- Variety Film + TV
Ana Katz’s “Sueño Florianópolis” has been generating buzz this week at the Karlovy Vary Film Festival, where the Argentine film world premiered in the main competition. Variety’s Guy Lodge praised Katz for keeping “the mood appealingly low-key in this semi-sweet study of a disbanding family on vacation.”
This builds on Katz’s strong record at major festivals. “Musical Chairs” won the San Sebastian Made in Spanish award while “A Stray Girlfriend” was selected for Cannes’ Un Certain Regard. “Los Marziano” was part of the official selection at San Sebastián and “My Friend from the Park” won her the screenwriting award at Sundance.
She has appeared as an actress in a number of critical and box office successes in her native Argentina, such as Juan Pablo Rebella and Pablo Stoll’s Cannes hit “Whisky” and Paco León’s “Kiki, Love to Love,” nominated for four Spanish Academy Goya Awards,...
This builds on Katz’s strong record at major festivals. “Musical Chairs” won the San Sebastian Made in Spanish award while “A Stray Girlfriend” was selected for Cannes’ Un Certain Regard. “Los Marziano” was part of the official selection at San Sebastián and “My Friend from the Park” won her the screenwriting award at Sundance.
She has appeared as an actress in a number of critical and box office successes in her native Argentina, such as Juan Pablo Rebella and Pablo Stoll’s Cannes hit “Whisky” and Paco León’s “Kiki, Love to Love,” nominated for four Spanish Academy Goya Awards,...
- 7/6/2018
- by Jamie Lang
- Variety Film + TV
Top brass at the festival, set to run from September 24-October 8, have announced the selections in Focus Mexico.
The films are as follows:
Focus Mexico
The Obscure Spring (Las Oscuras Primaveras)
Ernesto Contreras
Manuela Jankovic’s War (La Guerra De Manuela Jankovic)
Diana Cardozo
González
Christian Díaz Pardo
Asteroide
Marcelo Tobar
The Absent (Los Ausentes)
Nicolás Pereda
Cumbres
Gabriel Nuncio
We Are Mari Pepa (Somos Mari Pepa)
Samuel Kishi
The Well (Manto Acuífero)
Michael Rowe
Güeros
Alonso Ruizpalacios
Cantinflas
Sebastian del Amo
Los Angeles
Damian John Harper
The Amazing Catfish (Los Insólitos Peces Gato)
Claudia Sainte-Luce
The Empty Hours (Las Horas Muertas)
Aaron Fernandez.
Panorama section
Words With Gods (Palabras Con Dioses)
Guillermo Arriaga, Héctor Babenco, Warwick Thornton, Mira Nair, Hideo Nakata, Amos Gitai, Álex de la Iglesia, Emir Kusturica, Bahman Ghobadi
Short Plays
Daniel Gruener, Carlos Reygadas, Fernando Eimbcke, Felipe Gómez, Alejandro Valle, Karim Aïnouz, Marcelo Gomes, Pablo Fendrik, Pablo Stoll, [link...
The films are as follows:
Focus Mexico
The Obscure Spring (Las Oscuras Primaveras)
Ernesto Contreras
Manuela Jankovic’s War (La Guerra De Manuela Jankovic)
Diana Cardozo
González
Christian Díaz Pardo
Asteroide
Marcelo Tobar
The Absent (Los Ausentes)
Nicolás Pereda
Cumbres
Gabriel Nuncio
We Are Mari Pepa (Somos Mari Pepa)
Samuel Kishi
The Well (Manto Acuífero)
Michael Rowe
Güeros
Alonso Ruizpalacios
Cantinflas
Sebastian del Amo
Los Angeles
Damian John Harper
The Amazing Catfish (Los Insólitos Peces Gato)
Claudia Sainte-Luce
The Empty Hours (Las Horas Muertas)
Aaron Fernandez.
Panorama section
Words With Gods (Palabras Con Dioses)
Guillermo Arriaga, Héctor Babenco, Warwick Thornton, Mira Nair, Hideo Nakata, Amos Gitai, Álex de la Iglesia, Emir Kusturica, Bahman Ghobadi
Short Plays
Daniel Gruener, Carlos Reygadas, Fernando Eimbcke, Felipe Gómez, Alejandro Valle, Karim Aïnouz, Marcelo Gomes, Pablo Fendrik, Pablo Stoll, [link...
- 9/14/2014
- by jeremykay67@gmail.com (Jeremy Kay)
- ScreenDaily
As a film fan, self-professed cinenerd, and an ex-film programmer at the New York International Latino Film Festival, the closure of the long-running fest last year was soul crushing. There are very few spaces dedicated to exhibiting Latino cinema and a lot of the remaining ones are on shaky ground.
Simultaneously though — as many U.S. Latino film institutions are on their last legs — movies directed by Latin American-born filmmakers are circling the globe at prestigious film festivals, winning awards, and garnering praise from critics. Production numbers, south of our border, have risen astronomically. It’s a renewal, renaissance, new wave — whatever you want to call it — that began in the mid-nineties. The Film Society of Lincoln Center, with its eye on this rebirth, founded a film series in 1997. A yearly showcase of the newest voices in Latin American cinema, it would eventually be called Latinbeat.
This year’s Latinbeat, running July 11 – 20, carries on with its mission of presenting emerging directors and film trends from across Latin America with movies from powerhouses like Argentina, Mexico, Chile, and Brazil plus countries with smaller film industries like Uruguay, Colombia, Ecuador, Costa Rica, Venezuela, and the Dominican Republic. From films about a Mexican garage band ("We Are Mari Pepa") to heavy metal in the Andes ("Holiday") and from first-time directors as well as established ones, this year’s lineup is centered on young protagonists.
In advance of the series’ opening night, I got the chance to chat with Marcela Goglio — Latinbeat’s film programmer since 1999 — about the origins of the longstanding showcase, how she ended up at the Film Society of Lincoln Center, and the constant rebirth of Latin American cinema. Plus, there are some good stories about the struggles of getting filmmakers to their screenings on time. Spoiler alert: if something can go wrong, it will.
When did the Latinbeat series start? Was there something specific that motivated the creation of the series?
Latinbeat started in 1997, conceived by Richard Peña, the Programming Director of the Film Society of Lincoln Center at the time (and until the end of 2012.) He actually programmed that first edition. I came in as an intern that year and helped with the marketing, outreach, and with Q&As. He came up with the idea mainly because at the time there was a very evident explosion or renaissance of film in Latin America, mainly Argentina, Brazil, and Mexico (the so called “New Argentine Cinema” started in the mid 90s). By explosion I mean not only a spike in quantity but mainly there was some really interesting formal exploration going on and new kinds of films emerging as a reaction to drastically changing socio-political realities — end of dictatorships in some countries, devastating economic crises that changed the social landscape in others — in a film landscape that, up until then, had become rather stale. It was the perfect time and there was a real need, as no other venues existed that were showcasing that cinema in New York. Latinbeat was the very first to showcase these new emerging filmmakers that later became such symbols of their time.
Where did the name Latinbeat come from?
Richard Peña chose the name. I think it was a reference to precisely an urgent, watershed moment, urgent films, something palpitating in the air that the festival wanted to capture. Also, it was a reference to a new rhythm or language that was being created.
How did you end up programming the series?
Newly arrived in New York City in 1997, after having lived in Costa Rica for four years where I worked as a journalist and programmed a series of Latin American cinema at the Spanish Cultural Center, I heard that Richard Peña, whom I had studied under at Columbia University before moving to Costa Rica, was organizing a Latin American film festival. (At the time it was called “Latin American Cinema Now.”) I called him up and volunteered to help on that festival that he programmed. So I became an intern at the Film Society helping with Latin American outreach and other stuff. In 1998, he asked me and a fellow colleague, Cord Dueppe, to program the following edition in 1999 (it was biannual back then) and we programmed the subsequent editions together. Ines Aslan, from the Public Relations department, joined our team around 2003 under Richard’s guidance. In 2007, I became the sole programmer (Ines and Cord left the Film Society) and have programmed it since.
Richard Peña, former Programming Director at the Film Society of Lincoln Center
Can you describe the process of discovering and selecting the films each year? How is the process different now than when you first started?
I take submissions — and I watch everything that is sent to me — but I don’t do an open call for entries. Up until recently, I had traveled to the Havana Film Festival almost every year since 1996 and to every Bafici (Buenos Aires Independent Film Festival) since its first edition 12 years ago and I go to a few other festivals. Distribution companies send me titles and screeners but mostly the process involves keeping up to date with productions in the region through connections with film schools, institutes, filmmakers, and producers with whom I have developed a relationship with over the years. Also, of course, I follow the programming at all the other festivals.
The process now is different in that there are many more films to watch because, amongst other things, of an explosion in production in other countries in the region (and more production too in the aforementioned strongest countries: Argentina, Mexico, Brazil). The programming, necessarily, must become more complex because there is more to choose from and more variety but also more festivals that compete for the same films. There are more films to watch but because of technology it is also easier, in a sense, since viewing links get sent quickly instead of having to wait for screeners or videos via mail.
What was the biggest challenge in the first year of the series?
Getting a crossover audience, in terms of nationality.
Marcela Goglio with Yamandu Ross, co-director of '3 Million'
What years do you feel were the heyday of the series? What are some of your favorite memories of that time?
Definitely 2003 – 2004, when the festival was hugely successful — we had sold out screenings back to back — and longer, it ran for three weeks. We had a lot of Cuban cinema and my very favorite sidebar (in 2003) was these fabulous archival Cuban music documentaries (from the 50s, 60s, 70s) that we brought back from Havana and were never again shown in the city, or the U.S. The theater was packed and now, looking back, I realize we should have repeated that program. It was also the first year that I started to notice some crossover amongst audiences — Mexicans coming to see Chilean films, Argentines to see Cuban, etc — and that was thrilling.
One of my favorite memories is recognizing a Mexican bus boy from a neighborhood restaurant who came to see Carlos Sorin’s "Intimate Stories" (a small independent film from Argentina). He was standing in the back — there were no empty seats in the theater — laughing like crazy. One of the great things of those years too was that this “renaissance of Latin American cinema” that had started in the early/mid 90s was starting to come into its own and become more well known and popular abroad. Seeing such a new independent cinema gain popularity and fill the theaters — at least in NY, it definitely was not happening in Latin America, which made it even more exciting and special — was very gratifying. It felt like we were really a part of that big change that Latin America was experiencing cinematically.
Have you ever had trouble getting filmmakers to New York for their screenings?
In 2011, we opened the festival with Gustavo Taretto’s "Sidewalls" from Argentina. Taretto, who is of Italian descent and had a beard at the time, was coming for opening night and he almost didn’t make it because he was held up at the airport and being questioned. He claimed it was because of his “Middle Eastern” appearance. The irony is that Coca Cola was one of his clients; when the officers stopped him at the airport (because of his beard) and asked him his profession he made a joke about how he actually helped the American Empire — I’m paraphrasing — impose its products on the rest of the world.
Gustavo Taretto and Marcela Goglio
Something similar happened to another opening night guest, Roxana Blanco, coming to introduce the Uruguayan film "Kill Them All", a political thriller set in Uruguay. This time it was not because of her appearance, but because of the title of the film.
It also happened to the director and producer (Kenya Marquez and Karla Uribe) of Expiration Date, the opening night film in 2012. There was a storm so they were delayed arriving from the airport and couldn’t introduce the film. They finally showed up as the film was ending, direct from the airport and soaking wet, and practically changed in the lobby before marching into the theater to do the Q&A.
To Gustavo Taretto, it actually happened twice in that trip. After opening night (a Friday, I think) he had to travel to Mexico for a publicity gig. On his way back to New York, where he had to introduce his second screening, he was singled out in the immigration line (supposedly again because of his beard) and questioned right there.
Are there filmmakers who screened their first film at Latinbeat and are now big names? Do you feel like you took part in discovering them?
None of these are “big names” but are well known now in the Latin American film world, with a respected body of work; I feel like we took part in discovering many of them, but not all: Celina Murga, Argentina ("Ana y los otros," ‘04), Damian Szifron, Argentina ("En el fondo del mar," ‘03 ), Matias Bize, Chile ("Sabado" ‘04), Marite Ugas and Mariana Rondon from Venezuela ("A la medianoche y media," ‘01), Juan Pablo Rebella and Pablo Stoll from Uruguay ("25 Watts," ‘01), Everardo Gonzalez, Mexico ("Cancion del pulque," ‘04), Nicolas Pereda, Mexico ( "Perpetuum Mobile"— his second feature film, ‘09), Matias Meyer, Mexico ("Wadley," ‘08 ), Martin Rejtman, Argentina ("Silvia Prieto" — his second film, ‘99), Mercedes Moncada, Mexico/Nicaragua ("La pasion de Maria Elena," ‘03), Pedro Gonzales Rubio and Carlos Armella, Mexico ( "Toro Negro," ‘05), and finally Juan Jose Campanella from Argentina, we showed his "El mismo amor, la misma lluvia" in 1999. He went on to win an Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film in 2009 for "El secreto de sus ojos."
Matias Meyer, director of 'The Cramp' with Marcela Goglio
How does film production compare now to when Latinbeat started?
Numbers of films have increased twenty fold or more, in most countries — a lot. Mexico, Argentina and Brazil continue to produce the most but the main difference is that countries like Chile, Uruguay, Colombia and Venezuela — though Venezuela always had a high production — underwent their own explosion in the last years, as you might have heard. So, they are also important players. Another big difference is precisely the variety of themes, formal approaches and, storylines — political and personal, different genres — though the “independent”, low budget, formal exploration strain continues to be strong in all the countries, which is what is so fascinating. It’s as if the cinema in the region is constantly renewing itself. Also, the fact that there is this variety of genres, levels of production, styles — and the fact that there are some solid commercial films produced and consumed regularly in some of these countries — to me is an indication that there is an industry that’s getting strong. That is really great, even if we may not love everything that is being produced.
Have you ever considered including U.S. Latino films in Latinbeat?
We did include a few over the years — the Dominican-American "Red Passport" and the films of U.S.-based Puerto Rican director Mario Diaz. But, we focused on Latin America mostly and we understood that as separate from “Latino”. Also, the New York International Latino Film Festival seemed to have that area covered those years. [The Nyilff launched in 1999.] Now that that festival is gone [Nyilff], I would want to consider more Latino films. I also don’t see the “Latino” and “Latin American” as that separate anymore.
What is your favorite part of being a film programmer?
I love almost all aspects of it: watching the films (even when they’re not always great); choosing them and finding the best ways to make them work together; and finally, meeting the filmmakers and having conversations with them and the audience, onstage, brings everything full circle.
Pablo Cerda, director of 'P.E.' with Marcela Goglio
When you want to just sit on the couch and unwind what sort of films do you watch in your spare time?
I generally don’t watch films to unwind — I prefer to read. But these days I enjoy watching Argentine public television — many filmmakers are directing great series.
Did you ever want to be a filmmaker?
I did, a screenwriter. But wasn’t 100% sure. I went to film school briefly at the Universidad del Cine, in Buenos Aires, while I studied Journalism at Universidad de Buenos Aires.
This year, there are lots of films about young people, from "Somos Mari Pepa" (Mexico) to "Holiday" (Ecuador) and "Mateo" (Colombia). The opening night film "Casa Grande" also centers on a teenager but in Brazil. Was this on purpose? Is it a reflection of a larger trend in Latin American filmmaking?
"The Militant," "Root," "The Summer of Flying Fish" and "Natural Sciences" are also about young people and are a variation of “coming of age” stories. So it is definitely a recurring theme in the program. Yes, it’s on purpose. Most of our past editions have had many young first-time directors; it has been like this from the start. We look to reflect the region’s new trends with the program, to highlight emerging talents always, even if they might have imperfect films. And some of these titles mentioned are definitely by filmmakers to watch.
Latinbeat runs July 11 – 20 at The Film Society of Lincoln Center’s Walter Reade Theater.
Simultaneously though — as many U.S. Latino film institutions are on their last legs — movies directed by Latin American-born filmmakers are circling the globe at prestigious film festivals, winning awards, and garnering praise from critics. Production numbers, south of our border, have risen astronomically. It’s a renewal, renaissance, new wave — whatever you want to call it — that began in the mid-nineties. The Film Society of Lincoln Center, with its eye on this rebirth, founded a film series in 1997. A yearly showcase of the newest voices in Latin American cinema, it would eventually be called Latinbeat.
This year’s Latinbeat, running July 11 – 20, carries on with its mission of presenting emerging directors and film trends from across Latin America with movies from powerhouses like Argentina, Mexico, Chile, and Brazil plus countries with smaller film industries like Uruguay, Colombia, Ecuador, Costa Rica, Venezuela, and the Dominican Republic. From films about a Mexican garage band ("We Are Mari Pepa") to heavy metal in the Andes ("Holiday") and from first-time directors as well as established ones, this year’s lineup is centered on young protagonists.
In advance of the series’ opening night, I got the chance to chat with Marcela Goglio — Latinbeat’s film programmer since 1999 — about the origins of the longstanding showcase, how she ended up at the Film Society of Lincoln Center, and the constant rebirth of Latin American cinema. Plus, there are some good stories about the struggles of getting filmmakers to their screenings on time. Spoiler alert: if something can go wrong, it will.
When did the Latinbeat series start? Was there something specific that motivated the creation of the series?
Latinbeat started in 1997, conceived by Richard Peña, the Programming Director of the Film Society of Lincoln Center at the time (and until the end of 2012.) He actually programmed that first edition. I came in as an intern that year and helped with the marketing, outreach, and with Q&As. He came up with the idea mainly because at the time there was a very evident explosion or renaissance of film in Latin America, mainly Argentina, Brazil, and Mexico (the so called “New Argentine Cinema” started in the mid 90s). By explosion I mean not only a spike in quantity but mainly there was some really interesting formal exploration going on and new kinds of films emerging as a reaction to drastically changing socio-political realities — end of dictatorships in some countries, devastating economic crises that changed the social landscape in others — in a film landscape that, up until then, had become rather stale. It was the perfect time and there was a real need, as no other venues existed that were showcasing that cinema in New York. Latinbeat was the very first to showcase these new emerging filmmakers that later became such symbols of their time.
Where did the name Latinbeat come from?
Richard Peña chose the name. I think it was a reference to precisely an urgent, watershed moment, urgent films, something palpitating in the air that the festival wanted to capture. Also, it was a reference to a new rhythm or language that was being created.
How did you end up programming the series?
Newly arrived in New York City in 1997, after having lived in Costa Rica for four years where I worked as a journalist and programmed a series of Latin American cinema at the Spanish Cultural Center, I heard that Richard Peña, whom I had studied under at Columbia University before moving to Costa Rica, was organizing a Latin American film festival. (At the time it was called “Latin American Cinema Now.”) I called him up and volunteered to help on that festival that he programmed. So I became an intern at the Film Society helping with Latin American outreach and other stuff. In 1998, he asked me and a fellow colleague, Cord Dueppe, to program the following edition in 1999 (it was biannual back then) and we programmed the subsequent editions together. Ines Aslan, from the Public Relations department, joined our team around 2003 under Richard’s guidance. In 2007, I became the sole programmer (Ines and Cord left the Film Society) and have programmed it since.
Richard Peña, former Programming Director at the Film Society of Lincoln Center
Can you describe the process of discovering and selecting the films each year? How is the process different now than when you first started?
I take submissions — and I watch everything that is sent to me — but I don’t do an open call for entries. Up until recently, I had traveled to the Havana Film Festival almost every year since 1996 and to every Bafici (Buenos Aires Independent Film Festival) since its first edition 12 years ago and I go to a few other festivals. Distribution companies send me titles and screeners but mostly the process involves keeping up to date with productions in the region through connections with film schools, institutes, filmmakers, and producers with whom I have developed a relationship with over the years. Also, of course, I follow the programming at all the other festivals.
The process now is different in that there are many more films to watch because, amongst other things, of an explosion in production in other countries in the region (and more production too in the aforementioned strongest countries: Argentina, Mexico, Brazil). The programming, necessarily, must become more complex because there is more to choose from and more variety but also more festivals that compete for the same films. There are more films to watch but because of technology it is also easier, in a sense, since viewing links get sent quickly instead of having to wait for screeners or videos via mail.
What was the biggest challenge in the first year of the series?
Getting a crossover audience, in terms of nationality.
Marcela Goglio with Yamandu Ross, co-director of '3 Million'
What years do you feel were the heyday of the series? What are some of your favorite memories of that time?
Definitely 2003 – 2004, when the festival was hugely successful — we had sold out screenings back to back — and longer, it ran for three weeks. We had a lot of Cuban cinema and my very favorite sidebar (in 2003) was these fabulous archival Cuban music documentaries (from the 50s, 60s, 70s) that we brought back from Havana and were never again shown in the city, or the U.S. The theater was packed and now, looking back, I realize we should have repeated that program. It was also the first year that I started to notice some crossover amongst audiences — Mexicans coming to see Chilean films, Argentines to see Cuban, etc — and that was thrilling.
One of my favorite memories is recognizing a Mexican bus boy from a neighborhood restaurant who came to see Carlos Sorin’s "Intimate Stories" (a small independent film from Argentina). He was standing in the back — there were no empty seats in the theater — laughing like crazy. One of the great things of those years too was that this “renaissance of Latin American cinema” that had started in the early/mid 90s was starting to come into its own and become more well known and popular abroad. Seeing such a new independent cinema gain popularity and fill the theaters — at least in NY, it definitely was not happening in Latin America, which made it even more exciting and special — was very gratifying. It felt like we were really a part of that big change that Latin America was experiencing cinematically.
Have you ever had trouble getting filmmakers to New York for their screenings?
In 2011, we opened the festival with Gustavo Taretto’s "Sidewalls" from Argentina. Taretto, who is of Italian descent and had a beard at the time, was coming for opening night and he almost didn’t make it because he was held up at the airport and being questioned. He claimed it was because of his “Middle Eastern” appearance. The irony is that Coca Cola was one of his clients; when the officers stopped him at the airport (because of his beard) and asked him his profession he made a joke about how he actually helped the American Empire — I’m paraphrasing — impose its products on the rest of the world.
Gustavo Taretto and Marcela Goglio
Something similar happened to another opening night guest, Roxana Blanco, coming to introduce the Uruguayan film "Kill Them All", a political thriller set in Uruguay. This time it was not because of her appearance, but because of the title of the film.
It also happened to the director and producer (Kenya Marquez and Karla Uribe) of Expiration Date, the opening night film in 2012. There was a storm so they were delayed arriving from the airport and couldn’t introduce the film. They finally showed up as the film was ending, direct from the airport and soaking wet, and practically changed in the lobby before marching into the theater to do the Q&A.
To Gustavo Taretto, it actually happened twice in that trip. After opening night (a Friday, I think) he had to travel to Mexico for a publicity gig. On his way back to New York, where he had to introduce his second screening, he was singled out in the immigration line (supposedly again because of his beard) and questioned right there.
Are there filmmakers who screened their first film at Latinbeat and are now big names? Do you feel like you took part in discovering them?
None of these are “big names” but are well known now in the Latin American film world, with a respected body of work; I feel like we took part in discovering many of them, but not all: Celina Murga, Argentina ("Ana y los otros," ‘04), Damian Szifron, Argentina ("En el fondo del mar," ‘03 ), Matias Bize, Chile ("Sabado" ‘04), Marite Ugas and Mariana Rondon from Venezuela ("A la medianoche y media," ‘01), Juan Pablo Rebella and Pablo Stoll from Uruguay ("25 Watts," ‘01), Everardo Gonzalez, Mexico ("Cancion del pulque," ‘04), Nicolas Pereda, Mexico ( "Perpetuum Mobile"— his second feature film, ‘09), Matias Meyer, Mexico ("Wadley," ‘08 ), Martin Rejtman, Argentina ("Silvia Prieto" — his second film, ‘99), Mercedes Moncada, Mexico/Nicaragua ("La pasion de Maria Elena," ‘03), Pedro Gonzales Rubio and Carlos Armella, Mexico ( "Toro Negro," ‘05), and finally Juan Jose Campanella from Argentina, we showed his "El mismo amor, la misma lluvia" in 1999. He went on to win an Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film in 2009 for "El secreto de sus ojos."
Matias Meyer, director of 'The Cramp' with Marcela Goglio
How does film production compare now to when Latinbeat started?
Numbers of films have increased twenty fold or more, in most countries — a lot. Mexico, Argentina and Brazil continue to produce the most but the main difference is that countries like Chile, Uruguay, Colombia and Venezuela — though Venezuela always had a high production — underwent their own explosion in the last years, as you might have heard. So, they are also important players. Another big difference is precisely the variety of themes, formal approaches and, storylines — political and personal, different genres — though the “independent”, low budget, formal exploration strain continues to be strong in all the countries, which is what is so fascinating. It’s as if the cinema in the region is constantly renewing itself. Also, the fact that there is this variety of genres, levels of production, styles — and the fact that there are some solid commercial films produced and consumed regularly in some of these countries — to me is an indication that there is an industry that’s getting strong. That is really great, even if we may not love everything that is being produced.
Have you ever considered including U.S. Latino films in Latinbeat?
We did include a few over the years — the Dominican-American "Red Passport" and the films of U.S.-based Puerto Rican director Mario Diaz. But, we focused on Latin America mostly and we understood that as separate from “Latino”. Also, the New York International Latino Film Festival seemed to have that area covered those years. [The Nyilff launched in 1999.] Now that that festival is gone [Nyilff], I would want to consider more Latino films. I also don’t see the “Latino” and “Latin American” as that separate anymore.
What is your favorite part of being a film programmer?
I love almost all aspects of it: watching the films (even when they’re not always great); choosing them and finding the best ways to make them work together; and finally, meeting the filmmakers and having conversations with them and the audience, onstage, brings everything full circle.
Pablo Cerda, director of 'P.E.' with Marcela Goglio
When you want to just sit on the couch and unwind what sort of films do you watch in your spare time?
I generally don’t watch films to unwind — I prefer to read. But these days I enjoy watching Argentine public television — many filmmakers are directing great series.
Did you ever want to be a filmmaker?
I did, a screenwriter. But wasn’t 100% sure. I went to film school briefly at the Universidad del Cine, in Buenos Aires, while I studied Journalism at Universidad de Buenos Aires.
This year, there are lots of films about young people, from "Somos Mari Pepa" (Mexico) to "Holiday" (Ecuador) and "Mateo" (Colombia). The opening night film "Casa Grande" also centers on a teenager but in Brazil. Was this on purpose? Is it a reflection of a larger trend in Latin American filmmaking?
"The Militant," "Root," "The Summer of Flying Fish" and "Natural Sciences" are also about young people and are a variation of “coming of age” stories. So it is definitely a recurring theme in the program. Yes, it’s on purpose. Most of our past editions have had many young first-time directors; it has been like this from the start. We look to reflect the region’s new trends with the program, to highlight emerging talents always, even if they might have imperfect films. And some of these titles mentioned are definitely by filmmakers to watch.
Latinbeat runs July 11 – 20 at The Film Society of Lincoln Center’s Walter Reade Theater.
- 7/16/2014
- by Vanessa Erazo
- Sydney's Buzz
Organisers have announced the 16 projects selected for the inaugural edition of its international co-production market: Fantastic Market | Mercado Fantastico.
The market runs from Sept 19-21 in Austin, Texas. The festival proper runs from Sept 19-26.
The projects are: Belzebuth (Mexico) by Emilio Portes; Club Panico (Mexico) by Adrian Garcia Bogliano; Compulsion (Us) by Batan Silva; Cross Of Souls (Brazil) by Dennison Ramalho; El Duende (Colombia) by Jorge Navas; El Plata (Argentina) by Tamae Garateguy; El Arbol Del Olvido (The Tree Of Oblivion) (Canada) by Rodrigo Gudiño; and Greedy Beasts (Spain) by Juan Martínez Moreno.
The list includes The Incident (Mexico) by Isaac Ezban (first feature); Small Town (Uruguay) by Gustavo Hernández Ibáñez; The Summer Hit (Uruguay-Chile-Brazil) by Pablo Stoll; and Tatewari (Mexico) by Edgar Nito; Us Visitor (Argentina) by Nicolas Goldbart; The Wrong Place (Cuba-us) by Alejandro Brugués; Violent Rider (Chile) by Ernesto Diaz Espinosa; and Yamaha 300 (Mexico) by Jorge Michel Grau (Somos Lo Que Hay).
The market runs from Sept 19-21 in Austin, Texas. The festival proper runs from Sept 19-26.
The projects are: Belzebuth (Mexico) by Emilio Portes; Club Panico (Mexico) by Adrian Garcia Bogliano; Compulsion (Us) by Batan Silva; Cross Of Souls (Brazil) by Dennison Ramalho; El Duende (Colombia) by Jorge Navas; El Plata (Argentina) by Tamae Garateguy; El Arbol Del Olvido (The Tree Of Oblivion) (Canada) by Rodrigo Gudiño; and Greedy Beasts (Spain) by Juan Martínez Moreno.
The list includes The Incident (Mexico) by Isaac Ezban (first feature); Small Town (Uruguay) by Gustavo Hernández Ibáñez; The Summer Hit (Uruguay-Chile-Brazil) by Pablo Stoll; and Tatewari (Mexico) by Edgar Nito; Us Visitor (Argentina) by Nicolas Goldbart; The Wrong Place (Cuba-us) by Alejandro Brugués; Violent Rider (Chile) by Ernesto Diaz Espinosa; and Yamaha 300 (Mexico) by Jorge Michel Grau (Somos Lo Que Hay).
- 8/22/2013
- by jeremykay67@gmail.com (Jeremy Kay)
- ScreenDaily
Latin Americans have an iffy relationship with Spain. We get it, colonialism leaves scars. But, like it or not, they share language, culture, and DNA. They also share a faltering economy (along with the rest of the world). In times like these, when it’s hard for anyone to put together enough money to make a movie, collaboration is key. Spanish and Latin American co-productions are at an all-time high. This in part has led to a resurgence in the amount of movies produced each year in both Spain and Latin America.
Why a co-production?
There are many benefits to collaborating: pooling of financial resources, more options for government incentives and subsidies, better chances at entering each other’s markets, and risk reduction. Particularly in smaller Latin American countries where a weak film industry provides few funding opportunities and finding crews with professional experience is difficult, a co-production with Spain is a no-brainer. But, this is not without controversy.
Spanish Conquistadors or Equal Partners?
There are critics who warn about reproducing dependency on Spain (some dare to use the word neo-colonialism) and reinforcing economic disparities between the two regions. There is also concern about the effect outside sources of funding can have on content. Many wonder how much editorial control comes with allowing Spain to bankroll a project. Despite the criticism and concern Spanish-Latin American co-productions continue to increase and can offer lots of lessons to U.S. producers looking to team up with their southern neighbors.
How does it work?
As a result of the creation of a film institute (the Icaa or Instituto de la Cinematografía y de las Artes Audiovisuales) and policy changes in the eighties, Spain spearheaded a multinational organization called Caaci (La Conferencia de Autoridades Audiovisuales y Cinematográficas de Iberoamerica, or Conference of Ibero-American Audiovisual and Film Institutes). Its members are Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Honduras, México, Panamá, Perú, Portugal, Puerto Rico, Spain, Uruguay, and Venezuela. Caaci brokered the creation of conventions and co-production treaties amongst its member countries. On top of these multilateral agreements, Spain has several bilateral agreements with individual Latin American countries. Depending on which agreement or convention is applied the conditions are:
(Taken from ‘Industry Report: Produce - Coproduce. How to coproduce with Spain”)
For bilateral agreements; the minor producer’s participation cannot account for less than 20%, while the main producer’s cannot account for more than 80%, only allowing co-productions with real creative participation. For multilateral agreements, where the European or Ibero American Conventions are applied; the minor producer’s participation cannot account for less than 10%, while the main producer’s cannot exceed 70%. In this last case, certain financial co-productions are permitted.
Ibermedia is another source of funding that pools financial contributions from Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cuba, Chile, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Guatemala, México, Panamá, Paraguay, Perú, Portugal, Puerto Rico, Spain, Uruguay, and Venezuela. Although the fund receives contributions from each member country, the majority of the money comes from Spain and mostly goes to production costs. Ibermedia also grants financing for a film's development, distribution, exhibition and promotion. The main requirements are:
(Taken from ‘The New International Co-Production Scenario’ and ‘Co-Production and the Cultural Politics of Constructing an Ibero-American Audiovisual Space' by Tamara Falicov.
Co-productions must be among at least three countries. Films must be in Spanish or Portuguese. The director, actors, and technical crew must be from an Ibero-American country. Beneficiaries are limited to independent production companies in countries that are members of the Ibermedia Program. Repayable loans are allocated to each co-producer on the basis of their financial contribution in the co-production. Up to 50 percent of the funding may be awarded by Ibermedia; the rest must come from additional financing sources Films receiving funding are typically very low-budget, and Ibermedia’s contributions range from $30,000 to $200,000 per project
What about us in the U.S.?
It may be hard to believe but the U.S. has no co-production treaties. None! Still, Americans can enter as a third-party in treaty co-productions giving access to the same tax incentives and expanded market access as their partners. With an eye towards fostering collaborations in the absence of treaties, Independent Filmmaker Project (Ifp) offers the No Borders International Co-Production Market, “the oldest and most prominent co-production market in the U.S.” Ifp also operates the International Alliance Program with partners in various regions, the Latin American Training Center (Latc) acts as the official partner for Latin America. And for Latin American immigrants and U.S-born Latinos who are eligible for dual citizenship, opportunities abound.
Written by Juan Caceres and Vanessa Erazo, LatinoBuzz is a weekly feature on SydneysBuzz that highlights emerging and established Latino indie talent and upcoming trends in Latino film with the specific objective of presenting a broad range of Latino voices. Follow@LatinoBuzzon twitter.
Notable Spanish-Latin American Co-productions
El espinazo del diablo (The Devil’s Backbone, dir. Guillermo del Toro, Spain-Mexico, 2001)
La ciénaga (The Swamp, dir. Lucrecia Martel, Argentina-Spain-France, 2001)
El crimen del Padre Amaro (The Crime of Father Amaro, dir. Carlos Carrera, Mexico-Spain-Argentina-France, 2002)
Whisky (dir. Juan Pablo Rebella and Pablo Stoll, Uruguay-Spain, 2004)
Xxy (dir. Lucía Puenzo, Argentina-Spain, 2007)...
Why a co-production?
There are many benefits to collaborating: pooling of financial resources, more options for government incentives and subsidies, better chances at entering each other’s markets, and risk reduction. Particularly in smaller Latin American countries where a weak film industry provides few funding opportunities and finding crews with professional experience is difficult, a co-production with Spain is a no-brainer. But, this is not without controversy.
Spanish Conquistadors or Equal Partners?
There are critics who warn about reproducing dependency on Spain (some dare to use the word neo-colonialism) and reinforcing economic disparities between the two regions. There is also concern about the effect outside sources of funding can have on content. Many wonder how much editorial control comes with allowing Spain to bankroll a project. Despite the criticism and concern Spanish-Latin American co-productions continue to increase and can offer lots of lessons to U.S. producers looking to team up with their southern neighbors.
How does it work?
As a result of the creation of a film institute (the Icaa or Instituto de la Cinematografía y de las Artes Audiovisuales) and policy changes in the eighties, Spain spearheaded a multinational organization called Caaci (La Conferencia de Autoridades Audiovisuales y Cinematográficas de Iberoamerica, or Conference of Ibero-American Audiovisual and Film Institutes). Its members are Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Honduras, México, Panamá, Perú, Portugal, Puerto Rico, Spain, Uruguay, and Venezuela. Caaci brokered the creation of conventions and co-production treaties amongst its member countries. On top of these multilateral agreements, Spain has several bilateral agreements with individual Latin American countries. Depending on which agreement or convention is applied the conditions are:
(Taken from ‘Industry Report: Produce - Coproduce. How to coproduce with Spain”)
For bilateral agreements; the minor producer’s participation cannot account for less than 20%, while the main producer’s cannot account for more than 80%, only allowing co-productions with real creative participation. For multilateral agreements, where the European or Ibero American Conventions are applied; the minor producer’s participation cannot account for less than 10%, while the main producer’s cannot exceed 70%. In this last case, certain financial co-productions are permitted.
Ibermedia is another source of funding that pools financial contributions from Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cuba, Chile, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Guatemala, México, Panamá, Paraguay, Perú, Portugal, Puerto Rico, Spain, Uruguay, and Venezuela. Although the fund receives contributions from each member country, the majority of the money comes from Spain and mostly goes to production costs. Ibermedia also grants financing for a film's development, distribution, exhibition and promotion. The main requirements are:
(Taken from ‘The New International Co-Production Scenario’ and ‘Co-Production and the Cultural Politics of Constructing an Ibero-American Audiovisual Space' by Tamara Falicov.
Co-productions must be among at least three countries. Films must be in Spanish or Portuguese. The director, actors, and technical crew must be from an Ibero-American country. Beneficiaries are limited to independent production companies in countries that are members of the Ibermedia Program. Repayable loans are allocated to each co-producer on the basis of their financial contribution in the co-production. Up to 50 percent of the funding may be awarded by Ibermedia; the rest must come from additional financing sources Films receiving funding are typically very low-budget, and Ibermedia’s contributions range from $30,000 to $200,000 per project
What about us in the U.S.?
It may be hard to believe but the U.S. has no co-production treaties. None! Still, Americans can enter as a third-party in treaty co-productions giving access to the same tax incentives and expanded market access as their partners. With an eye towards fostering collaborations in the absence of treaties, Independent Filmmaker Project (Ifp) offers the No Borders International Co-Production Market, “the oldest and most prominent co-production market in the U.S.” Ifp also operates the International Alliance Program with partners in various regions, the Latin American Training Center (Latc) acts as the official partner for Latin America. And for Latin American immigrants and U.S-born Latinos who are eligible for dual citizenship, opportunities abound.
Written by Juan Caceres and Vanessa Erazo, LatinoBuzz is a weekly feature on SydneysBuzz that highlights emerging and established Latino indie talent and upcoming trends in Latino film with the specific objective of presenting a broad range of Latino voices. Follow@LatinoBuzzon twitter.
Notable Spanish-Latin American Co-productions
El espinazo del diablo (The Devil’s Backbone, dir. Guillermo del Toro, Spain-Mexico, 2001)
La ciénaga (The Swamp, dir. Lucrecia Martel, Argentina-Spain-France, 2001)
El crimen del Padre Amaro (The Crime of Father Amaro, dir. Carlos Carrera, Mexico-Spain-Argentina-France, 2002)
Whisky (dir. Juan Pablo Rebella and Pablo Stoll, Uruguay-Spain, 2004)
Xxy (dir. Lucía Puenzo, Argentina-Spain, 2007)...
- 6/13/2013
- by Vanessa Erazo
- Sydney's Buzz
#97. Manuel Nieto Zas’ El Lugar Del Hijo (The Militant)
Gist: Workshopped at Cannes’ Cinefondation Residence in 2008′, this is about a college student involved in militant leftist activism is faced with some difficult decisions when his father suddenly dies, leaving him in charge of their troubled ranch and forcing him to take on the role of a middle class bourgeois.
Prediction: Un Certain Regard: Right on cue, we should meet with a new figure in Uruguayan cinema and logically the launching pad might be in the same lieu where his first director work on films from Juan Pablo Rebella and Pablo Stoll (25 Watts and Whisky), Lisandro Alonso (Los Muertos and Liverpool) and Paz Encina (Hamaca Paraguaya) were presented. His first feature film, The Dogpound showed at the Rotterdam International Film Festival 2006, where it won the Vpro Tiger Award, and work on this sophomore film actually began in late 2011 – so this is...
Gist: Workshopped at Cannes’ Cinefondation Residence in 2008′, this is about a college student involved in militant leftist activism is faced with some difficult decisions when his father suddenly dies, leaving him in charge of their troubled ranch and forcing him to take on the role of a middle class bourgeois.
Prediction: Un Certain Regard: Right on cue, we should meet with a new figure in Uruguayan cinema and logically the launching pad might be in the same lieu where his first director work on films from Juan Pablo Rebella and Pablo Stoll (25 Watts and Whisky), Lisandro Alonso (Los Muertos and Liverpool) and Paz Encina (Hamaca Paraguaya) were presented. His first feature film, The Dogpound showed at the Rotterdam International Film Festival 2006, where it won the Vpro Tiger Award, and work on this sophomore film actually began in late 2011 – so this is...
- 4/2/2013
- by Eric Lavallee
- IONCINEMA.com
Boost! is a cooperation between the Hubert Bals Fund, Iffr's CineMart, Binger Filmlab and Nfdc of India and supported by Media Mundus. Yearly five projects selected for Hubert Bals Fund Script and Project Development support are offered the opportunity to further develop their project at Binger Filmlab as part of the Binger On Demand programme. At Binger Filmlab, the filmmakers are offered coaching based on the specific needs of the project and filmmaker. Strange but True by Michel Lipkes (Mexico) and Days of Cannibalism by Teboho Edkins (South Africa) are the final two Hbf supported projects that will receive a special coaching trajectory from the Binger Filmlab.
Strange but True tells the love story of two young trash collectors working under the despotic direction of Mr.Clean. Tragedy ensues when they find a corpse of a wealthy man and Mr. Clean takes terrible decisions.
Days of Cannibalism is a three-part feature film in three parts, stylistically a Western, set in contemporary Africa. It is a film about man-eat-man, from the business of globalised trade in China, to a band of smugglers in Lesotho to the violence of a cattle raid deep in the high mountains.
Selected earlier this year were:
Silver Shadow by Pablo Stoll (Uruguay/Argentina)
The Load by Ognjen Glavonic (Serbia)
The Fourth Direction by Gurvinder Singh (India)
Their first coaching sessions already took place in Berlin, Amsterdam and Mumbai. All Boost! projects will be presented at CineMart during the International Film Festival Rotterdam, where they will be offered special pitching and project development sessions prior to taking one-to-one meetings at the co-production market.
Boost!-project taking part in Rotterdam Lab 2013:
- The Fourth Direction / Gurvinder Singh / India
Check out Boost! on the Web
Additional Binger Filmlab News:
Eurimages is supporting Land. by writer/director Jan-Willem van Ewijk with Eur 230.000! Current Lab participant Meikeminne Clinckspoor has won 7 prices in the Cinekid Festival edition of the 48 hour project with Gewoon Ongewoon. Milo, by Berend and Roel Boorsma, has taken another prize: MovieSquad Best International Children’s Movie at the Cinekid Festival. Miro Bilbrough's Being Venice developed in the 2006 Writers Lab, had it's international premiere at The International Film Festival Mannheim-Heidelberg. Writers and Creative Producers Lab participants Arno Dierickx & Joram Willink have received support from the Netherlands Film Fund for their current lab project The Circle. Raf Reyntjes also received support for Paradise Trips from the Netherlands Film Fund. Parts of a Family by Diego Gutierrez Coppe, developed in the Binger Doc Lab, premiered at the Morelia Iff in Mexico. Niles Atallah and Lucie Kalmar have been granted a Production Award of Eur 70.000 at the Torino Film Lab Meeting Event for Rey.
Strange but True tells the love story of two young trash collectors working under the despotic direction of Mr.Clean. Tragedy ensues when they find a corpse of a wealthy man and Mr. Clean takes terrible decisions.
Days of Cannibalism is a three-part feature film in three parts, stylistically a Western, set in contemporary Africa. It is a film about man-eat-man, from the business of globalised trade in China, to a band of smugglers in Lesotho to the violence of a cattle raid deep in the high mountains.
Selected earlier this year were:
Silver Shadow by Pablo Stoll (Uruguay/Argentina)
The Load by Ognjen Glavonic (Serbia)
The Fourth Direction by Gurvinder Singh (India)
Their first coaching sessions already took place in Berlin, Amsterdam and Mumbai. All Boost! projects will be presented at CineMart during the International Film Festival Rotterdam, where they will be offered special pitching and project development sessions prior to taking one-to-one meetings at the co-production market.
Boost!-project taking part in Rotterdam Lab 2013:
- The Fourth Direction / Gurvinder Singh / India
Check out Boost! on the Web
Additional Binger Filmlab News:
Eurimages is supporting Land. by writer/director Jan-Willem van Ewijk with Eur 230.000! Current Lab participant Meikeminne Clinckspoor has won 7 prices in the Cinekid Festival edition of the 48 hour project with Gewoon Ongewoon. Milo, by Berend and Roel Boorsma, has taken another prize: MovieSquad Best International Children’s Movie at the Cinekid Festival. Miro Bilbrough's Being Venice developed in the 2006 Writers Lab, had it's international premiere at The International Film Festival Mannheim-Heidelberg. Writers and Creative Producers Lab participants Arno Dierickx & Joram Willink have received support from the Netherlands Film Fund for their current lab project The Circle. Raf Reyntjes also received support for Paradise Trips from the Netherlands Film Fund. Parts of a Family by Diego Gutierrez Coppe, developed in the Binger Doc Lab, premiered at the Morelia Iff in Mexico. Niles Atallah and Lucie Kalmar have been granted a Production Award of Eur 70.000 at the Torino Film Lab Meeting Event for Rey.
- 12/13/2012
- by Sydney Levine
- Sydney's Buzz
A first look into what’s ahead from some of our favorite auteurs, 2013′s CineMart (held during the Int. Film Festival Rotterdam) boosts an impressive selection of projects from the likes of Argentina’s Lucrecia Martel (The Headless Woman) who’ll be lensing Zama – the adaptation of a period piece about Don Diego de Zama, a 17th-century official for the Spanish crown based in Asuncion del Paraguay, who awaits his transfer to the city of Buenos Aires. We’ve got Greece’s Yorgos Lanthimos from Dogtooth and Alps fame, who the last time we spoke to mentioned how he was looking to break into English language film territory and we think The Lobster might be that first foray. Among the other Cannes Film Festival introduced filmmakers who’ll be seeking coin in Rotterdam we have Michael Rowe (Leap Year) who brings Rest Home, Alice Rohrwacher (Corpo celeste) who tackles Le Meraviglie,...
- 12/12/2012
- by Eric Lavallee
- IONCINEMA.com
Everyone all over the world have had their problems with the pesky undead, and now there's news of even more flesh eaters shambling their way all the way from Buenos Ares. Break out the skinchips and salsa! It's time for The Summer Hit!
Uruguay’s Pablo Stoll, a darling of the art-pic crowd since 2001′s Rotterdam Tiger-winning 25 Watts, is prepping a zombie movie, The Summer Hit, Variety reports. The move will shock some Stoll loyalists, which is exactly what he wants.
“Set at a Uruguay beach resort, the film turns on Santi, who meets the girl of his dreams. But a teen romantic comedy morphs into a thriller, then zombie pic,” Stoll said at Ventana Sur.
For decades, beyond local comedies, Latin America has largely turned out small social-issue art-house pics, lamenting its suffering. It’s what the world’s come to expect, says the site. But a new generation...
Uruguay’s Pablo Stoll, a darling of the art-pic crowd since 2001′s Rotterdam Tiger-winning 25 Watts, is prepping a zombie movie, The Summer Hit, Variety reports. The move will shock some Stoll loyalists, which is exactly what he wants.
“Set at a Uruguay beach resort, the film turns on Santi, who meets the girl of his dreams. But a teen romantic comedy morphs into a thriller, then zombie pic,” Stoll said at Ventana Sur.
For decades, beyond local comedies, Latin America has largely turned out small social-issue art-house pics, lamenting its suffering. It’s what the world’s come to expect, says the site. But a new generation...
- 12/3/2012
- by Uncle Creepy
- DreadCentral.com
Uruguayan director Pablo Stoll is probably best known as a director of Whisky, quite successful movie that even managed to win the Regard Original Award at the 2004 Cannes Film Festival. In case this still means nothing to you, relax, we’re just here to report that Stoll has a serious plan to helm a zombie movie! In other words, if everything goes well – we’ll be hearing a lot about Stoll and his next movie titled The Summer Hit!
So, at this moment we know that The Summer Hit is set up at Temperamento Films, Stoll’s new production company, and that he’s completing a first draft of a script. Then, he will continue the whole thing together with his Whisky co-scribe Gonzalo Delgado.
According to Variety, this zombie-story will be set at a Uruguay beach resort, and will center on a character named Santi, who meets the girl of his dreams.
So, at this moment we know that The Summer Hit is set up at Temperamento Films, Stoll’s new production company, and that he’s completing a first draft of a script. Then, he will continue the whole thing together with his Whisky co-scribe Gonzalo Delgado.
According to Variety, this zombie-story will be set at a Uruguay beach resort, and will center on a character named Santi, who meets the girl of his dreams.
- 12/3/2012
- by Jeanne Standal
- Filmofilia
The International Film Festival Rotterdam (Iffr) has announced the complete list of Boost programme of CineMart 2013. New projects by Michel Lipkes (Mexico) and Teboho Edkins (South Africa) have been added to those by Pablo Stoll (Uruguay), Ognjen Glavonic (Serbia) and Gurvinder Singh (India) selected earlier this year. The Boost! progarmme is organized by Hubert Bals Fund, CineMart, Binger Filmlab and Nfdc of India supported by Media Mundus. Yearly five projects Read More...
- 12/1/2012
- Bollywood Trade
The 17th edition of the International Film Festival of Kerala (Iffk) has announced its lineup. The festival will run from 7th to 14th December, 2012 in Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala.
Some of the highlights of the lineup are festival favourites of the year Amour, Chitrangada, Samhita, The Sapphires, Drapchi, Miss Lovely, Me and You, Celluloid Man, and Baandhon.
Fourteen films will screen in the Competition section while seven contemporary films will be screened in “Indian Cinema Now” section.
Complete list of films:
Competition Films
Fourteen feature films from Asia, Africa and Latin America will compete for the coveted “Suvarna Chakoram” (Golden Crow Pheasant) and other awards.
Always Brando by Ridha Behi (Tunisia)
Inheritors of the Earth by T V Chandran (India)
A Terminal Trust by by Masayuki Suo (Japan)
Shutter by Joy Mathew (India)
Today by Alain Gomis (Senegal-France)
The Repentant by Merzak Allouache (Algeria)
Sta. Niña by Manny Palo (Philippines)
Present Tense...
Some of the highlights of the lineup are festival favourites of the year Amour, Chitrangada, Samhita, The Sapphires, Drapchi, Miss Lovely, Me and You, Celluloid Man, and Baandhon.
Fourteen films will screen in the Competition section while seven contemporary films will be screened in “Indian Cinema Now” section.
Complete list of films:
Competition Films
Fourteen feature films from Asia, Africa and Latin America will compete for the coveted “Suvarna Chakoram” (Golden Crow Pheasant) and other awards.
Always Brando by Ridha Behi (Tunisia)
Inheritors of the Earth by T V Chandran (India)
A Terminal Trust by by Masayuki Suo (Japan)
Shutter by Joy Mathew (India)
Today by Alain Gomis (Senegal-France)
The Repentant by Merzak Allouache (Algeria)
Sta. Niña by Manny Palo (Philippines)
Present Tense...
- 11/2/2012
- by NewsDesk
- DearCinema.com
Above: Ernie Gehr's Auto-Collider Xv.
The vast bulk of Tiff's 2012 has been announced and listed here, below. We'll be updating the lineup with the previous films announced, as well as updating links to specific films for more information on them in the coming days. Of particular note is that the Wavelengths and Visions programs have been combined to create what is undoubtedly the most interesting section of the festival. Stay tuned, too, for our own on the ground coverage of Tiff.
Galas
A Royal Affair (Nikolai Arcel, Demark/Sweden/Czech Republic/Germany)
Argo (Ben Affleck, USA)
The Company You Keep (Robert Redford, USA)
Dangerous Liaisons (Hur Jin-ho, China)
Emperor (Peter Webber, Japan/USA)
English Vinglish (Gauri Shinde, India)
Free Angela & All Political Prisoners (Shola Lynch)
Great Expectations (Mike Newell, UK)
Hyde Park on Hudson (Roger Michell, UK)
Inescapable (Ruba Nadda, Canada)
Jayne Mansfield's Car (Billy Bob Thorton, USA/Russia)
Looper (Rian Johnson,...
The vast bulk of Tiff's 2012 has been announced and listed here, below. We'll be updating the lineup with the previous films announced, as well as updating links to specific films for more information on them in the coming days. Of particular note is that the Wavelengths and Visions programs have been combined to create what is undoubtedly the most interesting section of the festival. Stay tuned, too, for our own on the ground coverage of Tiff.
Galas
A Royal Affair (Nikolai Arcel, Demark/Sweden/Czech Republic/Germany)
Argo (Ben Affleck, USA)
The Company You Keep (Robert Redford, USA)
Dangerous Liaisons (Hur Jin-ho, China)
Emperor (Peter Webber, Japan/USA)
English Vinglish (Gauri Shinde, India)
Free Angela & All Political Prisoners (Shola Lynch)
Great Expectations (Mike Newell, UK)
Hyde Park on Hudson (Roger Michell, UK)
Inescapable (Ruba Nadda, Canada)
Jayne Mansfield's Car (Billy Bob Thorton, USA/Russia)
Looper (Rian Johnson,...
- 8/22/2012
- MUBI
The 37th Toronto International Film Festival® will roll out the red carpet for hundreds of guests from the four corners of the globe in September. Filmmakers expected to present their world premieres in Toronto include: Rian Johnson, Noah Baumbach, Deepa Mehta, Derek Cianfrance, Sion Sono, Joss Whedon, Neil Jordan, Lu Chuan, Shola Lynch, Barry Levinson, Yvan Attal, Ben Affleck, Marina Zenovich, Costa-Gavras, Laurent Cantet, Sally Potter, Dustin Hoffman, Francois Ozon, David O. Russell, David Ayer, Pelin Esmer, Tom Tykwer, Lana Wachowski, Andy Wachowski, Andrew Adamson, Michael McGowan, Bahman Ghobadi, Ziad Doueiri, Alex Gibney, Stephen Chbosky, Eran Riklis, Edward Burns, Bernard Émond, Zhang Yuan, Michael Winterbottom, Mike Newell, Miwa Nishikawa, Margarethe Von Trotta, David Siegel, Scott McGehee, Gauri Shinde, Goran Paskaljevic, Baltasar Kormákur, J.A. Bayona, Rob Zombie, Peaches and Paul Andrew Williams.
Actors expected to attend include: Bruce Willis, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Jackie Chan, Tom Hanks, Halle Berry, Bill Murray, Robert Redford,...
Actors expected to attend include: Bruce Willis, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Jackie Chan, Tom Hanks, Halle Berry, Bill Murray, Robert Redford,...
- 8/21/2012
- by Michelle McCue
- WeAreMovieGeeks.com
The globe-trotting section of this year’s Contemporary World Cinema programme has your Sundance (in a pair of excellent titles in Ava DuVernay’s Middle of Nowhere and James Ponsoldt’s Smashed) and has select items from several sections from this year’s Cannes ranging from Pablo Stoll Ward’s 3, Yousry Nasrallah’s After the Battle, Aida Begic’s Children of Sarajevo, Catherine Corsini’s Three Worlds, Ulrich Seidl’s Paradise: Love, and they must see In The Fog a masterwork from Sergei Loznitsa and will be padded by world premiere items such as Annemarie Jacir’s When I Saw You, Lenny Abrahamson’s What Richard Did and Sion Sono’s The Land of Hope (see pic above). Here’s the entire list of items that make up this year’s section:
3 Pablo Stoll Ward, Uruguay/Germany/Argentina North American Premiere For Rodolfo (Humberto de Vargas), life at home feels empty and cold,...
3 Pablo Stoll Ward, Uruguay/Germany/Argentina North American Premiere For Rodolfo (Humberto de Vargas), life at home feels empty and cold,...
- 8/14/2012
- by Eric Lavallee
- IONCINEMA.com
What will the next year's festivals be showing? Look at what the Hubert Bals Fund of the International Film Festival Rotterdam (Iffr) has selected for a preview: nineteen film projects will receive grants for script development, digital production, postproduction or workshops. In its Spring 2012 selection round, the Fund gives 260,000 Euro to projects from fifteen Asian, African and Latin-American and Eastern European countries. (See full list below)
In this selection round, the Fund welcomes promising first or second time feature film projects by Song Fang, Huang Ji (both China), Gurvinder Singh (India), Caroline Kamya (Uganda), Ognjen Glavonic (Serbia), Sebastian Hofmann (Mexico) and Eduardo Nunes (Brazil).
Supporting more experienced filmmakers, the Fund has selected projects from, among others, Pablo Stoll (Uruguay), Aditya Assarat (Thailand) and Tariq Teguia (Algeria).
The selection round also awards 5,000 Euro prize money for the Hubert Bals Fund Award, to be handed out to the most promising fiction project at the upcoming Durban FilmMart (20-23 July 2012), and a grant for the next Colón Workshop for Latin American filmmakers, partner organization of the Rotterdam Lab.
Postproduction
When finished in time, the films receiving Hbf postproduction grants are expected to screen at the 2013 International Film Festival Rotterdam.
After her short film 'Goodbye' (2009, awarded at Cannes’ Cinefondation), Chinese filmmaker Song Fang makes her feature debut with 'Memories Look At Me', a strikingly observed portrait of her Chinese family life.
DoP or editor of films by among others Fernando Eimbcke, Carlos Reygadas and Gerardo Tort, Sebastian Hoffman (Mexico) writes and directs his first feature film 'Halley', a contemporary gothic story that casts a compassionate look at the life of a zombie.
After 'Rome Rather Than You' (which premiered 2006 in Venice) and 'Inland', Tariq Teguia (Algeria) is working on his third feature film, 'Ibn Battuta' which follows a journalist on his investigative journey throughout North Africa and the Middle East. The project previously received a script development grant from the Hubert Bals Fund.
Digital production
This round, digital production support goes to acclaimed filmmakers Yang Heng (China) and Riri Riza (Indonesia). Yang’s previous works are 'Betelnut' (New Currents Award in Busan and Hivos Tiger Award competitor in 2010) and 'Sun Spots' (also supported by the Hubert Bals Fund). In his 'Lake August' he continues to portrait young adults’ life in his home province. Experienced film maker, producer and writer Riza ('Eliana, Eliana' 2002) situates his new film 'Atambua 39° Celsius' among a family separated from their relatives following the independence of the state of Eastern Timor in 2002.
Script development
The ten grants for script development support both upcoming and experienced filmmakers. Huang Ji (China) works on 'Foolish Bird', the second installment of the trilogy she started with her feature debut and Hivos Tiger Award-winning 'Egg and Stone'.
Ognjen Glavonic (Serbia) writes his first feature film, 'The Load'. Set in Serbia during the Nato bombings in 1999, the film follows the driver of a freeze truck. He does not want to know what the load is, but the cargo slowly becomes his burden.
Alex Piperno (Mexico) prepares his first feature project 'Window Boy Would Also Like to Have a Submarine', in which a ship crew member discovers a solitary girl behind a mysterious door.
Caroline Kamya (Uganda) works on her second feature film, 'Hot Comb' in which two school girls from different backgrounds become close. Her debut feature 'Imani' premiered in Berlin.
Furthermore, the Fund supports the script development of new projects by two experienced filmmakers: Pablo Stoll (Uruguay) whose ‘3’ was launched at CineMart and received its premiere this year in Cannes’ Directors’ Fortnight, writes and produces his next project 'Silver Shadow'; Aditya Assarat (Thailand), Hivos Tiger Award winner for 'Wonderful Town', prepares 'The White Buffalo' also presented at this year’s CineMart.
The line up of the Iffr’s Hubert Bals Fund Spring 2012 Selection Round in full:
Post-production funding or final-financing
Halley; Sebastian Hofmann; Mexico
Ibn Battuta; Tariq Teguia; Algeria
Peculiar Vacation and Other Illnesses; Yosep Anggi Noen; Indonesia
Poor Folk; Midi Z; Myanmar
Memories Look At Me; Song Fang; China
Digital production
Atambua 39° Celcius; Riri Riza; Indonesia
Lake August; Yang Heng; China
Script and projectdevelopment
Foolish Bird; Huang Ji; China
The Fourth Direction; Gurvinder Singh; India
A Happy Death; Eduardo Nunes; Brazil
Hot Comb; Caroline Kamya; Uganda
Leave It For Tomorrow, For Night Has Fallen; Jet Leyco; Philippines
The Load; Ognjen Glavonic; Serbia
The Sigbin Chronicles; Joanna Vasquez Arong; Philippines
Silver Shadow; Pablo Stoll; Uruguay
The White Buffalo; Aditya Assarat; Thailand
Window Boy Would Also Like to Have a Submarine; Alex Piperno; Uruguay
Workshops
Durban FilmMart; South Africa, Hubert Bals Fund Award
Xiii Colón Workshop for Latin American Filmmakers; Argentina
Profile of the Hubert Bals Fund
The Hubert Bals Fund (Hbf), along with the CineMart, is part of the International Film Festival Rotterdam (Iffr). The 42nd Iffr will take place January 23 – February 3, 2013. Year-round news on Iffr, Hbf and CineMart can be found onwww.filmfestivalrotterdam.com.
The Hubert Bals Fund is designed to bring remarkable or urgent feature films and feature-length creative documentaries by innovative and talented filmmakers from developing countries closer to completion. The Hubert Bals Fund provides grants that often turn out to play a crucial role in enabling these filmmakers to realize their projects. Although the Fund looks closely at the financial aspects of a project, the decisive factors remain its content and artistic value. Since the Fund started in 1989, hundreds of projects from independent filmmakers in Africa, Asia, Latin America, the Middle East and parts of Eastern Europe have received support. Approximately 80% of these projects have been realized or are currently in production. Every year, the Iffr screens completed films supported by the Fund.
The Hubert Bals Fund is supported by the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Media Mundus, Dutch non-governmental development organization Hivos Culture Foundation, the Doen Foundation and the Dioraphte Foundation and Lions Club Rotterdam: L’Esprit du Temps.
Grants and selection rounds
Annually, the Hubert Bals Fund is able to make individual grants of up to Euro 10,000 for script and project development, Euro 20,000 for digital production, Euro 30,000 for post-production, Euro 15,000 towards distribution costs in the country of origin or Euro 10,000 for special projects such as workshops. Selection rounds take place twice a year and have application deadlines on March 1 and August 1.
Hubert Bals Fund-supported films in Iffr and on DVD/VOD
Most of the films supported by the Hubert Bals Fund throughout the year are screened during the International Film Festival Rotterdam in attendance of the filmmaker. Subsequently, part of the Hbf-supported films is released by the Iffr on DVD or VOD, available on www.filmfestivalrotterdam.com/webshop (VOD for viewers in the Benelux only).
In this selection round, the Fund welcomes promising first or second time feature film projects by Song Fang, Huang Ji (both China), Gurvinder Singh (India), Caroline Kamya (Uganda), Ognjen Glavonic (Serbia), Sebastian Hofmann (Mexico) and Eduardo Nunes (Brazil).
Supporting more experienced filmmakers, the Fund has selected projects from, among others, Pablo Stoll (Uruguay), Aditya Assarat (Thailand) and Tariq Teguia (Algeria).
The selection round also awards 5,000 Euro prize money for the Hubert Bals Fund Award, to be handed out to the most promising fiction project at the upcoming Durban FilmMart (20-23 July 2012), and a grant for the next Colón Workshop for Latin American filmmakers, partner organization of the Rotterdam Lab.
Postproduction
When finished in time, the films receiving Hbf postproduction grants are expected to screen at the 2013 International Film Festival Rotterdam.
After her short film 'Goodbye' (2009, awarded at Cannes’ Cinefondation), Chinese filmmaker Song Fang makes her feature debut with 'Memories Look At Me', a strikingly observed portrait of her Chinese family life.
DoP or editor of films by among others Fernando Eimbcke, Carlos Reygadas and Gerardo Tort, Sebastian Hoffman (Mexico) writes and directs his first feature film 'Halley', a contemporary gothic story that casts a compassionate look at the life of a zombie.
After 'Rome Rather Than You' (which premiered 2006 in Venice) and 'Inland', Tariq Teguia (Algeria) is working on his third feature film, 'Ibn Battuta' which follows a journalist on his investigative journey throughout North Africa and the Middle East. The project previously received a script development grant from the Hubert Bals Fund.
Digital production
This round, digital production support goes to acclaimed filmmakers Yang Heng (China) and Riri Riza (Indonesia). Yang’s previous works are 'Betelnut' (New Currents Award in Busan and Hivos Tiger Award competitor in 2010) and 'Sun Spots' (also supported by the Hubert Bals Fund). In his 'Lake August' he continues to portrait young adults’ life in his home province. Experienced film maker, producer and writer Riza ('Eliana, Eliana' 2002) situates his new film 'Atambua 39° Celsius' among a family separated from their relatives following the independence of the state of Eastern Timor in 2002.
Script development
The ten grants for script development support both upcoming and experienced filmmakers. Huang Ji (China) works on 'Foolish Bird', the second installment of the trilogy she started with her feature debut and Hivos Tiger Award-winning 'Egg and Stone'.
Ognjen Glavonic (Serbia) writes his first feature film, 'The Load'. Set in Serbia during the Nato bombings in 1999, the film follows the driver of a freeze truck. He does not want to know what the load is, but the cargo slowly becomes his burden.
Alex Piperno (Mexico) prepares his first feature project 'Window Boy Would Also Like to Have a Submarine', in which a ship crew member discovers a solitary girl behind a mysterious door.
Caroline Kamya (Uganda) works on her second feature film, 'Hot Comb' in which two school girls from different backgrounds become close. Her debut feature 'Imani' premiered in Berlin.
Furthermore, the Fund supports the script development of new projects by two experienced filmmakers: Pablo Stoll (Uruguay) whose ‘3’ was launched at CineMart and received its premiere this year in Cannes’ Directors’ Fortnight, writes and produces his next project 'Silver Shadow'; Aditya Assarat (Thailand), Hivos Tiger Award winner for 'Wonderful Town', prepares 'The White Buffalo' also presented at this year’s CineMart.
The line up of the Iffr’s Hubert Bals Fund Spring 2012 Selection Round in full:
Post-production funding or final-financing
Halley; Sebastian Hofmann; Mexico
Ibn Battuta; Tariq Teguia; Algeria
Peculiar Vacation and Other Illnesses; Yosep Anggi Noen; Indonesia
Poor Folk; Midi Z; Myanmar
Memories Look At Me; Song Fang; China
Digital production
Atambua 39° Celcius; Riri Riza; Indonesia
Lake August; Yang Heng; China
Script and projectdevelopment
Foolish Bird; Huang Ji; China
The Fourth Direction; Gurvinder Singh; India
A Happy Death; Eduardo Nunes; Brazil
Hot Comb; Caroline Kamya; Uganda
Leave It For Tomorrow, For Night Has Fallen; Jet Leyco; Philippines
The Load; Ognjen Glavonic; Serbia
The Sigbin Chronicles; Joanna Vasquez Arong; Philippines
Silver Shadow; Pablo Stoll; Uruguay
The White Buffalo; Aditya Assarat; Thailand
Window Boy Would Also Like to Have a Submarine; Alex Piperno; Uruguay
Workshops
Durban FilmMart; South Africa, Hubert Bals Fund Award
Xiii Colón Workshop for Latin American Filmmakers; Argentina
Profile of the Hubert Bals Fund
The Hubert Bals Fund (Hbf), along with the CineMart, is part of the International Film Festival Rotterdam (Iffr). The 42nd Iffr will take place January 23 – February 3, 2013. Year-round news on Iffr, Hbf and CineMart can be found onwww.filmfestivalrotterdam.com.
The Hubert Bals Fund is designed to bring remarkable or urgent feature films and feature-length creative documentaries by innovative and talented filmmakers from developing countries closer to completion. The Hubert Bals Fund provides grants that often turn out to play a crucial role in enabling these filmmakers to realize their projects. Although the Fund looks closely at the financial aspects of a project, the decisive factors remain its content and artistic value. Since the Fund started in 1989, hundreds of projects from independent filmmakers in Africa, Asia, Latin America, the Middle East and parts of Eastern Europe have received support. Approximately 80% of these projects have been realized or are currently in production. Every year, the Iffr screens completed films supported by the Fund.
The Hubert Bals Fund is supported by the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Media Mundus, Dutch non-governmental development organization Hivos Culture Foundation, the Doen Foundation and the Dioraphte Foundation and Lions Club Rotterdam: L’Esprit du Temps.
Grants and selection rounds
Annually, the Hubert Bals Fund is able to make individual grants of up to Euro 10,000 for script and project development, Euro 20,000 for digital production, Euro 30,000 for post-production, Euro 15,000 towards distribution costs in the country of origin or Euro 10,000 for special projects such as workshops. Selection rounds take place twice a year and have application deadlines on March 1 and August 1.
Hubert Bals Fund-supported films in Iffr and on DVD/VOD
Most of the films supported by the Hubert Bals Fund throughout the year are screened during the International Film Festival Rotterdam in attendance of the filmmaker. Subsequently, part of the Hbf-supported films is released by the Iffr on DVD or VOD, available on www.filmfestivalrotterdam.com/webshop (VOD for viewers in the Benelux only).
- 7/9/2012
- by Sydney Levine
- Sydney's Buzz
Gurvinder Singh
Gurvinder Singh, National Award winning director (Anhey Ghore Da Daan) has been selected to receive Hubert Bals Fund Spring 2012 for his next project ‘The Fourth Direction’.
The Hubert Bals Fund of the International Film Festival Rotterdam (Iffr) has selected nineteen film projects that receive grants for script development, digital production, postproduction or workshops. In its Spring 2012 selection round, the Fund offers individual grants of up to Euro 10,000 for script and project development, Euro 20,000 for digital production, Euro 30,000 for post-production, Euro 15,000 towards distribution costs in the country of origin or Euro 10,000 for special projects such as workshops.
Selection rounds take place twice a year and have application deadlines on March 1 and August 1.
Gurvinder Singh will receive the fund in Script and Project development category.
‘The Fourth Direction’ combines two short stories by well-known Punjabi writer Waryam Singh Sandhu, in the backdrop of the movement for a Sikh separatist state in the 1980s.
Gurvinder Singh, National Award winning director (Anhey Ghore Da Daan) has been selected to receive Hubert Bals Fund Spring 2012 for his next project ‘The Fourth Direction’.
The Hubert Bals Fund of the International Film Festival Rotterdam (Iffr) has selected nineteen film projects that receive grants for script development, digital production, postproduction or workshops. In its Spring 2012 selection round, the Fund offers individual grants of up to Euro 10,000 for script and project development, Euro 20,000 for digital production, Euro 30,000 for post-production, Euro 15,000 towards distribution costs in the country of origin or Euro 10,000 for special projects such as workshops.
Selection rounds take place twice a year and have application deadlines on March 1 and August 1.
Gurvinder Singh will receive the fund in Script and Project development category.
‘The Fourth Direction’ combines two short stories by well-known Punjabi writer Waryam Singh Sandhu, in the backdrop of the movement for a Sikh separatist state in the 1980s.
- 7/2/2012
- by NewsDesk
- DearCinema.com
Early in the morning, the Directors’ Fortnight section hosted the international premiere to Pablo Stoll Ward’s 3. Starring a broken up family of the father (Humberto De Vargas), mother (Sara Bessio) and late teens daughter (Anaclara Ferreyra Palfy), the film navigates between solitudes, and post break-up connections. Put on the map via 25 Watts (2003) and then the Un Certain Regard selected Whisky (2004), Stoll took a bit of a break to produce and put energy towards the more experimental Hiroshima, before returning to a story that was originally created by him and Juan Pablo Rebella. The majority of the Q&A was in Spanish/French, but in a nutshell, the Uruguayan filmmaker discussed a.) the type of comedies he tries to make – more in the vein of those that make you think and smile rather than burst out laughing, b.) he mentioned the their cinema has started receiving support in terms of funding about five years back,...
- 5/21/2012
- by Eric Lavallee
- IONCINEMA.com
3 – Pablo Stoll Ward
Buzz: After attaining international acclaim with his break out pair of films (25 Watts and Whisky) alongside Juan Pablo Rebella, helmer Pablo Stoll understandably had a rebirth of sorts. He focused on producing oeuvres from the next wave of talents from his native Uruguay and worked on a tribute to Rebella with his first solo, experimental directing debut in Hiroshima (which played at Tiff in 2009). The filmmaker is back into a familiar terrain with this Latin American-European co-production number that premiered in his native country last month.
Gist: In the longstanding tradition of films featuring household occupants each on his or her pathway, Ana (Anaclara Ferreyra Palfy), an enterprising teenager, is living through a decisive moment in her life. Her mother, Graciela (Sara Bessio), seems at a turning point as well. For Rodolfo, Ana’s father and Graciela’s ex-husband, domestic life in the home of his second wife,...
Buzz: After attaining international acclaim with his break out pair of films (25 Watts and Whisky) alongside Juan Pablo Rebella, helmer Pablo Stoll understandably had a rebirth of sorts. He focused on producing oeuvres from the next wave of talents from his native Uruguay and worked on a tribute to Rebella with his first solo, experimental directing debut in Hiroshima (which played at Tiff in 2009). The filmmaker is back into a familiar terrain with this Latin American-European co-production number that premiered in his native country last month.
Gist: In the longstanding tradition of films featuring household occupants each on his or her pathway, Ana (Anaclara Ferreyra Palfy), an enterprising teenager, is living through a decisive moment in her life. Her mother, Graciela (Sara Bessio), seems at a turning point as well. For Rodolfo, Ana’s father and Graciela’s ex-husband, domestic life in the home of his second wife,...
- 5/15/2012
- by Eric Lavallee
- IONCINEMA.com
Edouard Waintrop, Artistic Director of Directors' Fortnight, has presented the lineup for this year's edition, running from May 17 through 27.
Features
Merzak Allouache's El Taaib. Evene claims it's an angry film aimed at the malaise of Algerian society.
Rodney Ascher's Room 237. A documentary about the plethora of theories that have sprung up over the years regarding just what Stanley Kubrick was up to when he made The Shining (1980). More here. IFC Midnight picked up North American rights just yesterday.
Stéphane Aubier, Vincent Patar and Benjamin Renner's Ernest et Célestine. From the makers of A Town Called Panic, this is an animated adaptation of a series of books about a little mouse who doesn't want to become a dentist and a big bear who doesn't want to become a notary. Site.
Benjamin Ávila's Infancia clandestina. From the San Sebastian Film Festival: "Juan lives in clandestinity. Just like his mum,...
Features
Merzak Allouache's El Taaib. Evene claims it's an angry film aimed at the malaise of Algerian society.
Rodney Ascher's Room 237. A documentary about the plethora of theories that have sprung up over the years regarding just what Stanley Kubrick was up to when he made The Shining (1980). More here. IFC Midnight picked up North American rights just yesterday.
Stéphane Aubier, Vincent Patar and Benjamin Renner's Ernest et Célestine. From the makers of A Town Called Panic, this is an animated adaptation of a series of books about a little mouse who doesn't want to become a dentist and a big bear who doesn't want to become a notary. Site.
Benjamin Ávila's Infancia clandestina. From the San Sebastian Film Festival: "Juan lives in clandestinity. Just like his mum,...
- 4/25/2012
- MUBI
We’ve already got a great line-up for this year’s Cannes Film Festival, but a few more quality films have been added to the Directors’ Fortnight section. Most notably is the latest film from Michel Gondry, The We and the I (more details on that one here). Then we’ve got Sightseers, the next film from Ben Wheatley, who gave us the frightening Kill List earlier this year. There’s also two Sundance films, one the excellent documentary on Stanley Kubrick‘s The Shining, Room 237, as well as the absurdly funny Wrong, from Quentin Dupieux (update: looks like it’s actually a brand-new short titled Wrong Cops, starring Marilyn Manson). Check out the line-up below.
Longs Metrages / Feature Films
3 de / by Pablo Stoll Ward (Uruguay, Allemagne, Argentine / Uruguay, Germany, Argentina) – Première internationale
Adieu Berthe, l’enterrement de mémé / Granny’s Funeral de / by Bruno Podalydès (France) – Première mondiale...
Longs Metrages / Feature Films
3 de / by Pablo Stoll Ward (Uruguay, Allemagne, Argentine / Uruguay, Germany, Argentina) – Première internationale
Adieu Berthe, l’enterrement de mémé / Granny’s Funeral de / by Bruno Podalydès (France) – Première mondiale...
- 4/24/2012
- by jpraup@gmail.com (thefilmstage.com)
- The Film Stage
After wowing horror fans with his sophomore feature Kill List, UK director Ben Wheatley is off to Cannes with his upcoming third effort - the ultra dark comedy Sightseers. Selected as part of a wildly diverse lineup in the Directors' Fortnight sidebar, Sightseers will play alongside Ernest And Celestine - the family friendly animation from the directors of A Town Called Panic - dark Korean animation King Of Pigs, a new short film from the director of Rubber and Wrong and the latest from Chile's Pablo Larrain. Check the complete list below:2012 SelectionLONGS Metrages / Feature FILMS3 de / by Pablo Stoll Ward (Uruguay, Allemagne, Argentine / Uruguay, Germany, Argentina) - Première internationaleAdieu Berthe - l'enterrement de mémé / Granny's Funeral de / by...
- 4/24/2012
- Screen Anarchy
Ben Wheatley's Sightseers is selected for Directors' Fortnight special screening, while British theatre director Rufus Norris's debut Broken will open Critics' Week
The Cannes film festival's two major independent sidebars have announced their lineup for the forthcoming festival, providing UK and Us film-makers with a considerable boost to their presence on the Croisette.
Ben Wheatley, who has impressed critics and fans alike with his first two films, Down Terrace and Kill List, has seen his third, Sightseers, selected for a special screening in the Directors' Fortnight event, while British theatre director Rufus Norris's debut feature, Broken, has been given the opening slot for the Critics' Week section. Sightseers is described as a "pitch-black comedy" about a caravan trip around the north of England, while Broken is an adaptation of Daniel Clay's novel, and stars Cillian Murphy and Tim Roth.
Us film-makers have added to their total...
The Cannes film festival's two major independent sidebars have announced their lineup for the forthcoming festival, providing UK and Us film-makers with a considerable boost to their presence on the Croisette.
Ben Wheatley, who has impressed critics and fans alike with his first two films, Down Terrace and Kill List, has seen his third, Sightseers, selected for a special screening in the Directors' Fortnight event, while British theatre director Rufus Norris's debut feature, Broken, has been given the opening slot for the Critics' Week section. Sightseers is described as a "pitch-black comedy" about a caravan trip around the north of England, while Broken is an adaptation of Daniel Clay's novel, and stars Cillian Murphy and Tim Roth.
Us film-makers have added to their total...
- 4/24/2012
- by Andrew Pulver
- The Guardian - Film News
Following yesterday's announcement of the Cannes Critic's Week lineup, the 51st edition of the festival has unveiled the Director's Fortnight selection. Michel Gondry's "The We and the I" will open this year's sidebar, while Noemie Lvovsky's "Camille Redouble" will serve as the closing film. Also included is Ben Wheatley's anticipated follow-up to "Kill List," "Sightseers" (discussed by the filmmaker here); Rodney Ascher's Sundance sensation "Room 237"; "Noche de Enfrente," the last film directed by the late Raoul Ruiz; "Tony Manero" director Pablo Larraín's "No de"; and the short "Wrong Cops," from Quentin Dupieux ("Rubber"). Below find the full lineup: Longs Metrages / Feature Films 3 de / by Pablo Stoll Ward (Uruguay, Allemagne, Argentine / Uruguay, Germany, Argentina) – Première internationale ...
- 4/24/2012
- by Nigel M Smith
- Indiewire
The 2012 Cannes Film Festival has announced its Directors’ Fortnight sidebar, naming the Michel Gondry-directed The We And The I as the opening film. There will be 21 films, 18 of which are premieres from around the world. Here’s the list: 3 de / by Pablo Stoll Ward (Uruguay, Allemagne, Argentine / Uruguay, Germany, Argentina) Adieu Berthe de / by Bruno Podalydès (France) Alyah de / by Elie Wajeman (France) – Caméra d’or Camille redouble de / by Noémie Lvovsky (France) Dae gi eui wang / The King of Pigs de / by Yeun Sang-Ho (Corée du Sud / South Korea) – Caméra d’or Dangerous Liaisons de / by Hur Jin-Ho (Chine / China) El Taaib / Le Repenti de / by Merzak Allouache (Algérie / Algeria) Ernest et Célestine de / by Stéphane Aubier, Vincent Patar, Benjamin Renner (France, Belgique, Luxembourg / France, Belgium, Luxembourg) Fogo de / by Yulene Olaizola (Mexique, Canada) Gangs of Wasseypur de / by Anurag Kashyap (Inde / India) Infancia clandestina/ Enfance clandestine de / by Benjamin Ávila (Argentine,...
- 4/24/2012
- by MIKE FLEMING
- Deadline
Yes, there's even more. With the lineup at the Cannes Film Festival already boasting a plethora of top-tier talent and highly anticipated films, the sidebar Directors' Fortnight is not to be outdone, and today they have unveiled their unusually name-brand-heavy lineup.
Michel Gondry's "The We & The I," Ben Wheatley's "Sightseers," plus new films by Pablo Lorrain, Quentin Dupieux and the late Raoul Ruiz will the lead the charge in 2012. Gondry's film has been rumored for south of France for a while now, but when it didn't show up in the Cannes lineup, and with the director already lensing his next effort "Mood Indigo," we figured we'd have to wait until the fall for "The We And The I." But the feature, which has been kept under wraps, and stars a cast of unknowns, will get a grand bow as the Opening Night film.
Elsewhere in the lineup: "Kill List...
Michel Gondry's "The We & The I," Ben Wheatley's "Sightseers," plus new films by Pablo Lorrain, Quentin Dupieux and the late Raoul Ruiz will the lead the charge in 2012. Gondry's film has been rumored for south of France for a while now, but when it didn't show up in the Cannes lineup, and with the director already lensing his next effort "Mood Indigo," we figured we'd have to wait until the fall for "The We And The I." But the feature, which has been kept under wraps, and stars a cast of unknowns, will get a grand bow as the Opening Night film.
Elsewhere in the lineup: "Kill List...
- 4/24/2012
- by Kevin Jagernauth
- The Playlist
“This year’s program captures how eclectic and varied in genre and style Latin American cinema has become,” says the Film Society of Lincoln Center’s Marcela Goglio, who, along with colleague Richard Pena, programs the films that play at the Walter Reade Theater during the 12th edition of Latin Beat (August 10-24). “In spite of ongoing financial struggle, good commercial films coexist with low-budget and more experimental ones.”
Even though it is the oldest of all, Latin Beat has not received its just due in a community that hosts so many mediocre Latin American and Latino film festivals and exhibitions. (Check out the Havana Film Festival New York and the New York International Latino Film Festival, if you’re in doubt. And just to pose a question: Is there a high enough percentage of quality films coming out of any one Latin American country to justify a New York...
Even though it is the oldest of all, Latin Beat has not received its just due in a community that hosts so many mediocre Latin American and Latino film festivals and exhibitions. (Check out the Havana Film Festival New York and the New York International Latino Film Festival, if you’re in doubt. And just to pose a question: Is there a high enough percentage of quality films coming out of any one Latin American country to justify a New York...
- 8/6/2011
- by Howard Feinstein
- Filmmaker Magazine - Blog
Uruguayan filmmaker Federico Veiroj was born in Montevideo in 1976. In 2000 he obtained a Degree in Social Communication at the Catholic University in Montevideo, coursing one semester at Vcu (Virginia Commonwealth University, USA). He has been directing and producing short-films since 1996. He has also worked as an actor in many Uruguayan short-films and as script supervisor in Juan Pablo Rebella and Pablo Stoll's features 25 Watts and Whisky. He has followed up his first feature film Acné with the cinephilic valentine A Useful Life (La vida útil, 2010).
A Useful Life was the first film at the 2010 Toronto International Film Festival I heard applauded at its press screening, confirming as Diana Sanchez had written in her program capsule that "for anyone who loves cinema in its purest form, this film will be a revelation." As Sanchez synopsized: "Federico Veiroj's thoughtful and delicate second feature contemplates the value of outmoded occupations with this evocative (and alarming!
A Useful Life was the first film at the 2010 Toronto International Film Festival I heard applauded at its press screening, confirming as Diana Sanchez had written in her program capsule that "for anyone who loves cinema in its purest form, this film will be a revelation." As Sanchez synopsized: "Federico Veiroj's thoughtful and delicate second feature contemplates the value of outmoded occupations with this evocative (and alarming!
- 10/1/2010
- MUBI
The German sales co. known for providing the fest circuit and art-house plexes with subtitled stuff from around the globe will set fire to the Director's Fortnight section this year. If I'm counting right, the Match Factory supply the section with a trio of titles (five total in the fest) including the much discussed on this site Cam Archer's sophomore feature, and they nabbed a Main Comp spot for one of the most celebrated directors of the decade in Apichatpong Weerasethakul latest – a sort of “ghost” story. - The German sales co. known for providing the fest circuit and art-house plexes with subtitled stuff from around the globe will set fire to the Director's Fortnight section this year. If I'm counting right, The Match Factory supply the fest with a five titles including The Light Thief (see pic above), The City Below, the including the much discussed...
- 5/12/2010
- IONCINEMA.com
The German sales co. known for providing the fest circuit and art-house plexes with subtitled stuff from around the globe will set fire to the Director's Fortnight section this year. If I'm counting right, The Match Factory supply the fest with a five titles including The Light Thief (see pic above), The City Below, the including the much discussed on this site Cam Archer's sophomore feature, and they nabbed a Main Comp spot for one of the most celebrated directors of the decade in Apichatpong Weerasethakul latest – a sort of “ghost” story. Everything Will Be Fine (Alting Bliver Godt Igen) by Christoffer Boe - Completed Shit Year by Cam Archer - Completed The City Below (Unter Dir Die Stadt) by Christoph HOCHHÄUSLER - Completed The Light Thief by Aktan Arym Kubat - Completed Uncle Boonmee Who Nn Recall His Past Lives (Loong Boonmee Raleuk Chaat) by Apichatpong Weerasethakul -...
- 5/11/2010
- IONCINEMA.com
Before going into my Women Directors Tracking which I have vowed to continue until women reach a parity with men in the film business and Latino Directors groove, I want to thank Howard Feinstein for watching the most obscure films of Rotterdam to find the jewels! Scratching Below the Surface for Some Rotterdam Fest Gems - indieWIRE. Kudos! I wish I could have seen these!
Howard spotted this one: "A young woman named Rusudan Pirveli brought to the 'Bright Future' section Susa, another story of hard financial times. 'The Lost Generation' is represented here by the absent father of an adolescent boy, who, working for his mother, sells bootleg vodka in bottles. Sadly, he lives under the delusion that dad’s return would ease his and his mom’s hardship. Like Koguashvili, Pirveli eschews unnecessary authorial intervention: Both directors understand all too well that they are living amidst powerful,...
Howard spotted this one: "A young woman named Rusudan Pirveli brought to the 'Bright Future' section Susa, another story of hard financial times. 'The Lost Generation' is represented here by the absent father of an adolescent boy, who, working for his mother, sells bootleg vodka in bottles. Sadly, he lives under the delusion that dad’s return would ease his and his mom’s hardship. Like Koguashvili, Pirveli eschews unnecessary authorial intervention: Both directors understand all too well that they are living amidst powerful,...
- 2/10/2010
- by Sydney
- Sydney's Buzz
A tribute to his former collaborator, the late Juan Pablo Rebella, Pablo Stoll's maiden solo flight has little chance of seeing major international theatrical distribution, but it remains a welcomed experimental film that might be mum on dialogue, but heavy on soundtrack... - Part two of two back to back offerings in Uruguayan cinema, there are some people who when decide to move away from society, they do so by not crawling into a ball, but by severing contact, communication in gradual, somewhat obscure steps. A tribute to his former collaborator, the late Juan Pablo Rebella, Pablo Stoll's maiden solo flight has little chance of seeing major international theatrical distribution, but it remains a welcomed experimental film that might be mum on dialogue, but heavy on soundtrack and ideas of isolation and disbanding from the family (the filmmaker employs his own members) – actual home movies intelligently inserted in this discourse.
- 11/30/2009
- by Ioncinema.com Staff
- IONCINEMA.com
- I've come up with a magical number of 30 films that I'll be covering for the fest (you might have noticed the Tiff Picks countdown over the past couple of weeks), when in fact that, the number of films I hope to catch a whopping 44! So I'm going to break this down in three steps, my top three suggestions going into the fest blindly (kind of what Toronto Star's Peter Howell does annually - read here), a top 10 films that I've caught prior to Tiff that are worth seeing whether you attend the fest or not, followed by a basic recap. My top three: Samuel Maoz's LebanonInvited to compete at Venice (reviews should be arriving sometime today), the word on this pic is that it could be even more poignant than last year's Waltz with Bashir. This is told from the Pov of a tank crew - not really
- 9/8/2009
- IONCINEMA.com
- #10. Hiroshima Director: Pablo Stoll Cast: Juan Andrés Stoll, Mario Stoll, Guillermo Stoll, Noelia Burlé, Leonor CourtoisieDistributor: Rights Available. Buzz: It's difficult to discuss a movement when one gets that sense that we might be in still in the nascent stages of it, but such as the new wave of Romanian films, Uruguay is seeing a definite collective that Pablo Stoll started along with the late Juan Pablo Rebella by introducing 25 Watts and Whisky to the int. film community. Stoll borrows family members, keeps the dialogue to a minimum, cranks up the volume and I imagine explores some personal turf with his first solo effort dedicated to the memory of his creative partner. The Gist: Set in Montevideo, Juan sings in a rock band, but he doesn’t talk much. He also works at a bakery during the night and sleeps most of the day. This is the story of
- 9/1/2009
- IONCINEMA.com
- Following my top ten Tiff list of titles available piece that I published a couples of hours back, Tiff released the lengthy list of titles that are looking for deals. Among those that I didn't mention in my top ten but could have easily have been there is the omission of Micmacs à tire-larigot (I wasn't sure if Warner Bros. only had domestic rights for France and not world rights), and titles such as Neil Jordan's Ondine, Atom Egoyan's Chloe, Oliver Parker's Dorian Gray, Aaron Schneider's Get Low, Derrick Borte's The Joneses and Michael J. Bassett's Solomon Kane should be generating key interest from the buyers as well. Without further ado, here is the list. L’Affaire Farewell Christian Carion, France Ahead of Time Bob Richman, USA The Angel Margreth Olin, Norway/Sweden/Finland The Art of the Steal Don Argott, USA Baaria Giuseppe Tornatore,
- 8/27/2009
- IONCINEMA.com
Looking better and better, we're getting to the more esoteric and arthouse film here including one we covered a long time ago called Slovenka or in English, Slovenian Girl (trailer here).
You can check out the full list after the break.
Contemporary World Cinema
Beyond the Circle Golam Rabbany Biplob, Bangladesh
World Premiere
In this political fable from Bangladesh's leading filmmaker, a simple village musician gets swept up in the market economy of big city Dhaka.
Blessed Ana Kokkinos, Australia
International Premiere
During the course of one day and night, seven children wander the streets in an urban odyssey. Blessed is a film about mothers and children, about love and beauty, about being lost and finding your way home.
Down for Life Alan Jacobs, USA
World Premiere
Based on a New York Times article, this film depicts a single, fateful day in the life of a 15-year-old Latina gang leader.
You can check out the full list after the break.
Contemporary World Cinema
Beyond the Circle Golam Rabbany Biplob, Bangladesh
World Premiere
In this political fable from Bangladesh's leading filmmaker, a simple village musician gets swept up in the market economy of big city Dhaka.
Blessed Ana Kokkinos, Australia
International Premiere
During the course of one day and night, seven children wander the streets in an urban odyssey. Blessed is a film about mothers and children, about love and beauty, about being lost and finding your way home.
Down for Life Alan Jacobs, USA
World Premiere
Based on a New York Times article, this film depicts a single, fateful day in the life of a 15-year-old Latina gang leader.
- 8/6/2009
- QuietEarth.us
Toronto -- Alan Jacobs' gang drama "Down for Life" is up for a world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival, one of 11 titles added Thursday to its Contemporary World Cinema sidebar.
The U.S. indie, based on a New York Times article, portrays a day in the life of a 15-year-old Latina gang leader and stars Danny Glover and local youths in South Central Los Angeles, where it was shot on location.
Also booked for the Toronto sidebar for world bows are Golam Rabbany Biplob's "Beyond the Circle," a political fable from Bangladesh; Iranian director Shalizeh Arefpour's "Heiran"; and "Sawasdee Bangkok," an ensemble of four Bangkok-themed films by local Thai directors Wisit Sasanatieng, Aditya Assarat, Kongdej Jaturanrasmee and Pen-ek Ratanaruang.
There's also international premieres for Australian director Ana Kokkinos' "Blessed," Giuseppe Piccioni's "Giulia Doesn't Date at Night," from Italy, and Finnish director Mika Kaurismaki's "The House of Branching Love,...
The U.S. indie, based on a New York Times article, portrays a day in the life of a 15-year-old Latina gang leader and stars Danny Glover and local youths in South Central Los Angeles, where it was shot on location.
Also booked for the Toronto sidebar for world bows are Golam Rabbany Biplob's "Beyond the Circle," a political fable from Bangladesh; Iranian director Shalizeh Arefpour's "Heiran"; and "Sawasdee Bangkok," an ensemble of four Bangkok-themed films by local Thai directors Wisit Sasanatieng, Aditya Assarat, Kongdej Jaturanrasmee and Pen-ek Ratanaruang.
There's also international premieres for Australian director Ana Kokkinos' "Blessed," Giuseppe Piccioni's "Giulia Doesn't Date at Night," from Italy, and Finnish director Mika Kaurismaki's "The House of Branching Love,...
- 8/6/2009
- by By Etan Vlessing
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
- Just when you think its safe to start considering making a short list, Tiff announce another eleven titles to the mix including: Pablo Stoll's first solo effort in Hiroshima (see pic) since the suicide of co-filmmaker friend Juan Pablo Rebella (together the pair gave us Whisky and 25 Watts), Harmony Korine returns to eating spaghetti in the tub with Trash Humpers, we get a Thailand filmmaker collective in Wisit Sasanatieng, Aditya Assarat, Kongdej Jaturanrasmee and Pen-ek Ratanaruang in Sawasdee Bangkok and favorite Czeck contemo filmmaker Jan Hrebejk explores sex and marriage with Eastern bloc humor in Shameless. Probably the last batch of titles to be added to the Contemporary World Cinema and Visions sections, here are the smorgasbord of mostly world premiere offerings from all four corners. Contemporary World CinemaBeyond the Circle Golam Rabbany Biplob, Bangladesh World Premiere In this political fable from Bangladesh’s leading filmmaker, a simple
- 8/6/2009
- IONCINEMA.com
Oscar 2005: Best Foreign-Language Film Entries (Afghanistan to China) Oscar 2005: Best Foreign-Language Film Entries (Croatia to Malaysia) Mexico, Innocent Voices, Luis Mandoki, director; The Netherlands, Simon, Eddy Terstall, director; Norway, Hawaii, Oslo, Erik Poppe, director; Palestine, The Olive Harvest, Hanna Elias, director; Philippines, Crying Ladies, Mark Meily, director; Poland, The Welts, Magdalena Piekorz, director; Portugal, The Miracle According to Salomé, Mário Barroso, director; Romania, Orient-Express, Sergiu Nicolaescu, director; Russia, Night Watch, Timolir Bekmambetov, director; Serbia and Montenegro, Goose Feather, Ljubiša Samardic, director; Slovenia, Beneath Her Window, Metod Pevec, director; South Africa, Yesterday, Darrell Roodt, director; Spain, The Sea Inside, Alejandro Amenabar, director; Sweden, As in Heaven, Kay Pollak, director; Switzerland, Mein Name Ist Bach, Dominique de Rivaz, director; Taiwan, 20 : 30 : 40, Sylvia Chang, director; Thailand, The Overture, Itthisoontorn Vichailak, director; Uruguay, Whisky, Juan Pablo Rebella, Pablo Stoll, directors; Venezuela, [...]...
- 4/19/2009
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
London -- A Korean remake, the latest from Chinese director Zhang Yuan and an animated tale from the Czech Republic are among the 36 selections for the next CineMart.
Organizers of the Rotterdam co-production market said Monday that they sifted through nearly 500 submissions from 26 territories before crafting their final lineup.
South Korea's "The Housemaid" is expected to land a production partner Gina Kim's remake for Mirovision.
Yuan's 1933-set "Executioner Garden" tells the story of a man sentenced to death who, as his last wish, requests that he be killed "in motion." He escapes into the vaults of the prison and a game of life and death ensues.
Czech animation stalwart Negativ Film, meanwhile, the production house behind the films of Bohdan Slama, will travel to the Dutch market to find partners for "Alois Nebel."
And the first movie directed solely by Pablo Stoll, half of the famous 25 Watts and Whisky duo from Uruguay,...
Organizers of the Rotterdam co-production market said Monday that they sifted through nearly 500 submissions from 26 territories before crafting their final lineup.
South Korea's "The Housemaid" is expected to land a production partner Gina Kim's remake for Mirovision.
Yuan's 1933-set "Executioner Garden" tells the story of a man sentenced to death who, as his last wish, requests that he be killed "in motion." He escapes into the vaults of the prison and a game of life and death ensues.
Czech animation stalwart Negativ Film, meanwhile, the production house behind the films of Bohdan Slama, will travel to the Dutch market to find partners for "Alois Nebel."
And the first movie directed solely by Pablo Stoll, half of the famous 25 Watts and Whisky duo from Uruguay,...
- 12/22/2008
- by By Stuart Kemp
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
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