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Exclusive: Im Global’s Latino sales subsidiary ramps up before Texas festival.

Mexican Rubén Imaz’s feature will receive its North American debut after the recent world premiere in Cartagena.

Tormentero centres on a retired fisherman who discovered an oil field in his village many years ago that caused his friends and neighbours to lose sight of their values and reject him.

Now alcoholic, schizophrenic and haunted by his past, the man sets out to reclaim the love and honour he lost decades ago after his fateful discovery.

Gabino Rodríguez stars with José Carlos Ruiz and Mónica Jiménez. Julio Bárcenas Sánchez served as producer alongside Imaz, Gerylee Polanco Uribe, Oscar Ruiz Navia, Laura Amelia Guzmán and Israel Cárdenas.

“Ruben is a filmmaker I have admired since my time at Canana Distribution, when we released his first film Familia Tortuga,” Mundial general manager Cristina Garza, who made the announcement on Monday, said.

“When...

Claudia Pedraza’s debut feature scooped the $20,000 top prize at the Bogotá Audiovisual Market.

The seventh edition of the Bogotá Audiovisual Market closed on Friday (July 15) with this year’s award-winners illustrating the energy and diversity of the Colombian film industry.

La Sed (The Thirst) won the Efd (Equipment and Film Design Colombia) Prize, which comes with $20,000 (€18,000) worth of Efd shooting equipment. The film marks director Claudia Pedraza’s [pictured] debut feature after working as first assistant director on Ciro Guerra’s Embrace Of The Serpent.

La Sed, a Marejada Films production, is a drama set in a world where the lack of water has made living conditions extreme. With a budget of $490,000 (€443,000), the film will be shot next year in La Guajira desert in Colombia, the same location where Ciro Guerra is planning to shoot Pájaros De Verano, his next feature following the success of Embrace Of The Serpent, which won at Director’s Fortnight in Cannes...

Twenty-nine films from twelve countries have been nominated in the sixth annual edition of the Cinema Tropical Awards, honoring the best of Latin American cinema of the year in six different categories: Best Feature Film; Best Documentary Film; Best Director, Feature Film; Best Director, Documentary Film; Best First Film; and Best U.S. Latino Film.

The five films competing for the Cinema Tropical Award for Best Feature Film of the Year are: The Club by Pablo Larraín (Chile), Jauja by Lisandro Alonso (Argentina), Los Hongos by Oscar Ruiz Navia (Colombia), The Princess of France by Matías Piñeiro (Argentina), and White Out, Black In by Adirley Queirós (Brazil).

The five nominees for Best U.S. Latino Film of the Year are: The Book of Life by Jorge Gutierrez, East Side Sushi by Anthony Lucero, Mala Mala by Antonio Santini and Dan Sickles, Me and Earl and the Dying Girl by Alfonso Gomez-Rejon, and We Like It Like That by Mathew Ramirez Warren.

The winners of the 6th Annual Cinema Tropical Awards will be announced at a special evening ceremony at The New York Times Company headquarters in New York City on Wednesday, January 20, 2016. The winning films will be showcased as part of the Cinema Tropical Festival at Museum of the Moving Image, February 25-28, 2016, celebrating the organization’s 15th anniversary.

The candidates were culled from a comprehensive list of films created by a nominating committee composed of 12 film professionals from Latin America, the U.S., and Europe. All the films under consideration had a minimum of 60 minutes in length and premiered between April 1, 2014 and March 31, 2015.

Complete List of Nominations:

Best Feature Film

• "The Club"/ "El club" (Pablo Larraín, Chile, 2015)

• "Jauja" (Lisandro Alonso, Argentina, 2014)

• "Los Hongos" (Óscar Ruiz Navia, Colombia, 2014)

• "The Princess of France" / "La princesa de Francia" (Matías Piñeiro, Argentina/USA, 2014)

• "White Out, Black In" / "Branco Sai, Petro Fica" (Adirley Queirós, Brazil, 2014)

Best Director, Feature Film

• Nicolás Pereda, "The Absent" / "Los ausentes" (Mexico, 2014)

• Gabriel Mascaro, "August Winds" / "Ventos de Agosto" (Brazil, 2014)

• Pablo Larraín, "The Club" / "El club" (Chile, 2015)

• Laura Amelia Guzmán and Israel Cárdenas, "Sand Dollars" / "Dólares de arena" (Dominican Republic/Mexico/Argentina, 2014)

• Paz Fábrega, "Viaje" (Costa Rica, 2015)

Best First Film

• "600 Miles" (Gabriel Ripstein, Mexico, 2015)

• "The Fire" / "El incendio" (Juan Schnitman, Argentina, 2015)

• "Ixcanul" (Jayro Bustamante, Guatemala, 2015)

• "She Comes Back on Thursday" / "Ela Volta Na Quinta" (Andrés Novais Oliveira, Brazil, 2014)

• "Videophilia (and Other Viral Syndromes)" / "Videofilia (y otros síndromes virales)" (Juan Daniel F. Molero, Peru, 2015)

Best Documentary Film

• "A Committee Chronicle" / "Crónica de un comité" (José Luis Sepúlveda and Carolina Adriazola, Chile, 2014)

• "Identification Photos" / "Retratos de Identificaçao" (Anita Leandro, Brazil, 2014)

• "Invasion" / "Invasión" (Abner Benaim, Panama, 2014)

• "Last Conversations" / "Últimas Conversas" (Eduardo Coutinho, Brazil,2015)

• "Monte Adentro" (Nicolás Macario Alonso, Colombia/Argentina, 2014)

Best Director, Documentary Film

• Maíra Bühler and Matias Mariani, "I Touched All Your Stuff"/ "A Vida Privada dos Hipopótamos" (Brazil, 2014)

• Karina García Casanova, "Juanicas" (Mexico, 2014)

• Betzabé García, "Kings of Nowhere"/ "Los reyes del pueblo que no existe" (Mexico, 2015)

• Aldo Garay, "The New Man" / "El hombre nuevo" (Uruguay, 2015)

• Christopher Murray, "Propaganda" (Chile, 2014)

Best U.S. Latino Film

• "The Book of Life" (Jorge Gutierrez, USA, 2014)

• "East Side Sushi" (Anthony Lucero, USA, 2014)

• "Mala Mala" (Antonio Santini and Dan Sickles, USA/Puerto Rico, 2014)

• "Me and Earl and the Dying Girl" (Alfonso Gomez-Rejon USA, 2015)

• "We Like It Like That" (Mathew Ramirez Warren, USA, 2015)

2015 Jury: Amalia Córdova, film programmer and scholar; Aaron Cutler, film critic and programmer; Paul Dallas, film critic; Vanessa Erazo, Film Editor, Remezcla; Michelle Farrell, film scholar; Sandra Kogut, filmmaker; Dominic Davis, film programmer, Rooftop Films; David Schwartz, Chief Curator, Museum of the Moving Image; Diana Vargas, Artistic Director, Havana Film Festival New York.

2015 Nominating Committee: Fábio Andrade, Revista Cinética, Brazil; Juan Pablo Bastarrachea, Cine Tonalá, Mexico; Consuelo Castillo, Doctv Latinoamérica, Colombia; Fernando del Razo, Riviera Maya Film Festival, Mexico; Vanessa Erazo, Film Editor, Remezcla, USA; Luis Gonzalez Zaffaroni, DocMontevideo, Uruguay; James Lattimer, Berlinale's Forum, Germany; Alicia Morales, Lima Film Festival, Peru; Joel Poblete. Sanfic, Chile; Andrea Stavenhagen, San Sebastian Film Festival, Spain; Charles Tesson, Critics' Week, Cannes, France; Raúl Niño Zambrano, International Documentary Film Festival - Idfa, Netherlands.

Following the unveling of the Official Selection, news from the Cannes Film Festival (May 13-24) continues to arrive. The prestigious Critics' Week –aimed at discovering the world's most interesting directors– announced the list of films to be included in the 54th edition of this event, one of the Festival's most important, along with the Directors' Fortnight.

The big news for Colombia is the selection of director/screenwriter César Augusto Acevedo's first film, "La Tierra y la Sombra" (Land and Shade), one of the seven feature films chosen to compete from among 1,100 submissions from around the world. The film was produced by Jorge Forero, Paola Pérez Nieto and Diana Bustamante, partners and founding members of Burning Blue, the production company responsible for some of the most internationally recognized films to come out of Colombia in recent years ("El vuelco del Cangrejo," "La Playa D.C," "La Sirga," "Solecito," "Los Hongos," "Climas," "Refugiado," and many others).

In "La Tierra y la Sombra," a woman refuses to give up the land she has fought to defend all her life; a son is incapable of leaving his mother, to the point of risking his own life; a father must confront past mistakes in order to recover the loved ones he abandoned; a brave wife fights to save her family; and a child grows up in the midst of devastation. Staged in a family microcosm –a tiny house and a tree surrounded by a formidable sugar cane filed–, the film presents the final days of these characters intent on repairing the fragile ties that bind them as they face their own imminent demise in the overwhelming wake of progress. Out of this situation comes a cruel story, densely populated with metaphors and allegories for culture, the fatality of alienation and oblivion, the fragility of memory, the inevitability of family breakdown, and the solitude it provokes.

The film was produced by Burning Blue (Colombia) in co-production with Ciné-Sud Promotion (France), Tokapi Films (Holland), Rampante Films (Chile), and Preta Portê Filmes (Brazil). In addition to director/screenwriter Cesar Acevedo, the film's crew included cinematographer Mateo Guzmán; editor Miguel Schverdfinger; art director Marcela Gómez; actor trainer Fátima Toledo; and soundman Felipe Rayo. The film stars Haimer Leal as Alfonso; Hilda Ruiz as Alicia; Edison Raigosa as Alfonso's and Alicia's son Gerardo; Marleyda Soto as Gerardo's wife Esperanza; and Felipe Cárdenas as Gerardo's and Esperanza's son Manuel.

According to César Acevedo: "The idea for this film was born of personal pain. At the time I began writing the screenplay my mother was dead, my father was a ghost, and given my inability to generate memories, they seemed completely lost to me. Thus arose my need to make a film that would allow me to recover the two most important people in my life, using the language of film. What I intended at the time was a reflection on our lives together, and what they might have been, based on the most private, the most important elements of this relationship. I believed that only by returning to my roots would I be able to face what I'd forgotten. This led to my decision to create a microcosm consisting of a small house and a tree, where I could somehow be reunited with those I loved most."

That was just the beginning, however, and the film couldn't remain tied to this initial concept with time tugging it in another direction. Acevedo continues: "As I began writing the screenplay I realized that the house was inhabited by ghosts, who drifted through the rooms, incapable of speech, unrecognizable to each other. It took a long time to accept that what I was trying to accomplish was impossible, simply because everything I was looking for had disappeared with them. So I distanced myself from the original intention with the sole purpose of better developing my characters and the film's conflict and the idea arose of telling the story of a dysfunctional family's attempt to repair the ties that bind them, just before being separated for good. Not only are they forced to confront the feelings of others, but, more challenging still, they discover feelings they never knew existed, or never suspected they harbored. "

Burning Blue: Spearheading the Internationalization of Colombian Cinema

After participating in the 65th Berlin Film Festival's Forum less than two months ago with Jorge Forero's film "Violence," Burning Blue is proud to announces the inclusion of "La Tierra y la Sombra" in the Cannes Festival's Critics' Week. This selection confirms Burning Blue's role as key Colombian representative in major film events around the world.

Burning Blue's efforts to produce daring films focusing on the value and power of stories, and construction of self-sustaining formats to achieve significant results internationally, allowing Colombian films to be seen worldwide, are examples of the creativity and innovation in Latin America productions and prove that Burning Blue has succeeded in asserting itself in a depressed market with a new vision that provides transcendent stories.

The successful start-up of a co-production model allowing films to work with partners in France, Germany, Poland and Holland –not to mention Latin America, where they have co-produced with Argentina, Mexico, Chile, Peru and Brazil; the presence of the company's films in more than 200 festivals, with commercial releases in countries like the Us, Greece, Canada, Spain, Portugal, Eastern Europe, and several African nations (as well as co-producing countries); an the company's presence at the Cannes Film Festival in four consecutive years (co-producers of Argentine director Diego Lerman's "Refugiado" in 2014; co-producers of Oscar Ruíz Navia's short film "Solecito" at the 2013 Director's Fortnight; and producers of William Vega's "La Sirga" and Juan Andrés Arango's "La Playa D.C." included in the 2012 Director's Fortnight and Certain Regard sections, respectively) make Burning Blue Colombia's most visible presence on the global film market.

Although Burning Blue has achieved major recognition for its films on the international market, the company aspires, above all, to participate in the creation of films by and for Colombians and, in even more romantically ambitious terms, the creation of Latin American cinema for the Latin American subcontinent. The stories told, therefore, speak profoundly of the continent's many different peoples and uncover the traditions, imagery, dreams, desires, fears and problems facing these richly diverse, passionate, and complex cultures. To this end, Burning Blue hopes to harness the favorable international attention garnered to date to continually ignite local interest, using international platforms as a springboard to its natural audience: Colombia.

Burning Blue, led by Diana Bustamante, Jorge Forero and Paola Pérez Nieto, is currently developing the feature films "Asilo" (Jaime Osorio Márquez), in co-production with Rhayuela Cine, "Desobsesión" (Jorge Navas), and the co-production "Niño Nadie" (Fernando Guzzoni), produced for Chile's Rampante Films.

Diana Bustamante produced Ciro Guerra's "Los Viajes del Viento" (included in the 2009 Cannes Festival's Certain Regard section) and Oscar Ruiz Navia's "El vuelco del cangrejo" (2009 Toronto Film Festival premiere and Fripresci Award at the 2010 Berlinale Festival and Forum). She also designed and managed Caracol Television's film department from 2008 to 2012, taking more than 20 Colombian feature films from the financing to final promotion stages. She recently became the artistic director of the Cartagena International Film Festival (Ficci), contributing to the success of the festival's 55th edition last March, and is currently working on the 2016 festival.

"La Tierra y la Sombra" - Nothing But Success

The process of creating and financing "La Tierra y la Sombra" allowed the film to mature with assistance from specialists, tutors, and evaluation committees at a number of national and international institutions and festivals, each of them helping to move the film towards its world premiere at the upcoming Cannes Festival.

During the project's development stage it won a development grant from Colombia's Film Development Fund in 2009 and was selected the following year to participate in the Pitch Workshop at Colombia's Cali Film Festival. The project also took part in the Ibero-American Films Crossing Borders event at the 2010 Havana Film Festival and the 2012 Ibero-American Co-Production Meeting at the Huelva Film Festival in Spain.

It was, however, in 2013 that the project became a reality, winning at the Cartagena International Film Festival's Co-Production Meeting, which made it possible to attend the Cannes Marché Du Film. The film went on to win a Casa de las Américas Film Project Development grant from the Carolina Foundation and a production grant from Colombia's Film Development Fund. Also in 2013, the Hubert Bals Fund awarded the project a development grant and the San Sebastian Film Festival selected it for the Co-Production Forum.

The final push came in 2014 when the project was invited to participate in Boost! at the Rotterdam Film Festival in Holland and received production grants from both the Ibermedia and Hubert Bals Funds. Shooting took place in late 2014 with post-production following in early 2015 and, finally, the film's submission, in the company of another 1,100 feature films, to the Cannes Festival.

Screening as part of the Museum of Modern Art and the Film Society of Lincoln Center's 44th New Directors/New Films (Nd/Nf) festival (March 18-29) in NYC is "Los Hongos," from Colombian director Oscar Ruiz Navia, his second feature which follows 2 young street artists as they explore the vibrant and exciting milieu of the director’s hometown of Cali. Every night after work, Roberto makes graffiti on different walls of his neighborhood on the east of Cali. One day he loses his job because he steals several cans of paint, using them to create a large mural on the lot next to his house. Without a dime to help his mother, he crosses the city looking for...

Alexander Skarsgård and Kristen Wiig in Marielle Heller's The Diary Of A Teenage Girl

Stevan Riley's Listen To Me Marlon, Simone Rapisarda Casanova's The Creation Of Meaning (La Creazione Di Significato), Lukas Valenta Rinner's Parabellum, and Goodnight Mommy directed by Severin Fiala and Veronika Franz are films to look out for.

Bas Devos (Violet); Stéphane Lafleur (Tu Dors Nicole); Shim Sung-bo (Haemoo); Kornél Mundruczó (White God); Britni West (Tired Moonlight); Darhad Erdenibulag (K); Naji Abu Nowar (Theeb); Bill Ross and Turner Ross (Western); Yohei Suzuki (Ow); Nadav Lapid (The Kindergarten Teacher); Benjamin Crotty (Fort Buchanan); Laura Citarella and Verónica Llinás (Dog Lady); Salomé Alexi (Line Of Credit); Chaitanya Tamhane (Court); Sarah Leonor (The Great Man); Charles Poekel (Christmas, Again); Oscar Ruiz Navia (Los Hongos) are filmmakers scheduled to participate in post-screening Q&As.

The Museum of Modern Art and the Film Society of Lincoln Center's 44th...

It’s a thrill to see two out of three of the CineMart Awards are to filmmakers we are tracking: “Luxembourg” by Myroslav Slaboshptyskly from Ukraine and Cuba’s Claudia Calvino and Carlos Lechuga's “Santa y Delfin” won the inaugural Wouter Barendrecht Award. Best unpublished screenplay prize was awarded to the team this past December at Havana’s Festival de Nuevo Cine Latinoamericano. The Ukrainian-German production to be produced by Miff’s Business Square founder Anna Katchko, “Luxembourg”, was awarded the €7,000 Arte International Prize after winning the Sundance Aj+ sponsored Global Filmmaking Award of Us $10,000.

The project has a budget of €1.5 million and is half financed by the Ukrainean State Film Agency. It received a grant from Hubert Bals Fund earlier and will be at Berlin’s Efm Coproduction Market next week. This U.K.-German-French coproduction is being sold internationally by Ultra Violet who sold writer-director Myroslav Slaboshptyskly’s first film “The Tribe” to 35 territories. Myroslav and I spoke at Sundance and he gave me a link to his short “Nuclear Waste” which is a pilot for this film, shot in the Chernobyl exclusion zone and awarded the Silver Leopard of Tomorrow at the Locarno Film Festival and showed at many festivals.

CineMart 2015 awards were announced recently, marking the close of the 32nd edition of the co-production market. Dutch/French/Belgian production “Tonic Immobility” was awarded the Eurimages Co-Production Development Award of €20,000, which is given to a project presented by a European producer.

CineMart selected 24 international projects to participate in the four day event which has been one of the most successful in recent years. A panel discussion to launch Iffr’s new VoD initiative, Tiger Release, was well attended with several filmmakers now in discussion with the Iffr team on releasing their new films via this platform. Multiple conferences and panels covering topics ranging from “Making the most of a film festival” to “The Director-Producer Partnership” were held in front of packed audiences who were invited to be involved in the debates and receive advice. The "Creative Europe Day" on Tuesday, January 27th which offered advice and guidance on creating beyond the boundaries of Europe proved one of the highlights of Iffr 2015.

On making the announcement Head of Industry & CineMart, Marit van den Elshout commented “The quality of our line-up this year is something the whole team is very proud of - so many standout projects with talented teams behind them, the award winners exemplify this. We hosted multiple extremely well attended panels and conversations, experienced great success with the launch of Tiger Release and the enthusiasm with which our Creative Europe day was received all adds up to one of the strongest CineMart’s in a long time. ”

This year’s Eurimages Co-Production Development Award winner, “Tonic Immobility” by Nathalie Teirlinck, (The Netherlands, France, Belgium), is a Bart van Langendonck, Xavier Rombaut, Savage Film production. It tells the story of Alice, an escort who abandons her baby son Robin. Unexpectedly, seven years later Alice is reunited with the boy and they must find a way to co-exist while Alice is confronted with the fact that true emotions can't be controlled and that intimacy can lead to vulnerability. On the Jury’s decision Dorien van de Pas commented “ The award is being given to a project from a multitalented first time feature director who will tell a very emotional, universal story. His short films demonstrate a strong visual style in combination with a great focus on sound. ”

The Arte International Prize winner “Luxembourg”, (Ukraine, Germany) by Myroslav Slaboshpytskiy, and produced by Anna Katchko with Tandem Production is a film noir with touches of a western. A great project by a very talented director, stunningly set up for a strong and cinematic story. On presenting the award Annamaria Lodato commented. “This year the Arte International Prize is awarded to a talented, daring and radical director. He is preparing a film that explores a world unknown to most of us: today’s Chernobyl. Far from being a ‘disaster film’, it is a story about living in the Chernobyl zone, a world with its own rules, an almost primitive community that the director knows from the inside. ”

The Wouter Barendrecht Award winner “Santa y Delfin” (Cuba), by Carlos Lechuga is produced by Claudia Calvino and Producciones de la 5ta Avenida. Cuba, homosexuality, censorship, working class and intellectuals, a young talented director and a real story - real potential for a hit project.

On presenting the award Managing Director of Fortissimo Films, Nelleke Driessen commented “The Wouter Barendrecht Foundation (Wbf) encourages the work of talented young filmmakers, we encourage daring films, films that oppose social conventions, with a large urgency. There were 8 films eligible for this award, but in the end only one can win and 'Santa y Delfin' stood out amongst all - if Wouter were here he would be thrilled with the choice. ”

CineMart Selected Projects

"A Shining Flaw" by Erwin Olaf

Eyeworks Film & TV Drama, Netherlands

"Cobain" by Nanouk Leopold

Circe Films/Waterland Film, Netherlands

"Vita & Virginia" by Sacha Polak

Mirror Productions/Viking Film, United Kingdom/Netherlands

"Tonic Immobility" by Nathalie Teirlinck

Savage Film/Ctm Pictures, Belgium/France/Netherlands

"The Miracle of the Sargasso Sea" by Syllas Tzoumerkas

Homemade Films/Prpl, Greece/Netherlands

"Angel" by Koen Mortier

Czar Film/Tobina Films/Anonymes Films, Belgium/Senegal/France

"Ceux qui travaillent" by Antoine Russbach

Box Productions, Switzerland

"Cunningham" by Alla Kovgan

Arsam International/Chance Operations, France/USA

"La Fille de l’Estuaire" by Gaëlle Denis

Life to Live Films, United Kingdom/France

"Holiday" by Isabella Eklöf

Dharmafilm/Beofilm, Denmark

"Luxembourg" by Myroslav Slaboshpytskiy

Tandem Production/Garmata Film, Ukraine/Germany

"Bat, Butterfly, Moth" by Sergio Caballero

Corte y Confección de Películas/Am Films, Spain

"The Gray Beyond" by Alejandro Fernández Almendras

Jirafa Films/Wa Entertainment, Chile/Japan

"Only the Dead Have Seen the End of the War" by Khavn

Kamias Overground, Philippines

"Rojo" by Benjamin Naishtat

Pucará Cine, Argentina

"La Barracuda" by Jason Cortlund & Julia Halperin

Small Drama/Hot Metal Films/Blue Suitcase Productions, USA

"Boyfriend" by Ashim Ahluwalia

Future East Film, India

"Gabriel and the Mountain" by Fellipe Barbosa

TvZero/Gamarosa Filmes, Brazil

"Los Delincuentes" by Rodrigo Moreno

Compañía Amateur/Rizoma, Argentina

"Santa y Delfín" by Carlos Lechuga

Producciones de la 5ta Avenida, Cuba

"Kodokushi" by Janus Victoria

Paperheart, Philippines/Malaysia/Japan

Art:Film projects "Cactus Flower" by Hala Elkoussy

Transit Films, Egypt

"Hurrah, Wir Leben Noch" by Agnieszka Polska

Kijora Anna Gawlita/Museum of Modern Art Poland, Poland/Germany

"Mr Sing Sing" by Phil Collins

Shady Lane Productions, Germany/USA

Audience Awards Winners

The awards, as voted for by the public audience attending the Festival, were announced this evening at the Iffr 2015 Closing Night Ceremony, hosted by Festival Director, Rutger Wolfson and Managing Director, Janneke Staarink. James Napier Robertson was awarded the Iffr Audience Award 2015 of €10,000 for his film "The Dark Horse." The award is Napier’s second of the Festival following the MovieZone Iffr Award which was presented on Friday, January 30th at the Iffr Awards Ceremony. The Hubert Bals Fund Dioraphte Award, also of €10,000, presented to the most popular film which received support from the Hubert Bals Fund (Hbf) went to Oscar Ruiz Navia for "Los Hongos," an autobiographical drama centering on the youth culture of Cali, Colombia.

Read More - Toronto Review: Cliff Curtis is a Fallen Champion Turned Mentor in "The Dark Horse"

On the announcement of the Iffr Audience Award 2015 Wolfson commented “The audiences who come from all over the Netherlands and around the world to participate in the Festival and explore our diverse, thought provoking programme are integral to Iffr. It would not be the special Festival it is without them so we would like to thank all who joined us in celebrating cinema this year and of course congratulations to James who created a wonderful, personal film.”

On the announcement of the Hubert Bals Fund Dioraphte Award, Manager of the Hubert Bals Fund, Iwana Chronis commented “I am thrilled with the reception the Hbf supported films received throughout the twelve days of the Festival. Oscar Ruiz Navia is a talented filmmaker with a long and successful career ahead of him, this recognition is fully deserved, we are so pleased to have been a part of helping getting this film to the big screen .”

A highly acclaimed drama, "The Dark Horse" tells the true and moving story of Genesis Potini, who fought for the future of disadvantaged children in New Zealand until his death in 2011. In spite of his own bipolar disorder, he taught them to play chess and fight for opportunities. "The Dark Horse" is both amusing and raw, and above all intensely moving. Born in New Zealand, director James Napier Robertson made a name for himself in the world of television before switching to cinema. He appeared as an actor in the series "The Tribe" and "Shortland Street." He directed his first feature film "I’m Not Harry Jenson" in 2009.

Directed by Oscar Ruiz Navia, "Los Hongos" is an autobiographically inspired drama based around two skater friends who are at the heart of the colorful, noisy street and youth culture of Cali, Colombia. With a warm heart, Ruiz tells the story of Ras and Calvin, who are looking for their own voice, a stage and of course freedom, love and fun. Born in Colombia, Oscar Ruiz Navia’s debut film "Crab Trap" won a Fipresci Award at the Berlinale in 2010. Prior to that he was focused on the development and production of independent cinema in Colombia and founded the production company Contravia Films having previously studied Social Communications and Journalism.

Top 5 Audience Award Iffr 2015

"The Dark Horse" "The Farewell Party" "Loin des Hommes" "La Vie de Jean-Marie" "Alice Cares" Top 5 Hbf Dioraphte Award 2015

"Los Hongos" "La Mujer de los Perros" (Dog Lady) "Nn" "Court" "The Tribe" The full list can be found on the Festival's website:

www.iffr.com/professionals/iffr-2015/iffr-audience-award-2015...

Iffr also reveals other award winners including the audience prize.

International Film Festival Rotterdam (Iffr) unveiled the three winners of the Hivos Tiger Award Competition at an awards ceremony hosted by outgoing festival director Rutger Wolfson.

The films, which each received a cash prize of €15,000 ($17,000), were La Obra Del Siglo by Carlos M. Quintela (Cuba), Vanishing Point by Jakrawal Nilthamrong (Thailand) and Videophilia (And Other Viral Syndromes) by Juan Daniel F. Molero (Peru).

The competition jury was comprised of writer, director and producer Rolf de Heer, producer Ichiyama Shozo, director Maja Miloš, art photographer and director of Spanish Film Archive Jose Maria Prado Garcia and actress Johanna ter Steege.

On making their decision, the jury said: “In dealing with both living and broken dreams, La Obra Del Siglo confronts themes both intimate and epic. With its wonderful performances, with its humour and poignancy and boldness of execution, the film resonates with history.

”Vanishing Point combines...

Iffr reveals Big Screen Awards nominees and the complete line-up for its Bright Future and Spectrum strands, including world premieres from the Us, China and the Netherlands.

Second Coming, starring Idris Elba and Nadine Marshall, has been named as one of 10 films up for the Big Screen Award at the International Film Festival Rotterdam (Iffr) (Jan 21 - Feb 1).

The UK film, written and directed by Debbie Tucker Green, will be vying for a prize of €10,000 ($12,000) awarded specifically to support theatrical distribution of the film in The Netherlands

The 10 nominees are from Iffr’s Bright Future and Spectrum programmes with the winner chosen by a specially selected audience jury. Other titles include Lisandro Alonso’s Cannes Fipresci winner Jauja and Carlos Vermut’s San Sebastian winner Magical Girl.

The nominees are:

I Swear I’ll Leave This Town, Danial AragãoJauja, Lisandro AlonsoKey House Mirror, Michael NoerThe Lesson, Kristina Grozeva, Petar ValchanovMagical Girl, Carlos VermutA...

Los Hongos

Directed by Oscar Ruiz Navia

Written by Marietta von Hausswolff von Baumgarten

France | Germany | Argentina | Colombia, 2014

In Colombia’s urban jungle Santiago de Cali, whose barrios buzz with optimism for an upcoming election and a desire to express unity with the rest of the world, two friends from very different backgrounds are trying to get the message out the only way that they know how: through street art. Like a love letter to his hometown, Oscar Ruiz Navia’s second feature, Los Hongos, provides a snapshot of present-day Colombia, exploring issues of religion, love, art and class through the unclouded eyes of the young protagonists.

Ras (Jovan Alexis Marquinez) lives in a one-room apartment with his devout Christian single mother, losing his short-lived construction job for stealing paint. Calvin (Calvin Buenaventura Tascón), an art student, divides his time between his former singing sensation father and ailing grandmother. The...

World premieres from Goupil, Li, De La Cruz, Yeo, Yoshida and more.Scroll down for Competition line-up

The 27th Tokyo International Film Festival (Tiff) (Oct 23-31) has announced the rest of its line-up with a Competition selection that includes world premieres such as Romain Goupil’s French film The Days Come and Li Ruijun’s Chinese film River Road.

The other world premieres in Competition will be: Filipino maverick Khavn De La Cruz‘s Ruined Heart - Another Love Story Between A Criminal & A Whore; Malaysian producer of Cannes title Tiger Factory, Edmund Yeo’s feature directorial debut River Of Exploding Durians, and the previously announced single Japanese film in Competition, Pale Moon, directed by Daihachi Yoshida.

Claudio Noce’s Italian film Ice Forest will make an international premiere in Competition.

Tiff Programming director Yoshi Yatabe explained the selection was made on three criteria: “an unswerving focus on depicting humanity”, “diversity” and “auteurism”.

He said, “To sum up...

Coverage of International Sales Agents (ISAs) has resumed for the Toronto International Film Festival. This segment covers inspirational companies that have officially selected films in the festival. SydneysBuzz features ISAs, as they play an instrumental and necessary role in helping filmmakers to share their visions and voices with the world.

FiGa Films is based in Los Angeles, California and focuses on sharing current Latin American cinema with the world. It has two world premiers at Tiff this year, including "Sand Dollars" and "Obra". It will also be the North American premier of FiGa's "Los Hongos".

More About FiGa's films at Tiff:

"Sand Dollars", by Laura Amelia Guzman

Every afternoon Noelí, a young Dominican girl, goes to the beaches at Las Terrenas. Along with her boyfriend, they look for ways to make a living at the expense of one of the hundreds of tourists that wander the beach.

As people parade through her life, Noelí has a steady client, Anne, a mature French woman who, as time goes by, has found an ideal refuge on the island to spend her last years.

Noelí’s boyfriend feigns to be her brother and outlines a plan in which Noelí travels to Paris with the old lady and sends him money every month.

For Noelí, the relationship with the old lady is one of convenience, but the feelings become more intense as the departure date closes in.

"Obra", by Gregorio Graziosi

In the heavily populated city of São Paulo, Brazil, a young architect discovers a clandestine cemetery walking through the worksite of his first important project, located in a lot belonging to his family. As terrible memories float back, he must struggle with his conscience and question his own heritage.

"Los Hongos", by Oscar Ruiz Navia

During the day Ras is a construction worker. At night after work he tags the walls of his neighborhood east of Cali. Ras can’t sleep and is constantly daydreaming. His mother, Maria, a sweet woman who migrated to the city from the jungle on the Pacific side of Colombia, worries that her son has been bewitched and will end up insane.

One day Ras is fired from his job for stealing several cans of paint, which he is using to create a huge mural on the lot next to his house. Without a dime to help his mother, he searches the city for his best friend Calvin, another young graffiti artist, who studies fine arts but is having difficulty since his parents’ divorce and his grandmother’s recurring cancer.

Like a couple of mushrooms, Ras and Calvin will sprout and wander aimlessly through the city on a journey of no return, infecting the world around them with immense freedom and hope.

See FiGa's catalogue here.

More about FiGa Films:

FiGa Films is an international sales agency, production, and distribution company established in 2006. Our initial focus was to acquire the best of the "new" Latin American cinema. It still is. We have since expanded to include works from North America, Europe, and Africa. Our library, now consisting of over 60 films, runs the gamut of styles and themes by established, as well as up-and-coming, filmmakers.

We treat every project, big or small, with the same passion and commitment as the filmmakers. We start early, from placing the film in the right festival, to its ultimate sale and release in major territories around the world. Whether it’s theatrical, TV, online, museums or universities, our goal is to make sure the largest audience possible gets to see these amazing films. We are proud of our reputation for launching careers and finding exciting and bold works of art to an appreciative audience.

The lineups for the Mavericks, Discovery, and Tiff Kids parts of the Toronto Film Festival were announced, wrapping up a series of lineup announcements for the Toronto International Film Festival.

With the added films, the festival’s entire slate is now a whopping 393 movies. Two hundred eighty-five of those movies are feature films, of which 143 are world premieres.

The Mavericks portion of the festival includes onstage discussions following the screening of each film. Do I Sound Gay? will be followed by a talk between director David Thorpe and sex-advice guru Dan Savage. Also premiering in that space is The 50 Year Argument,...

Bill Murray is coming to Toronto folks. Actually, the film he stars in (Theodore Melfi’s St. Vincent) is having its official World Premiere launch at the jaw-dropping 285 feature film 2014 Tiff line-up. In the final batch of items we finally get the confirmation that 2014′s Palme d’Or Winner Winter Sleep (which gets added along with a trio of others to the Masters Programme) will show, and Tomm Moore’s highly anticipated Song of the Sea (among the four item line-up for Tiff Kids) also lands. Worth mentioning are the sprinkling of add-ons to the various other sections (Marjane Satrapi’s Sundance preemed The Voices, Matt Shakman’s Cut Bank and the world preem of Danis Tanovic’s Tigers) with a Studio Ghibli docu item being fitted into the Tiff Docs, but it is the Discovery Programme that finally takes shape.

The “up-and-comers” include Berlin Film Fest (and future Nyff...

Bill Murray starrer St. Vincent will premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival as part of this week’s wave of programming that includes Discovery.

The Discovery section includes the upcoming world premiere of Stories Of Our Lives, a portmanteau of gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender and intersex testimonies by anonymous filmmakers from Kenya.

Selections include first-looks of Ross Katz’s Us comedy Adult Beginners, Sarah Leonor’s French Legion drama The Great Man, Isidora Marras’ Chile-Argentinian psychothriller I Am Not Lorena and UK drama X + Y.

“Christopher Nolan, Steve McQueen, Lynne Ramsay and David Gordon Green all presented their first features in our Discovery section,” said Tiff artistic director Cameron Bailey. “It’s a great place to spot new talent first.”

Besides St. Vincent, Festival Additions includes concert film cum road movie Roger Waters The Wall, while the world premiere of Krzysztof Zanussi’s Foreign Body takes its place among the Masters strand.

Tiff Docs arrivals...

The results are in and the two heavy favorites, Lav Diaz and Pedro Costa, have both received major awards.

Concorso internazionale

Golden Leopard

From What is Before (Lav Diaz, Philippines)

Special Jury Prize

Listen Up Philip (Alex Ross Perry, USA)

Best Director

Pedro Costa for Horse Money (Portugal)

Best Actor

Artem Bystrov for The Fool (Yury Bykov, Russia)

Special Mention

Ventos de Agosto (Gabriel Mascaro, Brazil)

Concorso Cineasti del presente

Pardo d’oro Cineasti del presente – Premio Nescens

Navajazo (Ricardo Silva, Mexico)

Premio speciale della giuria Ciné+ Cineasti del presente

Los Hongos (Oscar Ruiz Navia, Colombia/France/Argentina/Germany)

Premio per il miglior regista emergente

The Creation of Meaning (Simone Rapisarda Casanova, Canada/Italy)

Special Mention

Un jeune poete (Damien Manivel, France)

Opera Prima

Pardo per la migliore opera prima

Songs From the North (Soon-mi Yoo, USA/South Korea/Portugal)

Special Mention

Parole De Kamizake (Sawada Masa, France)

Pardi di...

Locarno’s Golden Leopard has been awarded to Filipino director Lav Diaz’s five-and-a-half-hour epic From What Is Before.Scroll down for full list of winners

The film, which has the Filipino title Mula sa kung ano ang noon, also picked up the Fipresci International Critics Prize, the Environment is Quality of Life Prize, and the International Federation of Film Societies’ (Iffs) Don Quixote Prize.

On learning that he had won Locarno’s top honour, Diaz said that he wanted to dedicate the award to his father.

“He brought me cinema, he’s a cinema addict, and he started this passion in me,” said Diaz.

“For the Filipino people, it’s for them, for their struggle, and then I would like to dedicate it to all serious filmmakers in the world, to Pedro Costa, he’s my brother and I love his work, to Matias Pineiro, and to the makers of all the other films in the...

Fund is dedicated to supporting audience development strategies; Meanwhile, Beta Cinema has acquired Toronto title Labyrinth of Lies.

The TorinoFilmLab (Tfl) is launching a distribution fund dedicated to supporting audience development strategies to accompany the releases of four EU or non-eu co-productions in at least three territories

Speaking exclusively to Screen at this week’s Locarno Film Festival, Tfl’s Olga Lamontanara explained: “This initiative really completes the circle and the successful projects will be able to make use of the experiences of the alumni from our audience design course which have been working on the implementation of audience engagement strategies.”

A total of four grants, worth a maximum of €43,000 each, will be awarded in 2014/15 to feature film projects which have been previously selected and developed at one of the Tfl programmes since 2008.

“Those applying must be a producer or sales agent from a country participating in the Media sub-programme,” outlined Lamontanara...

Above: Pedro Costa's Horse Money

The Locarno Film Festival has announced their lineup for the 67th edition, taking place this August between the 6th and 16th. It speaks for itself, but, um, wow...

"Every film festival, be it small or large, claims to offer, if not an account of the state of things, then an updated map of the art form and the world it seeks to represent. This cartography should show both the major routes and the byways, along with essential places to visit and those that are more unusual. The Festival del film Locarno is no exception to the rule, and I think that looking through the program you will be able to distinguish the route map for this edition." — Carlo Chatrian, Artistic Director

Above: Matías Piñeiro's The Princess of France

Concorso Internazionale (Official Competition)

A Blast (Syllas Tzoumerkas, Greece/Germany/Netherlands)

Alive (Jungbum Park, South Korea)

Horse Money (Pedro Costa,...

13 of the 17 films competing for the Golden Leopard are world premieres; Juliette Binoche to receive Excellence Award.

Full details of the line-up for the 67th Locarno Film Festival, which runs August 6-16, were unveiled at a press conference in the Swiss capital Berne today.

13 of the 17 films competing for the Golden Leopard in the festival’s International Competition section are world premiers including Syllas Tzoumerkas’s A Blast [pictured], Jungbum Park’s Alive (South Korea), Paul Vecchiali’s White Nights On The Pier (France) and Yury Bykov’s The Fool (Russia). International premieres include Alex Ross Perry’s hotly antipated Us comedy Listen Up Philip starring Jason Schwartzman who is expected to attend.

The Piazza Grande line-up includes the international premieres of Eran Riklis’ Dancing Arabs, Aaron Katz and Martha Stephens’ critically acclaimed Iceland set Land Ho! Which world premiered at Sundance, and Olivier Assayas’ Clouds Of Sils Maria, which played in competition in Cannes. World premieres...

Seventh edition of the development scheme will include nine projects of first or second feature films.

TorinoFilmLab has unveiled its selection for FrameWork 2014.

The seventh edition of the development scheme will include nine projects of first or second feature films, representing ten countries. The participants will work on their projects throughout two week-long workshops under the guidance of international experts.

Following these workshops, there will be a public pitch at the TorinoFilmLab meeting event, held during the 32nd Torino Film Festival. The jury will assign production awards (starting from €50,000), while an audience award (€30,000) will be given to the project most voted for by the attending decision makers.

TorinoFilmLab’s partners will also award various prizes.

The projects, formed in majority from TorinoFilmLab’s Script&Pitch programme, are:

Aleli by Ana Guevara & Leticia Jorge, producer Agustina Chiarino (Uruguay)Carbon by Michalis Konstantatos, producer Yorgos Tsourgiannis (Greece)Hunting Season by Natalia Garagiola, producer Benjamin...

Let’s face facts, the days of the short film being your calling card are pretty much gone (along with the bank account you pillaged). The digital revolution did democratize filmmaking and it meant any Tom, Dick and Harry could pick up a camera and shoot a film. And they did, saturating the festival circuit and bringing about countless of needless short festivals in every neighborhood (this being especially true in NYC). In curating thousands of short films over the years, I’ve lost years of my life to the art. So, you can imagine the joy one gets when you come across those “bangers”. A film that never leaves you. Some of my dearest friends are people whose film I happened upon. There’s a support system that exists between people getting their short films out there. Maybe it’s the nerves. But there’s no competition to sell your film like with feature films. They just want their film to be seen and to share these small precious stories because they know they have about 10 minutes to leave a lasting impression. LatinoBuzz caught up with filmmakers whose short films are starting to make noise on the festival circuit and you will be pleasantly surprised at the disparity in their stories. Here’s to meeting these filmmakers with their features.

You're Dead to Me dir. by Wu Tsang (USA)

LatinoBuzz : Where did the idea come from to do a short film?

Wu: Initially I approached Adelina Anthony about co-writing a script about a “trans” character who is dealing with the death of a parent. It turned out that Adelina was already working on a beautiful script with a related theme and that ended up being the film we made! I really love this story, because it enabled me to play with elements of the supernatural to explore a very human story: dealing with irreconcilable feelings of losing someone, when you had already broken off the relationship before they died. Adelina's title "You're Dead to Me" refers to that experience, which can be especially painful when it comes to disowning a family member, because it is another thing entirely to process their physical passing.

LatinoBuzz: What do you want your short film to do for you?

Wu: I hope that this film can convey emotional truth about relationships between parents and transgender children, which can unfortunately sometimes be difficult. As a transgender filmmaker I have a personal stake in telling this story. On the other hand, I like that this film also plays with transgender identity to work within a ghost story genre convention. The ambiguity of who the missing child is (are they are boy or girl?) helps maintain the suspense. I studied some films closely, especially The Sixth Sense and The Others, as examples of when ghost characters can be ambiguous until the end of the story.

LatinoBuzz: What was the writing, funding and shooting process?

Wu: This project was developed through Film Independent's Project: Involve Fellowship, so there was a competitive process for us to team up and get our script green-lit. But once we did, we were able to work quickly with support from Find and the PBS National Minority Consortium. We had to work within some strict guidelines, but I always believe that rules provide a structure to be creative with (and against) the boundaries.

LatinoBuzz: Name one "Hustle"/"Guerrilla" moment where you did what you had to do to get the shot/scene?

Wu: Thanks to our stellar producer Melissa Haizlip, and the brilliance of our cinematographer Michelle Lawler, I don't recall having to cut any corners; we were able to get all the shots we needed. But we did have a few challenges with the location; at the last minute, we realized we didn't have a really crucial 'door buzzer' - and we ended up taping a chocolate bar to the wall - a little trick of lighting and sound effects, and voila!

- https://twitter.com/deadtomeshort

Milk and Honey dir. by Daniel Pfeffer (USA)

LatinoBuzz: Where did the idea come from to do a short film?

Daniel: ‘Milk and Honey’ stems from a feature film script titled: Mama Left Me in the 607. I have been writing various drafts of the feature film script for years. At one point, while juggling freelance locations work on major motion pictures, I decided to take the bull by the horns and make a short film inspired by the feature. They are very different films but I thought it was important to make a short representation of what could be a much bigger picture. It was important for me to be able to showcase out of film school, such a personal story, and let an audience see the unique world of my main character, Maya. I loosely based Maya on a girl I fell in love with growing up in Ithaca, New York. Milk and Honey is my first short film produced independently out of film school. I was eager to direct again and keep honing in on my craft. I wanted to make a short without any strings attached.

Latinobuzz: What do you want your short film to do for you?

Daniel: The short film genre has become beyond competitive, so it's hard to tell what opportunities can develop from making a short film. A part of me just feels honored and lucky as hell to be able to make a short outside of film school. It has been a blessing to get a team together and work towards one vision. On the other hand, I felt I had to make a short film to gain credibility and be able to market myself as a writer, producer, director. I wanted to keep expanding my network and create a new portfolio piece to compliment my feature film about an orphaned Puerto Rican girl, Maya, and how she copes with her problems in an abusive foster home.

Maya's story is based on a personal story, so I know the feature script might not sit well with producers and investors without a truly solid vision in place. I am marketing this film with attention to its unique setting, upstate New York. I would love to have my lead actors, Yainis Ynoa and Joshua Rivera come back for the feature, they are amazing to work with, incredibly talented, and have a special chemistry on screen. If I can use this short film to showcase my talent as a director/screenwriter to potential investors for a feature, then the short has been a success in my eyes.

LatinoBuzz: What was the writing, funding and shooting process?

Daniel: The short script writing process went through many stages. Because it was based off a longer screenplay, my first short draft had too many characters. It was overwhelming for a short film. My co-producer immediately advised me to cut characters for the sake of a better film. At first I craved to keep all the characters because the story and them were loosely based off my childhood. However, as I wrote the second draft I saw how much I could further develop my protagonist Maya, by eliminating the excess characters. It became clear this couldn't be a story about my youth, but had to be Maya's story and focus on her struggles and strength.

Funding the film was a battle because I didn't have any savings to back up my short. It's hard enough just to make rent in NYC, much less have savings for a short film. Instead I turned to Kickstarter and made a pledge video with my two lead actors, Yainis Ynoa and Joshua Rivera. We shot it the same week both of them had premiered their feature film Babygirl at the 2012 Tribeca Film Festival. It was a blessing having them on board, I couldn't have raised the funds without them. They provided a spirit and legitimacy that drew a lot of support and in turn a successful fundraising campaign. We didn't ask for too much money, but that was because Kickstarter doesn't grant you the funds if you don't make your goal! After working on major film productions for some pretty important producers in the metro area, I learned each departments' role on a set, and how truly important they were. I always tried to cut too many corners in film school, but this time I made sure I had the right players involved to be able to liberate myself as a director.

Making a short film on six thousand dollars is no easy feat, and we shot about five pages a day, which in hindsight, I do not recommend. On this production, I cut off some of the fat my other shorts suffered from. This time I was able to focus more on performances and storytelling, which I think should always be the ultimate goal! In the end, making a film is a team effort, so the struggle is always getting people involved that really want to bring your vision to life. There are always rifts, but the trick is to contain them, so the show can keep going. We filmed on all kinds of formats, RedCam, handicam, 8mm, Canon 7d and T2i - which later became a post production nightmare, but worth the sleepless nights to create a unique picture.

LatinoBuzz: Name one “Hustle”/”Guerrilla” moment where you did what you had to do to get the shot/scene?

Daniel: A memorable moment was getting the only "dolly" shot in the film. I wanted to backtrack on Yainis as she storms out of her house and charges down the middle of the street. Since most of the film was handheld, we couldn't get the movement right even after trying the backtrack on foot with various lenses. So we took a volvo station wagon and opened the back hatch, placed our cinematographer in the hatch and rolled the car on neutral without the engine running. The shot came out beautifully and ended up in the final cut of the short!

- http://milkandhoneythemovie.com/

Solecito dir. by Oscar Ruiz Navia (Colombia)

LatinoBuzz: Where did the idea come from to do a short film?

Oscar: I was doing casting in different schools and institutions for another feature film project (Los Hongos, currently in post production) and I met the 2 teenagers of the film who told me the story of their loving breaking up. I realized that they both didn’t have any communication and I decided to propose them to make a fiction film about how they could meet again.

LatinoBuzz: What do you want your short film to do for you?

Oscar: I wanted to explore the representation of reality with non-professional actors playing themselves. This is something I´ve been always interested in.

LatinoBuzz: What was the writing, funding and shooting process?

Oscar: I did the film with a very low budget. I got a small grant and support from Danish artist Olafour Eliasson and the support of Tine Fisher form Cph:dox. Then after I got some support for 2 companies in Colombia, besides my own, Contravia Films. These 2 companies were Burning Blue and Post Bros. I also got support from my habitual French co-producer Arizona Productions. The film was a miracle, it was made with 3 people on the set with our script and with a very small camera. It was selected in Director´s Fortnight at Cannes Film Festival 2013.

- http://contraviafilms.com.co

Tinto dir. by Felix Solis (Chile/USA)

LatinoBuzz: Where did the idea come from to do a short film?

Felix: My co-writer Liza Fernandez who also plays Anita in the short was invited to visit her mother who owns vineyard land in Isla de Maipo, Chile. It had been quite some time since she had been there. I was drawn to the idea of what happens to us when we return to a place we have not been to in a long time. Also, having been born and raised in the concrete jungles of NYC, I was also inspired by the location. Lush rolling hills, farm land, cattle and vegetation soils. And the idea of placing a city urbanite in the unfamiliar landscape of countryside.

LatinoBuzz: What do you want your short film to do for you?

Felix: My initial drive to make a short was to follow the natural progression I was going through as an actor of film and television. You spend long enough hours on a set, and if you are even remotely aware of your surroundings and the inner workings of film and tv, you see what needs to happen, you have make your own film. Now that the process is somewhat complete for me, I am finding myself wanting to share my story in the hopes of becoming a part of a generation of NYC based filmmakers that will leave behind a library of cinematic stories. Whether financing comes from within or from afar. The story will always be grounded in my company's (Subway token films) identity "everydayers, derailments, and street level miracles".

LatinoBuzz: What was the writing, funding and shooting process?

Felix: Well, the writing was relatively simple once we nailed the story we wanted to tell. There were specific variables that we knew were going to be unavoidable so that helped plot points. For example we were going to be on a vineyard. We were going to be in a foreign country. We were not going to have many locations. And we we're going to be doing most, if not all the work ourselves. These things helped narrow a script down to its basic core. Less is more.

As far as funding goes, there's the old adage "if you want something done right, do it yourself" I funded the entire project out of pocket. I used money I had saved from my years of working as an actor. One of the perks of living well below my means. The shooting process was as exciting an endeavor as anything I have ever had the pleasure of doing. I was blessed enough to put together a bare bones team that took very little time to trust me and feel connected to me in a way that allowed for all the things I didn't know, all the answers I didn't have, all my ignorance, to become learning moments and creative "explosions" if you will, that kept us from imploding. I also reminded myself of my theatre background, where it's all about the story and not one Individual aspect. We worked as a team top to bottom, don't get me wrong, there storms and catastrophes but we weathered them as a unit. This was my shooting process.

LatinoBuzz: Name one “Hustle”/”Guerrilla” moment where you did what you had to do to get the shot/scene?

Felix: This is a great question! On the property in Isla de Maipo, Chile there is a mega tall free standing water tank tower, and when I saw it, I knew I wanted a shot from atop it. I hoped to maybe get a sunset or a sunrise. It just felt right to have it. I didn't know where in the short I would use it but I knew I wanted it. I asked my Director of Photography, Miguel Alvarez, about it, and I seem to recall him saying, "who's going up there, you or me?" I said to him "Well, as a director I should be willing to do first, anything that I would asks my actors or crew to do for me" and we left it at that. One day I was prepping inside the mainstay house and was told Miguel was climbing the water tank tower, when I went out, he was half way up and I could do nothing but watch as he scaled to the top and began shooting the sunset. Our production designer, Nazanin Shirazi, sat worried for her Dp. I was worried too, but have to admit, I did wonder what the footage would look like. We also did lots of driving with the camera pointing out of the window, throughout the surrounding areas, which always garners some nasty stares for the locals.

One final thing, I must confess, I never got the chance to climb to the top of the water tank tower. I owe him one. - http://www.subwaytokenfilms.com/

Alta Exposición dir. by Cecilia Robles (USA)

LatinoBuzz: Where did the idea come from to do a short film?

Cecilia: Well, I studied filmmaking in Mexico, then France, then here in the USA. But this particular short is a stepping-stone between the novel and the feature film that is screaming to be produced. It turns out that in my younger years I was a daring and venturesome flight-attendant who happened to participate in, let's say peculiar activities. Since I could not tell anyone about my questionable adventures, I started compiling them on a diary. That diary became an erotic novel, ‘Bienvenidos a Bordo’ (Welcome on board) and then I adapted the best chapters into a full length screenplay (Alta EXPOSICiÓN. I know what you’re thinking…. And you know what? In my case it would have been true (wink-wink) The short allows me to introduce three of my favorite characters ;)

LatinoBuzz: What do you want your short film to do for you?

Cecilia: Well, as I said, I would love to raise interest in the short to find funds for the long. The long is too expensive for me to produce alone. Also, I'd love to direct the long, so I needed to showcase what I was able to do as a director. The motto of this project is to encourage people to act towards the realization of their dreams; to remind them that no one should live in autopilot, which is basically what I did to produce it.

LatinoBuzz: What was the writing, funding and shooting process?

Cecilia: As I said, I wrote a book, a screenplay and a wait for it...Also a TV series! Yes! It could be a franchise: Bienvenidos A Bordo - the novel, Alta EXPOSICIÓN - the film, and Te La Volaste - the TV series. I would say the three are based on the semi-autobiographical intimate and artistic exploits of a young airline stewardess who takes a turbulent journey into the depths of self-discovery. So, long story Short: it comes from my novel ;). The funding: financed it myself, but I consider the crew my co-producers for the very low rates they gave me. It was really, really extra low budget. Everything was shot Guerilla Style, I had no insurance (Thank God no one got hurt). There were 9 speaking roles and we used their clothes and I hand made the flight-attendant uniforms... We needed 7 locations, a theater, an apartment, a hotel room, a trapeze school, a bar, an art gallery, and most importantly: an airplane mockup!!!

We shot everything "a escondiditas", stole the shots everywhere except for the airplane cabin, which btw, I could have never afford it, alas I can't tell you how I got it, because I made a pact. :)

As for post, I did the editing. For the music, I hit the lottery with this amazing composer that was worth every single last penny of my miserable budget. As for the animated logo, I ended up becoming a friend of the animator because he really delivered for a ridiculous amount of $. The crew was minimal and everybody was very cooperative! Without my precious crew, my line producer and all the people that I convinced through exacerbated enthusiasm, I would have never been able to make it for that kind of money.

LatinoBuzz: Name one “Hustle”/”Guerrilla” moment where you did what you had to do to get the shot/scene?

Cecilia: All of them. It was such an intense and fast learning experience for me, that I created 12 vlogs and uploaded them on my blog. Basically I give quick tips about all that I learned on each step of the way. I just sat in front of my Mac shared some guerrilla-nugget-experiences throwing in some footage, pictures and advices for when wearing several hats at once. You can watch them here: http://ceciliarobles.com

Written by Juan Caceres . LatinoBuzz is a weekly feature on SydneysBuzz that highlights Latino indie talent and upcoming trends in Latino film with the specific objective of presenting a broad range of Latino voices. Follow [At]LatinoBuzz on Twitter and Facebook .

The awards have all been handed out at this year's International Film Festival Rotterdam. Here is a list of the winners:

Canon Tiger Awards for Short Films:

La isla by Dominga Sotomayor and Katarzyna Klimkiewicz, Chile/Poland/Denmark

Giant by Salla Tykkä, Finland/Romania 

The Chimera of M. by Sebastian Buerkner, United Kingdom

 

Lions Film Award:

Love Steaks by Jakob Lass

 

Hubert Bals Fund Lions Film Award:

Los Hongos by Oscar Ruiz Navia

 

Hivos Tiger Awards:

Anatomy of a Paperclip by Ikeda Akira

Han Gong-Ju by Lee Su-Jin

Something Must Break by Ester Martin Bergsmark

 

MovieZone Award:

Jacky au royaume des filles by Riad Sattouf (France)

 

Netpac Award:

28 by Jayakody Prasanna (Sri Lanka)

 

Fipresci Award:

The Songs of Rice by Uruphong Raksasad (Thailand)

 

Knf Award:

To Kill a Man by Alejandro Fernández Almendras (Chile/France)

 

Big Screen Award:

Another Year by Oxana Bychkova (Russia)

 

Eurimages Co-Production Development Award:

Tabija by...

Harmony Lessons director Emir Baigazin and Uncle Boomee… director Apichatpong Weerasethakul among those selected by the Hubert Bals Fund of International Film Festival Rotterdam (Iffr) to receive grants for post production and for script and project development.Scroll down for full list

In its Fall 2013 selection round, the Fund allocated €161,700 to projects from nine Asian, Eastern European, Latin-American and African countries.

The selection was made out of 464 applications, the highest number of funding applications to date.

Five Hbf-supported projects get the opportunity to further develop their project as part of the Boost! programme.

Two of the 11 projects selected in the script and project development category are from Thailand. Cemetery of Kings by Golden Palm winner Apichatpong Weerasethakul (Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives), and By the Time it Gets Dark by Anocha Suwichakornpong, who won a Tiger Award for her feature debut Mundane History in 2010.

Emir Baigazin (Kazakhstan) also receives funding in this category for his...

The Directors Fortnight announced its full lineup on Tuesday, including nine short films and 21 features which will run parallel to the Cannes Film Festival in May. Notable selections include the Ruairi Robinson’s sci-fi film Last Days on Mars, starring Liev Schreiber (X-Men Origins: Wolverine), Romola Garai (The Hour), and Olivia Williams (Rushmore), and Sebastian Silva’s thriller Magic Magic, about a tourist in Chile who starts to experience a metal breakdown, with Juno Temple (Killer Joe) and Michael Cera (Arrested Development).

Avant-garde Chilean director Alejandro Jodorowsky (The Holy Mountain) will return to the Festival with a film about his life,...

The 2013 Cannes Film Festival lineup is virtually complete, though an Out of Competition selection or two may still be announced. This morning from Paris the fest announced their full Directors' Fortnight (Quinzaine) selection, which we already knew would open with Ari Folman's The Congress, but added to that are a couple of Sundance features including Sebastian Silva's Magic Magic starring Michael Cera, Juno Temple, Emily Browning, Catalina Sandino and Agustin Silva and Jim Mickle's cannibal feature We are What We are. Additionally, Ruairi Robinson arrives with Last Days on Mars, a sci-fi thriller starring Liev Schreiber, Romola Garai and Elias Koteas centered on a group of astronaut explorers who succumb one by one to a mysterious and terrifying force while collecting specimens on Mars. There will also be a special tribute to director Alejandro Jodorowosky who has a film in the selection, La Danza De La Realidad,...

Heavy on the French film items and with a side dish of Chilean influence, this year’s Directors’ Fortnight also known as the Quinzaine des Réalisateurs is offering “double” Alejandro Jodorowosky, and the highly anticipated titles we predicted from the likes of Clio Barnard (The Selfish Giant) and Serge Bozon (Tip Top). Repping Chile, we have Sebastián Silva’s Magic Magic (review) which is joined by another Sundance preemed title in Jim Mickle’s We Are What We Are (fittingly this is the remake of Somos lo que hay (which was featured in the section in 2010). Upping the sci-fi quotient by joining the already announced The Congress, we find Ruairi Robinson highly anticipated feature debut with Last Days On Mars. Anurag Kashyap makes it two for two years, after unloading the almost six hour Gangs of Wasseypur, he returns with Ugly, while Tehilim (Main Comp in 2007) helmer Raphaël Nadjari returns...

This morning the official 2013 Cannes Film Festival line-up was announced from Paris, France. The committee saw 1,858 films submitted this year and while additional titles will continue to be announced, this morning we got the full Competition and Un Certain Regard lineup and it looks amazing so far. Among the films announced In Competition so far, many were expected including Nicolas Winding Refn's Only God Forgives, Steven Soderbergh's Behind the Candelabra, Roman Polanski's Venus in Fur, Asghar Farhadi's The Past and Joel and Ethan Coen's Inside Llewyn Davis. Additionally James Gray's once titled Lowlife starring Marion Cotillard, Joaquin Phoenix and Jeremy Renner will play, but under the name The Immigrant and Takashi Miike's cop thriller Wara No Tate (Straw Shield) has also made the competition list. However, the biggest "surprise" is the inclusion of Alexander Payne's black-and-white film Nebraska, which is sure to be a big attention getter,...

"Film must provide audiences the opportunity to discover questions."--Lisandro Alonso. When I interviewed programmer Diana Sanchez at the 2010 edition of the Toronto International Film Festival (Tiff), she admitted--within the parameters of curatorial taste--her fascination with the appearance of a new genre she was noticing in such films as Pedro González-Rubio's sophomore feature Alamar (To the Sea, 2009), Oscar Ruiz Navia's debut feature Crab Trap (El Vuelco del Cangrejo, 2009), and the films of Lisandro Alonso, José Luis Guerín, and Miguel Gomes; a genre that she described as "a mix of documentary and fiction with a real sense of play between these two forms." The Pacific Film Archive (Pfa) celebrates the appearance and critical popularity of this new documentary-fiction hybrid with their upcoming series...

Zipangu Fest, London

When it comes to off-the-scale weirdness, Japan comes out on top. And as the name suggests, it's that side of the nation's cinema this inaugural festival celebrates, with a menu of cult/indie/exploitation film, animation, and outsider documentary and other oddities. Where else will you find naked hippies on motorbikes (music doc Rock Tanjo: The Movement 70s); cartoons about lecherous carnival freaks (Midori: The Girl In The Freakshow); a transgender performer dressed as a giant bouquet of flowers (documentary Pyuupiru 2001-2008); and a kick-ass squad of mutant girls (er, Mutant Girl Squad). Indie movement leader Tetsuaki Matsue, meanwhile, introduces his amazing one-take street music documentary, Live Tape.

Various venues, Tue to 28 Nov

ID Fest, Derby

What makes a person English? What makes a person a person? Are English people people? These and other questions might be answered at this new festival exploring identity (exclusively English identity...

While I do not think that something as edgy or unusual as Giorgos Lanthimos' Dogtooth (pictured above) will make the 'final five' short list, but kudos to Greece for throwing it out there.  Perhaps something like Tetsuya Nakashima's Confessions will make the cut despite its similarly unsettling subject matter.  Either way, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences did put out a big release yesterday with all of their Foreign Language film submissions, 65 of them in total even Greenland, from various countries.  Many of these films have reviews in our archives.

Albania, East West East, Gjergj Xhuvani

Algeria, Hors la Loi ("Outside the Law"), Rachid Bouchareb

Argentina, Carancho, Pablo Trapero

Austria, La Pivellina, Tizza Covi and Rainer Frimmel

Azerbaijan, The Precinct, Ilgar Safat

Bangladesh, Third Person Singular Number, Mostofa Sarwar Farooki

Belgium, Illegal, Olivier Masset-Depasse

Bosnia and Herzegovina, Circus Columbia, Danis Tanovic

Brazil, Lula the Son of Brazil,...

65 Countries Enter Race for 2010 Foreign Language Film Oscar®

Beverly Hills, CA: Sixty-five countries, including first-time entrants Ethiopia and Greenland, have submitted films for consideration in the Foreign Language Film category for the 83rd Academy Awards®.

The 2010 submissions are:

.Albania, .East, West, East,. Gjergj Xhuvani, director;

.Algeria, .Hors la Loi. (.Outside the Law.), Rachid Bouchareb, director;

.Argentina, .Carancho,. Pablo Trapero, director;

.Austria, .La Pivellina,. Tizza Covi and Rainer Frimmel, directors;

.Azerbaijan, .The Precinct,. Ilgar Safat, director;

.Bangladesh, .Third Person Singular Number,. Mostofa Sarwar Farooki, director;

.Belgium, .Illegal,. Olivier Masset-Depasse, director;

.Bosnia and Herzegovina, .Circus Columbia,. Danis Tanovic, director;

.Brazil, .Lula, the Son of Brazil,. Fabio Barreto, director;

.Bulgaria, .Eastern Plays,. Kamen Kalev, director;

.Canada, .Incendies,. Denis Villeneuve, director;

.Chile, .The Life of Fish,. Matias Bize, director;

.China, .Aftershock,. Feng Xiaogang, director;

.Colombia, .Crab Trap,. Oscar Ruiz Navia, director;

.Costa Rica, .Of Love and Other Demons,. Hilda Hidalgo, director;

.Croatia, .The Blacks,...

I have been keeping track of all of the Foreign Language Oscar submissions in my "The Contenders" section of the site and today the official list of sixty-five films from sixty-five countries was unveiled by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences for consideration for the 83rd Academy Awards. On January 20, 2011 a shortlist of nine contenders will be announced prior to the naming of the nominees on January 25, 2011.

I have included the complete list directly below, which includes first-time entrants Ethiopia and Greenland. The only film that was originally thought to be under consideration, but didn't show up on the Academy's final list was Afghanistan's entry, Black Tulip, directed by Sonia Nassery Cole. IMDb doesn't list a release date for the film, which means it may not have met the release requirements in time.

I have linked each film to their corresponding IMDb page for those films not included...

Buenos Aires -- Oscar Ruiz Navia's "Crab Trap" will be Colombia's contender for the foreign-language Oscar next year, the recently formed Academy of Arts and Film Science of Colombia announced Tuesday.

The film won the Fipresci award at the 60th Berlinale Forum and a special jury mention at the Bafici 2010. It also picked up a jury's special mention for a first film in the Havana Film Festival and the Decouverte de la Critique Francaise and "Rail D'Oc" awards at the Rencontres Cinemas D'Amerique Latine in Toulouse, France, one of the most prestigious festivals of Latin American cinema outside the region.

  First-time director Ruiz Nava has also been selected for Cannes' Residence Program to settle in Paris and work on script development for his second feature on 2011.

Set in the Afro-Colombian community of La Barra on the Pacific coast, "Crab Trap" tells the story of both the drama of a...

The Man's Woman and Other Stories directed by Amit Dutta will be screened in the International Competition section of the 11th Jeonju Film Festival in Korea. The festival will run from April 29 to May 7. Park Jinoh's debut feature Should Have Kissed will be the opening film of the festival while Pedro Gonzalez-Rubio's To the Sea will be the closing film of the festival.

The Man's Woman and Other Stories is a series of three episodes which explore the relationship between men, women and the physical and mental spaces they inhabit.

Jff will screen 209 films from 49 countries this year, including 11 in the international competition.

The list of films in the International Competition are:

"The Anchorage," U.S.-Sweden (dir. Anders Edstom, C.W. Winter)

"Castro," Argentina (dir. Alejo Moguillansky)

"Clash," Phillippines (dir. Pepe Diokno)

"Crab Trap," Colombia-France (dir. Oscar Ruiz Navia)

"Huacho," Chile-France-Germany (dir. Alejandro Fernandez Almendras)

"I Am a Cat Stalker,...

With Berlinale wrapped, let's take one last looksie at random celebs working the premieres and photo ops. Part of our irregular red carpet lineup tradition. And then the awardage.

From left to right: I didn't know what Michael Winterbottom looked like, so I've included him here. He's a boyish 48. I think his career is pretty fascinating because it covers so much global ground and differing genre terrain. He's so prolific while still making intelligent films. I'm impatient so prolific works for me. That said, his new noir The Killer Inside Me might be one I'll have to skip. If festival types are so horrified by the violence I'm sure it's more than I can take.

Julianne Moore looking foxy on her way to fifty. She's gone a bit goth here with smoky eyes, black dress and black fingernails. More on her in a bit.

Two-time Oscar nominee Isabelle Adjani, who hasn't been working much,...

What do Central Station (1998), The Thin Red Line (1999) and Paul Thomas Anderson's Magnolia (2000) all have in common? They were awarded the top honor at the Berlin Film Festival and you can add Honey, the final leg in Semih Kaplanoglu's trilogy which commenced with Egg and last year's Milk, to that grouping. - What do Central Station (1998), The Thin Red Line (1999) and Paul Thomas Anderson's Magnolia (2000) all have in common? They were awarded the top honor at the Berlin Film Festival and you can add Honey, the final leg in Semih Kaplanoglu's trilogy which commenced with Egg and last year's Milk, to that grouping. Florin Serban's If I Want to Whistle, I Whistle, which won Alfred Bauer Prize, also claimed 2nd place prize in the Silver Bear - The Jury Grand Prize - thus continuing the wave of film festival winning Romanian cinema.

There is an intimate scene in Oscar Ruiz Navia's debut feature Crab Trap (El Vuelco del Cangrejo, 2009) that reveals the true translation of the film's title. Daniel, a "white" stranger, has drifted into the Afro-Colombian coastal village of La Barra in hopes of securing a boat to escape Colombia. While waylaid in the village, he befriends a local girl Lucia who entertains him one afternoon by showing him how she traps crabs by flipping them over onto their backs. The crabs are helpless in this position until a wave sets them right side up. Is Daniel in the same position? And what kind of wave will be required to free him from being trapped?...

In “Crab Trap,” “Cerebro (or ‘Brain,’ played by Arnobio Salazar Rivas), the leader of the Afro-Colombian community that inhabits the isolated village of La Barra on Colombia’s Pacific coast, is trying to adjust to the advent of modernity represented by El Paisa (the White Man), a landowner who wants to build a beach resort. Oscar Ruiz Navia’s debut feature captures a part of Colombia rarely seen on film, the black communities …...