The Bright Future programme section, in which International Film Festival Rotterdam presents debut or second feature films, will this year screen eighteen world premieres, ten international premieres and eleven European premieres. The South African/Uganda film, Speak, Yes! That’s Us will be screened under the international premiere category,
Both fiction films and documentaries are included in the programme. The selection as a whole, which encompasses a wide range of subjects and filmic forms, demonstrates young filmmakers’ unflagging faith in the possibilities offered by film as a means of expression. In total, this year’s Bright Future is made up of eighty films selected from thirty-eight countries.
Fifteen of these films received support from IFFR’s Hubert Bals Fund. These include the world premiere of Yulene Olaizola´s impressive fiction debut, Paraisos Artificiales (Mexico) and the international premiere of Theo Court’s debut film Ocaso (Chile).
Bright Future also presents a number of highly individual documentaries, a striking feature of which is that the makers have often spent many years working on these: a method facilitated by today’s film equipment, and resulting in revealing documents about a changing world.
Africa features in some of these documentaries. Belgian filmmaker Lotte Stoops recorded life today in a five-star hotel built in the 1950s in Mozambique – now a shell, stripped of all fittings, fixtures and decoration. With Imagine, The Sky, another European filmmaker in Africa, Swiss Brigitte Uttar Kornetzky has made an observing film about an institute for the blind in Sierra Leone.
IFFR 2011, Bright Future: list of world, international and European premieres
(Note that the complete Bright Future line up will be available on www.filmfestivalrotterdam.com from January 20)
World premiere
EL INVIERNO DE LOS RAROS / THE WINTER OF THE ODD ONES OUT, Rodrigo Guerrero, Argentina LE GRAND’TOUR, Jerome le Maire, Belgium GRANDE HOTEL, Lotte Stoops, Belgium BLACK BLOOD, Zhang Miaoyan, China/France (Hubert Bals Fund supported film) ROOZI KE MAN NAPADID SHODAM / THE DAY I DISAPPEARED, Atousa Bandeh Ghiasabadi, Iran/Netherlands PARAÍSOS ARTIFICIALES / ARTIFICIAL PARADISES, Yulene Olaizola, Mexico (Hubert Bals Fund supported film) JA TEBYA LUBLU / I LOVE YOU, Alexander Rastorguev, Pavel Kostomarov, Russia WATER HANDS, Vladimir Todorovic, Singapore/Serbia/Montenegro CHARACTERS, Son Kwang-Ju, South Korea ANYANG, PARADISE CITY, Park Chan-Kyong, South Korea
COLOR PERRO QUE HUYE / COLOR RUNAWAY DOG, Andres Duque, Spain PANGPANG BRÖDER, 53 SCENER FRÅN EN BARNDOM / TWIN BROTHERS, 53 SCENES FROM A CHILDHOOD, Axel Danielson, Sweden/Denmark IMAGINE, THE SKY, Brigitte Uttar Kornetzky, Switzerland/Sierra Leone NEW JERUSALEM, R. Alverson, USA
THE LAST BUFFALO HUNT, Lee Anne Schmitt, Lee Lynch, USA BAD POSTURE, Malcolm Murray, USA A LITTLE CLOSER, Matthew Petock, USA BEHIND THE RED MOTEL DOOR, TheWorldFamous Ike, USA/Mexico
International premiere
EL AGUA DEL FIN DEL MUNDO / THE WATER AT THE END OF THE WORLD, PAULA SIERO, Argentina NEVERQUIET (FILM OF WONDERS), Felipe Bragança, Marina Meliande, Karim Ainouz, Ivo Lopes Araujo, Gustavo Bragança, Helvecio Marins Jr., Clarissa Campolina, Caetano Gotardo, Raphael Mesquita, Leonardo Levis, Carolina Durao, Andrea Capella, Marco Dutra, Juliana Rojas, Brazil Primordial Ties, Otto Buj, Canada OCASO / DECLINE, Theo Court, Chile/Dominican Republic (Hubert Bals Fund supported film) JE SUIS UN NO MAN’S LAND / UNPLUGGED, Thierry Jousse, France
LA BM DU SEIGNEUR / THE LORD’S RIDE, Jean-Charles Hue, France BELKIBOLANG, Agung Sentausa, Ifa Isfansyah, Tumpal Christian Tampubolon, Rico Marpaung, Anggun Priambodo, Azhar Lubis, Wisnu Surya Pratama, Edwin, Sidi Saleh, Indonesia
HOT AS HELL: THE DEADBEAT MARCH, Okuda Yosuke, Japan HINTER DIESEN BERGEN / BEYOND THESE MOUNTAINS, Michael Krummenacher, Switzerland/Germany
SPEAK, YES! THAT’S US, Uganda, South Africa SEPTIEN, Michael Tully, USA
European premiere
FORTUNE TELLER, Xu Tong, China THE OLD DONKEY, Li Ruijun, China (Hubert Bals Fund supported film) TAPE, Li Ning, China PIANO IN A FACTORY, Zhang Meng, China SOUL OF SAND, Sidharth Srinivasan, India (Hubert Bals Fund supported film)
QARANTINA, Oday Rasheed, Iraq, Germany (Hubert Bals Fund supported film)
BREAKFAST, LUNCH, DINNER, Wang Jing / Anocha Suwichakornpong / Kaz Cai, Singapore KARMA, Prasanna Jayakody, Sri Lanka TYRANNOSAUR, Paddy Considine, United Kingdom GRAVITY WAS EVERYWHERE BACK THEN, Brent Green, USA
