OFFICIAL SELECTiON - Short Film Documentary

8 short documentaries from the siberian tundra, to a Russian dinner in Mexico City, to the story of a supernatural table in Slovenia. The documentary section is full of surprises.

Yaptik Hasse
(Yaptik Hasse)
Director: Edgar Bartenev
Russia

Small Boy Wanted
Director: Lucy Allwood
France

Praznik
(Celebration)
Director: Masha Kostiurina
México

Confrontation in Cuba
Director: Arto Halonen
Finland

Miza, ki tudi laize
(Table that also tells lies)
Director: Barbare Zemljic
Slovenia

Un dimanche a Pripiat
(A Sunday in Pripyat)
Director: Blandine Huk y Frederic Cousseau
France

Bagher Bachcha
(The Tiger´s Cub)
Director: Bishnu Dev Halder
India

Somos alzados en bastones de mando
(We are raised in our staffs of authority)
Director: Mauricio Acosta
Colombia

OFFICIAL SELECTION - Short Film Fiction

23 Short Fiction Films from around the world were selected to participate. All from distant far away places yet strangely similar and close to home:

Raak
(Contact)
Director: Hanro Smitsman
Netherlands

Sexy Thing
Director: Denie Pentecost
Australia

Tristeza
Director: Pierre Saint-Martin Castellanos
México

Die Freisetzung
(Discharged)
Director: Ludwig Lockinger
Germany

Chocolate con Churros
Director: Mario de la Torre
Spain

Lo que trae la lluvia
Director: Alejandro Fernández Almendras
Chile

Contracuerpo
Director: Eduardo Chapero-Jackson
Spain

Parz
(Duty of the son)
Director: Temirbek Birnazarov
Kyrgystan

Rabenmutter
(Childhood Scars)
Director: Alex Schmidt
Germany

Kibera Kid
Director: Nathan Collet
Kenya

Lampa Cu Caciula
(The tube with a hat)
Director: Radu Jude
Romania

Soft
Director: Simon Ellis
United Kingdom

Plaz im Schatten
(In the shade)
Director: Sophie Narr
Germany

Merry Christmas
Director: CHOI Young - Jun
South Korea

Puente
Director: Miguel Muzquiz
México

Los amorosos
Director: José Luis Solís
México

Fin de trayecto
Director: Acán Coén
México

Innocent as I was
Director: Xiao Xiao
China

Beckenrand
(Poolside)
Director: Michael Koch
Germany-Switzerland

Bhaï Bhaï
(Bhai Bhai)
Director: Olivier Klein
France

El Relevo
(The Relief)
Director: David González
Spain

Moment de Gloire
(Moment of Glory)
Director: Hendrik Moneen
Belgium

Podróz
(Journey)
Director: Dariusz Glazer
Poland

Chinese Lessons

In preparation to the arrival of the Chinese Delegation from the Beijing Film Academy, the core festival team has been taking chinese lessons... now they know how to say hello "Ni hao" and thank you "Xié xie", but we´re afraid they might not be able to say much more than that... we´ll see in three weeks... but Huang jiàng quiáng, their teacher will make sure that they do!

OFFICIAL SELECTION - Features

(This is Luis Garza, our programming director)

After many hours of watching preview tapes and DVD´s, the Selection Committee has returned with probably the best selection of feature and short films that the Festival has shown:

FEATURE FILMS IN COMPETITION

DOCUMENTARY

La sombra del Iceberg
(The shadow of the Iceberg)
74 mins / Spain
Director: Raúl M. Riebenbauer and Hugo Doménech
Producer: Xavier Crespo Rico

Sugartown: Los novios
(Sugartown: The Bridegrooms)
82 mins / Greece-Germany
Director: Kimon Tsakiris
Producer: Rea Apostolides, Kimon Tsakiris


La guía del pervertido para cine
(The Pervert´s Guide to Cinema)
150 mins / United Kingdom-Austria-Netherlands
Dirección: Sophie Fiennes
Producción: Martin Rosenbaum

Invisibles
107 mins / Spain
Directors: Mariano Barroso, Isabel Coixet, Javier Corcuera, Fernando León de Aranoa and Wim Wenders
Producers: Javier Bardem

Zidane: Un retrato del siglo 21
(Zidane: A 21st Century Portrait)
90 minutes / France
Directors: Douglas Gordon y Philippe Parreno
Producers: Joni Sighvatsson, Anna-Lena Vaney and Victorien Vaney

Estrellas de La Línea
(The Railroad All-Stars)
91 mins / Spain
Director: Chema Rodríguez
Producers: Tomás Cimadevilla and Chema Rodríguez

Los Ladrones Viejos.
(The Old Thieves)
97 mins / México
Director: Everardo González
Producers: Issa Guerra, Everardo González, Roberto Garza and Alejandro Molina



FICCIÓN


El viaje de Iska
(Iska´s Journey)
93 mins / Hungary
Director: Csaba Bollók
Producer: Agnes Cseré

Libre Albedrío
(The Free Will)
163 mins / Germany
Director: Matthias Glasner
Producer: Frank Döhmann, Matthias Glasner, Christian Granderath, Jürgen Vogel

El Hombre de la Embajada
(The man from the Embassy)
100 mins / Germany
Director: Dito Tsintsadze
Producer: Christine Ruppert

Señorita
(Fraulein)
81 mins / Switzerland and Germany
Director: Andrea Staka
Producer: Susann Rüdlinger y Samir

Gucha: trompeta distante
(Gucha - Distant Trumpet)
94 mins / Serbia
Director: Dusan Milic
Producer: Karl Baumgartner, Thanassis Karathanos, Goran Radakovic, Aleksandra Milic, Josef Aichholzer, Stefan Kitanov and Emir Kusturica

El año en que mis padres fueron de vacaciones
(The year my parents went on vacation)
105 mins / Brazil
Director: Cao Hamburger
Producer: Fabiano Gullane y Cao Hamburger

Escucha el tiempo
(Fissures)
87 mins / France
Director: Alanté Kavaité
Producer: Antoine Simkine

2007 PROMO

The Festival is happy to present its 2007 promo. The work of several very creative people, the short film is fresh and groovy. Jorge González, our image designer, provided the basic imagery that Morfo, our key animator brought to life and mixed to a score by Chewbacca. Chewbacca? Well yeah...

Chewbacca is the name musician Daniel Rodríguez goes by. He blames Morfo (his nick is a whole other story) with his baptism under the wookie name. "Morfo had a radio show, and he played different characters, when people asked him who played Chewbacca, he said it was me..."

Morfo (check out his videos at www.youtube.com/morfologico) is quite a character. He seems not to sleep at all... or to sleep throughout the day... he's funny, loyal and very creative.

The staff worked long distance thanks to the internet. Chewbacca from Canada where he's currently going to music school and Morfo from ESTUDIO MORFIX in Monterrey (Actually the Morfix residence, studio, office, and many other things). After quite a few nights work, the promo was finally done and ready to be transferred to 35mm and of course, uploaded to the web.

So check out the video and let us know what you think!

THE FINAL COUNTDOWN

Well, it´s been a week since we closed our call for entries. The selection committee has been working hard because 1354 filmmakers from 80 different countries have helped us break our record with the largest number of entries the festival has ever had.

We wish you all the best of luck. We will be publishing results for the official selection on our website at the beginning of july. Please be patient... :)

Thanks to all of the filmmakers that sent us their films and please come back soon for more news about the Monterrey International Film Festival.

Last Day

Today we´ve come to the last day of our call for entries. There have been many more submissions than any other year. Today we´ve had repeat visits from the mailman, DHL, Fedex, UPS, and other national and international couriers. We´ll soon have a full report on how many films and from how many countries. It is always exciting to open a package from a country half a way around the world and be able to see what a filmmaker saw and fixed upon celluloid or video. It really helps you to not forget the real sense of a film festival: the coming together of images, thoughts, ideas and minds.