Latin American Film Festival opens in New York

The inaugural edition of the Latin American Film Festival at New York University kicked off Thursday with a screening of the Mexican feature “Cochochi,” produced by a company owned by Mexican actors Gael Garcia Bernal and Diego Luna.
“The goal of this festival is to bring attention to independent and innovative films that have come out of Latin America and frequently haven’t even been screened in the United States,” NYU professor Juan de Dios Vazquez, who organized the festival with colleague Alexandra Falek.
NYU’s King Juan Carlos I of Spain Center is the venue for the free-admission event.
Vazquez, who said the idea is for the festival to become an annual event, stressed the importance of making the public aware of “the quality of Latin American films that opt for an independent path.”
“In recent years, there’s been a very abrupt change, resulting in cinema with greater resources and quality, yet innovative at the same time. A cinema that asks what Latin American identity is and who makes up the communities that inhabit the hemisphere,” he added.

Revolucion: “What does the Mexican Revolution mean to you today?” 10 Filmmakers, 10 shorts, 1 revolution (Trailer)

 

Revolucion

An omnibus collection of short films held together by a location-based theme, Revolución initially brings to mind such recent collaborative projects as Paris, Je T’aime, New York, I Love You, and Tokyo! Instead of just love of a city, however, the stories of Revolución share much more specific themes. They’re held together by producer Pablo Cruz’s loose conceptual question: “What does the Mexican Revolution mean to you today?” Inspired by the centennial celebration of the uprising-turned-civil-war and eventual establishment of what has since been the political system of Mexico, each filmmaker who contributed a piece took a unique approach, but it’s perhaps more interesting to explore what these pieces have in common than the ways in which they differ.

BFI London Film Festival: A World Away From the Mundane Mainstream

With so few features from outside of the United States and Europe securing a theatrical release in this country, it is vital that festivals continue to showcase pictures from Latin America, Asia and Africa. No British event is as committed to world cinema as the BFI London Film Festival and the 54th selection is typically diverse and distinguished.
From Quebec to Patagonia, the contribution from the Americas is particularly strong this year, with Xavier Dolan’s Heartbeats confirming the good impression that he made at the tender age of 21 with How I Killed My Mother (2009). Indeed, he also takes the lead in this Montreal variation on François Truffaut’s Jules et Jim (1961), as he competes with gal pal Monia Chokri for the affections of new-in-town Niels Schneider. Seething with catty lines and camply hip visuals that owe as much to Wong Kar-wai, François Ozon and Christophe Honoré as the nouvelle vague, this achingly stylish paean to unrequited lust peppers the action with vox pops to emphasise its dramatic points. However, it’s the fond rivalry between Dolan and Chokri (that eventually brings them to blows during a stay in the

Dallas’ Vistas Latino Film Festival Announces 2010 Line-Up: Watch Trailer!!!

 

Dallas Latino Film Festival

Dallas’ Vistas Latino Film Festival is celebrating its eleventh annual appearance with a great line up of Latin American films and visits from several of the minds and faces behind them.  Vistas runs from October 28th through the 31st and showcases some of the best recent Latino film of recent years.  The Mexican omnibus film, Revolucion opens the festival on October 28th at the Angelika Film Center at Mockingbird Station.  This is Revolucion’s US debut and stars Jaime Camil, Blanca Soto, Alejandra Barros, Liz Gallardo, Adal Ramones, Alejandra Ambrosi, Pedro Armendariz, Jr., Jeannine Derbez, Gustavo Sanchez-Parra, Humberto Busto, Erik del Castillo, and Maria Soleno will be in attendance, it should be a fun night!  Twitch readers will probably recognize Seres: Genesis among the films being screened this year.  The film opened a couple of weeks ago in Mexico and is getting good notices, this could be a new landmark in Latin American Sci-fi, which has not been a big seller south of the border historically.  Passes for the festival are available and very affordable.  Follow the link at the bottom for more information.  I’ll try to keep you guys updated with more info about the features and hopefully some advance reviews to whet your appetites!  Watch this space!

Latin America Presente at Chicago International Film Fest

One of North America’s oldest film events will once again take over the AMC River East theaters for its annual celebration of the best and brightest in World Cinema: a staggering 122 feature films, seven short film showcases, seven panels and three tributes to actor Forest Whitaker, filmmaker and novelist Guillermo Del Toro and producer Paula Wagner.
Some of the festival’s highlights have already made the rounds of the most important film festivals and will soon land at a multiplex or indie house near you: Darren Aronofsky’s “Black Swan,” John Wells’ “The Company Men,” Julie Taymor’s “The Tempest,” and Stephen Frears’ “Tamara Drewe,” for example. Other films, like the ones showcased in the “Cinema of the Americas” program, may never reach our theaters.
Latin America is represented by 14 films from Mexico, Argentina, Brazil, Cuba and a co-production between Costa Rica and

AFI Latin American Film Fest Opens with “Revolution;” Closes in and with “October”

An image from Walter Salles and Daniela Thomas's "Linha de Passe."

AFI has announced their complete lineup for the 2010 AFI Latin American Film Festival in Silver Spring, MD.
The fest will open on September 21 with “Revolution,” a shorts compilation commissioned by Gael García Bernal, Diego Luna and Pablo Cruz, featuring some of Mexico’s leading contemporary directors (among them, Fernando Eimbcke, Carlos Reygadas, Rodrigo Garcia, Bernal, and Luna) exploring themes and stories inspired by the Mexican Revolution, in honor of its 100th anniversary.
The festival will close on October 13 with “October,” Daniel and Diego Vega Vidal’s film that won the Jury Prize in the 2010 Canne Film Festival’s Un Certain Regard section.  “October” follows Clemente, a moneylender, who enters his office to find a baby girl in a basket.  He must search among the prostitutes he frequents to find the baby’s mother, as his neighbor looks after the baby and his office. 

Latin American Cinema at the Thrissur International Film Festival and a lesson or two worth reading

Malayalam cinema will progress only if exhibitors and distributors change their dismissive attitude to alternative productions, veteran filmmaker Adoor Gopalakrishnan has said. He was inaugurating the fifth Thrissur International Film Festival (TIFF- 2010) on Thursday.
“Film festivals are showcases of cinematic trends across the world and lessons in film aesthetics. They play an important artistic role. But t

Latest in Latin American cinema in Sydney

The 5th Sydney Latin American Film Festival opens on the 1st of September at Dendy Opera Quays.
The 2010 Sydney Latin American Film Festival – September 1st to 19th – brings over 60 fresh and exciting Latin American films to Sydney audiences, from the Rio Grande to Tierra del Fuego and the Caribbean, including many award-winners and Australian premieres.
The festival opens on the 1st of September, at Dendy Opera Quays, with award-winning Argentine comedy and box-office hit Cuestión de principios (A Matter of Principles).

Maya Indie Film Series: Diego Luna / Ana De La Reguera / Jimmy Smits / America Ferrera… and many more!

Exclusive Chicago Engagement: AUGUST 13 – 19

Click here for timetable

Film of the week: “Abel” by Diego Luna – Trailer -

Guaranteed to be something you’ve never seen before, “Abel,” helmed by Mexican actor Diego Luna making his feature-directing debut, is the tale of a psychologically troubled nine-year-old boy who imagines he is t