Caged Birds Singing: Arias Re-enacts Prison Experiences
If Orange is the New Black was being workshopped as a community theater musical, it might resemble something like Reas, the second experimental documentary feature from Argentinean filmmaker Lola Arias. Much like her approach with 2018’s Theater of War, in which former British and Argentinean soldiers shared their experiences during the Falklands war through a variety of approaches including reenactment, Arias delivers a new kind of women-in-prison experience, this time featuring cis and trans women who are ex-cons. Reflecting on the necessity of escapism, it’s a film which utilizes music as a form of liberation, courting levity rather than desperation.…...
If Orange is the New Black was being workshopped as a community theater musical, it might resemble something like Reas, the second experimental documentary feature from Argentinean filmmaker Lola Arias. Much like her approach with 2018’s Theater of War, in which former British and Argentinean soldiers shared their experiences during the Falklands war through a variety of approaches including reenactment, Arias delivers a new kind of women-in-prison experience, this time featuring cis and trans women who are ex-cons. Reflecting on the necessity of escapism, it’s a film which utilizes music as a form of liberation, courting levity rather than desperation.…...
- 2/19/2024
- by Nicholas Bell
- IONCINEMA.com
The BFI Flare: London Lgbtqia+ Film Festival has revealed the line-up for its 38th edition which takes place March 13-24.
The programme comprises 57 features across the Hearts, Bodies and Mind strands, four of which are world premieres.
Scroll down for full line-up
World premiering is Karen Knox’s sophomore feature We Forgot To Break Up about a trans musician caught in a love triangle with his bandmates. The Canadian actress and filmmaker’s debut Adult Adoption premiered at Glasgow Film Festival in 2022.
Other world premieres are Kat Rohrer’s Austrian romantic comedy What A Feeling about two women who meet...
The programme comprises 57 features across the Hearts, Bodies and Mind strands, four of which are world premieres.
Scroll down for full line-up
World premiering is Karen Knox’s sophomore feature We Forgot To Break Up about a trans musician caught in a love triangle with his bandmates. The Canadian actress and filmmaker’s debut Adult Adoption premiered at Glasgow Film Festival in 2022.
Other world premieres are Kat Rohrer’s Austrian romantic comedy What A Feeling about two women who meet...
- 2/13/2024
- ScreenDaily
A Different Man.The Berlinale have begun to announce the first few titles selected for the 74th edition of their festival, set to take place from February 15 through 21, 2024. This page will be updated as further sections are announced.COMPETITIONAnother End (Piero Messina)Architecton (Victor Kossakovsky)Black Tea (Abderrahmane Sissako)La Cocina (Alonso Ruiz Palacios) Dahomey (Mati Diop)A Different Man (Aaron Schimberg)The Empire (Bruno Dumont)Gloria! (Margherita Vicario)Suspended Time (Olivier Assayas)From Hilde, With Love (Andreas Dresen)My Favourite CakeLangue Etrangère (Claire Berger)Small Things Like These (Tim Mielants)Who Do I Belong To (Meryam Joobeur)Pepe (Nelson Carlos De Los Santos Arias)Shambhala (Min Bahadur Bham)Sterben (Matthias Glasner)Small Things Like These (Tim Mielants)A Traveler’s Needs (Hong Sang-soo)Sleep With Your Eyes Open. ENCOUNTERSArcadia (Yorgos Zois)Cidade; Campo (Juliana Rojas)Demba (Mamadou Dia)Direct ActionSleep With Your Eyes Open (Nele Wohlatz)The Fable (Raam Reddy...
- 1/23/2024
- MUBI
Berlinale co-directors Carlo Chatrian and Mariette Rissenbeek are going out with a bang in their final year, with a lineup unveiled today featuring the latest works by Olivier Assayas, Bruno Dumont, Mati Diop, Hong Sang-soo, Abderrahmane Sissako, Jane Schoenbrun, Alonso Ruizpalacios, Matias Pineiro, Travis Wilkerson, Kazik Radwanski, Annie Baker, and more.
When the co-directors were asked by Screen Daily about their departure, Chatrian said, “It’s quite simple. Mariette and I had a mandate of five years. It is true that at the beginning I said that I was willing to go on because there was a shared will with the [German] Ministry [of Culture] to go on. But then the people who have the responsibility to see the future of the Berlinale thought this structure of two leaders was not the right one and I don’t consider myself able to run the festival alone. And that was the decision of the Ministry.
When the co-directors were asked by Screen Daily about their departure, Chatrian said, “It’s quite simple. Mariette and I had a mandate of five years. It is true that at the beginning I said that I was willing to go on because there was a shared will with the [German] Ministry [of Culture] to go on. But then the people who have the responsibility to see the future of the Berlinale thought this structure of two leaders was not the right one and I don’t consider myself able to run the festival alone. And that was the decision of the Ministry.
- 1/22/2024
- by Jordan Raup
- The Film Stage
Paris-based outfit Luxbox – one of Europe’s biggest sales agents and sometimes producers – of higher-profile Spanish-language art house fare, has swooped on international rights to “Reas,” a prison musical in which ex female cons process their experiences, which was confirmed last week as one of the first eight films selected for Berlin’s Forum section.
The second film by Argentine playwright and writer Lola Arias (“Theater of War”), and winner of the Head Pitchings du Réel Award at Visions du Réel in 2020, “Reas” was also selected by San Sebastian Film Festival for its 2023 Wip Latam.
It will world premiere at the Forum, a section focusing on boundary-breaking titles that challenge aesthetic and narrative norms.
“We feel extremely honored to represent the second feature by artist and filmmaker Lola Arias, whom we discovered at San Sebastian Work In Progress,” Luxbox CEO Fiorella Moretti told Variety.
An international co-production between Gema Juárez and Clarisa Oliveri,...
The second film by Argentine playwright and writer Lola Arias (“Theater of War”), and winner of the Head Pitchings du Réel Award at Visions du Réel in 2020, “Reas” was also selected by San Sebastian Film Festival for its 2023 Wip Latam.
It will world premiere at the Forum, a section focusing on boundary-breaking titles that challenge aesthetic and narrative norms.
“We feel extremely honored to represent the second feature by artist and filmmaker Lola Arias, whom we discovered at San Sebastian Work In Progress,” Luxbox CEO Fiorella Moretti told Variety.
An international co-production between Gema Juárez and Clarisa Oliveri,...
- 12/19/2023
- by Holly Jones
- Variety Film + TV
Argentinian director Lola Arias will world premiere her musical documentary Reas about trans people in prison.
The world premiere of Argentinian director Lola Arias’s musical documentary Reas is one of the first eight titles of the 2024 Berlinale Forum unveiled today.
Arias’ second feature explores cis and trans people living in a Buenos Aires prison through musical re-enactment. The filmmaker’s debut Prisoner Of War also premiered in Berlinale Forum where it picked up the Ciace award as well as screening at SXSW, London, Jerusalem and San Sebastian.
Also world premiering in Berlinale’s sidebar is Vinothraj Ps’s The...
The world premiere of Argentinian director Lola Arias’s musical documentary Reas is one of the first eight titles of the 2024 Berlinale Forum unveiled today.
Arias’ second feature explores cis and trans people living in a Buenos Aires prison through musical re-enactment. The filmmaker’s debut Prisoner Of War also premiered in Berlinale Forum where it picked up the Ciace award as well as screening at SXSW, London, Jerusalem and San Sebastian.
Also world premiering in Berlinale’s sidebar is Vinothraj Ps’s The...
- 12/13/2023
- by Ellie Calnan
- ScreenDaily
The Berlinale Forum, the Berlin Film Festival’s avant-garde sidebar, has announced the first 8 films confirmed for its 2024 line-up.
The 8 films come from 8 different countries, reflecting the Forum’s global reach and a broader push towards greater diversity in it’s line-up. New Forum head Barbara Wurm, who took over running the Forum section in October, highlighted how her program selection team was “diverse with respect to age, ethnicity and cinematic focus.”
One focus of the selection is on cinema coming from regions outside the centers of the Western film industry. “We are looking for worldly films beyond self-referentiality – but those that get involved,” says Wurm. “By being open and resolute in dealing with cinematic forms, we want to bridge the gap between the real worlds we live in and a cinema aware of its public impact.”
The announced titles include the Indian drama The Adamant Girl from director Vinothraj Ps,...
The 8 films come from 8 different countries, reflecting the Forum’s global reach and a broader push towards greater diversity in it’s line-up. New Forum head Barbara Wurm, who took over running the Forum section in October, highlighted how her program selection team was “diverse with respect to age, ethnicity and cinematic focus.”
One focus of the selection is on cinema coming from regions outside the centers of the Western film industry. “We are looking for worldly films beyond self-referentiality – but those that get involved,” says Wurm. “By being open and resolute in dealing with cinematic forms, we want to bridge the gap between the real worlds we live in and a cinema aware of its public impact.”
The announced titles include the Indian drama The Adamant Girl from director Vinothraj Ps,...
- 12/13/2023
- by Scott Roxborough
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
San Sebastian’s pix-in-post showcases have often launched standout movies, such as Sebastian Lelio’s “Gloria,” winner of the Films in Progress Award at the 2012 edition, plus notable directors, such as Jayro Bustamante, whose praised debut “Ixcanul” played at the festival in rough cut in 2015 before winning the Alfred Bauer prize for innovation at 2016’s Berlinale, breaking out handsome sales.
San Sebastian’s 2023 Co-Production Forum registers two trends: Films that are genre pics or enrol genre tropes or genre blend; an exploration of identity.
Thus year’s San Sebastian Wip Latam skews in another direction. “The films and stories are very grounded in reality, either by there hybrid formal move between fiction and non-fiction, their singular take on daily matters or the very social issues they address,” Javier Martín, San Sebastian Latin American delegate, told LatAmCinema.com.
Yet genre surfaces in disparate ways: the mix of coming of age, apocalypse...
San Sebastian’s 2023 Co-Production Forum registers two trends: Films that are genre pics or enrol genre tropes or genre blend; an exploration of identity.
Thus year’s San Sebastian Wip Latam skews in another direction. “The films and stories are very grounded in reality, either by there hybrid formal move between fiction and non-fiction, their singular take on daily matters or the very social issues they address,” Javier Martín, San Sebastian Latin American delegate, told LatAmCinema.com.
Yet genre surfaces in disparate ways: the mix of coming of age, apocalypse...
- 9/23/2023
- by Emiliano De Pablos and John Hopewell
- Variety Film + TV
The Europe-Latin American Co-Production Forum and Wip Latam industry events are showcasing a wealth of new projects.
The Europe-Latin American Co-Production Forum and Wip Latam industry events are showcasing a selection of upcoming projects from Latin America to potential international partners at San Sebastian this month. Regional trends and financing models will also be in the spotlight.
Fifteen titles are in the Forum - from 222 submissions - and six films will showing a first cut in the Wip section. Both sections will take place from September 25-27.
There is a strong showing from Argentina in the Forum, despite the country’s long-running instability,...
The Europe-Latin American Co-Production Forum and Wip Latam industry events are showcasing a selection of upcoming projects from Latin America to potential international partners at San Sebastian this month. Regional trends and financing models will also be in the spotlight.
Fifteen titles are in the Forum - from 222 submissions - and six films will showing a first cut in the Wip section. Both sections will take place from September 25-27.
There is a strong showing from Argentina in the Forum, despite the country’s long-running instability,...
- 9/22/2023
- by Emilio Mayorga
- ScreenDaily
The six projects are all Latin American Films in post-production.
Argentinian directors Lola Arias and Maximiliano Schonfeld will present their films as part of San Sebastian’s Wip Latam which supports six Latin American films in their post-production stages.
Arias presents her second feature Reas about former women and transgender prisoners who reconstruct their reality in the shape of a musical. The director’s debut feature Prisoner Of War screened at Jerusalem, SXSW, London, San Sebastian and Berlin Forum – picking up the Ciace award at the latter.
Schonfeld also returns to the festival, after premiering Jesus Lopez in Horizontes in...
Argentinian directors Lola Arias and Maximiliano Schonfeld will present their films as part of San Sebastian’s Wip Latam which supports six Latin American films in their post-production stages.
Arias presents her second feature Reas about former women and transgender prisoners who reconstruct their reality in the shape of a musical. The director’s debut feature Prisoner Of War screened at Jerusalem, SXSW, London, San Sebastian and Berlin Forum – picking up the Ciace award at the latter.
Schonfeld also returns to the festival, after premiering Jesus Lopez in Horizontes in...
- 8/10/2023
- by Ellie Calnan
- ScreenDaily
Ruben Östlund and Erik Hemmendorff’s company Plattform Produktion has issued an apology to Berlin-based Argentinian artist Lola Arias over the use of her name in the 2017 Cannes Palme d’Or Winner The Square.
“We understand that the use of Lola Arias’ name, which was not discussed as clearly as it should have been, created a misunderstanding connecting her work as an artist to the artwork The Square (Rutan) shown in the film,” the company said in a statement.
“After meeting the artist in Berlin and discussing the misperception caused, we would like to emphasize that The Square (Rutan) is an artwork originally created by Ruben Östlund and Kalle Boman for the city of Värnamo, Sweden in 2015. All reference to the artist Lola Arias as the creator of the artwork is fictional,” it continued.
“We would like to offer an apology to Lola Arias for the way her name was...
“We understand that the use of Lola Arias’ name, which was not discussed as clearly as it should have been, created a misunderstanding connecting her work as an artist to the artwork The Square (Rutan) shown in the film,” the company said in a statement.
“After meeting the artist in Berlin and discussing the misperception caused, we would like to emphasize that The Square (Rutan) is an artwork originally created by Ruben Östlund and Kalle Boman for the city of Värnamo, Sweden in 2015. All reference to the artist Lola Arias as the creator of the artwork is fictional,” it continued.
“We would like to offer an apology to Lola Arias for the way her name was...
- 3/28/2023
- by Melanie Goodfellow
- Deadline Film + TV
Mubi Podcast: Encuentros returns this week with a new episode.The fourth episode features:Lola Arias, an Argentine artist based in Berlin. Her work has developed organically between the fields of film, theater, literature, and visual arts. Her projects are known for their reenactments that depart from political events and the biographies of their main characters in order to provoke deep reflections on topics such as migration, state violence, and the historical past of Chile and Argentina. In 2018 her first feature film Teatro de guerra (Theatre of War) premiered at the Berlinale Forum; this work is part of an artistic project that brought together former Argentine and English enemies from the Falklands War. The second guest is Valeria Luiselli, a renowned Mexican writer whose work has been inspired by her own biography, linguistic borders, and a great concern for the immigration policies of the United States, the country where she currently resides.
- 12/14/2022
- MUBI
Peliculas Nobles, a filmmaker-led VOD platform for Argentine films, is launching Nov. 16. Argentina’s Gema Juarez Allen of Gema Films and Diego Dubcovsky of Bd Cine and Varsovia Cine have kicked off the new initiative in response to the dearth of platforms for homegrown titles.
The idea first arose from observing that a great number of Argentine catalog films couldn’t find spaces or platforms, said Juarez Allen. Classics like the 2003 gem by Albertina Carri, “Los Rubios,” were left in limbo.
“Many filmmakers whose films are not programmed or acquired by platforms — or whose contracts were discontinued — were forced to hire Vimeo on Demand individually or just open their links for free,” she explained.
“We decided to start organizing this platform and offer a very generous deal that would allow them to receive the same amount per transaction as if they, for instance, hired Vimeo on Demand themselves,” she said.
The idea first arose from observing that a great number of Argentine catalog films couldn’t find spaces or platforms, said Juarez Allen. Classics like the 2003 gem by Albertina Carri, “Los Rubios,” were left in limbo.
“Many filmmakers whose films are not programmed or acquired by platforms — or whose contracts were discontinued — were forced to hire Vimeo on Demand individually or just open their links for free,” she explained.
“We decided to start organizing this platform and offer a very generous deal that would allow them to receive the same amount per transaction as if they, for instance, hired Vimeo on Demand themselves,” she said.
- 11/12/2020
- by Anna Marie de la Fuente
- Variety Film + TV
14 projects from four continents received prizes in Pitching du Réel, Rough Cut Lab and Docs in Progress, and three shorts in the Opening Scenes section were awarded by Idfa, Tënk and Slon. The Industry section of the 51st Visions du Réel, which took place online from 25-30 April, has announced its award winners. The Industry jury, comprising Vincenzo Bugno, head of the Berlinale World Cinema Fund, Debra Zimmerman, executive director of Women Make Movies, and filmmaker Sergei Loznitsa, gave out seven prizes in the Pitching du Réel segment and another three in Docs in Progress. The Party Film Sales Award, consisting of the acquisition of international rights for a documentary film, went to the French-Russian co-production Paradise by Alexander Abaturov. Norwegian filmmakers Petter Aaberg and Sverre Kvamme received the Rts Award for Nightcrawlers, which means their film will be pre-sold to Swiss Radio Television. Argentinian actress-writer-director Lola Arias received.
Alexander Abaturov’s “Paradise,” Lola Arias’ “Reas” and Yosep Anggi Noen’s “Voice of Baceprot” figure among 15 documentary features set to be pitched over April 27-28 at the 51st Pitching du Réel.
A co-production forum for creative documentaries, the Pitching is an industry centerpiece at Visions du Réel, one of Europe’s most prestigious documentary festivals.
These titles are joined by 12 others in a lineup which boasts well-known filmmakers, for example, Egypt’s Mohamed Siam, whose “Amal” opened 2017’s Idfa, Argentina’s Gaston Solnicki, director of Venice Horizons player “Kékszakállú, and Nelson Carlo de lo Santos, a Locarno Golden Leopard winner with “Cocote.”
It also takes in an extraordinary range of countries of origen led by France, with three titles in the section, and Switzerland, Argentina and Lebanon with a couple but including 18 territories, marked by a strong Middle East showing with further productions from Egypt, Syria and Quatar.
Projects...
A co-production forum for creative documentaries, the Pitching is an industry centerpiece at Visions du Réel, one of Europe’s most prestigious documentary festivals.
These titles are joined by 12 others in a lineup which boasts well-known filmmakers, for example, Egypt’s Mohamed Siam, whose “Amal” opened 2017’s Idfa, Argentina’s Gaston Solnicki, director of Venice Horizons player “Kékszakállú, and Nelson Carlo de lo Santos, a Locarno Golden Leopard winner with “Cocote.”
It also takes in an extraordinary range of countries of origen led by France, with three titles in the section, and Switzerland, Argentina and Lebanon with a couple but including 18 territories, marked by a strong Middle East showing with further productions from Egypt, Syria and Quatar.
Projects...
- 4/16/2020
- by John Hopewell
- Variety Film + TV
Since its launch in 2012, the Sarajevo Film Festival’s Kinoscope sidebar has presented challenging, experimental and genre-bending titles from around the globe.
This year’s lineup includes an eclectic showcase of feature and documentary works from mostly young directors, half of them women, including Nicolas Pesce’s U.S. thriller “Piercing”; Dominga Sotomayor’s “Too Late to Die Young”; Hélène Cattet and Bruno Forzani’s “Let the Corpses Tan”; and Gustav Möller’s Danish thriller “The Guilty,” this year’s opening film.
Kinoscope programmers Alessandro Raja and Mathilde Henrot sat down with Variety to discuss the section and this year’s lineup.
Q: Half of your films are by female filmmakers. Is there a conscious effort on your part to present works by women?
Henrot: It’s a conscious selection which doesn’t require too much effort. Since the beginning of Kinoscope we’ve always chosen to have a balanced...
This year’s lineup includes an eclectic showcase of feature and documentary works from mostly young directors, half of them women, including Nicolas Pesce’s U.S. thriller “Piercing”; Dominga Sotomayor’s “Too Late to Die Young”; Hélène Cattet and Bruno Forzani’s “Let the Corpses Tan”; and Gustav Möller’s Danish thriller “The Guilty,” this year’s opening film.
Kinoscope programmers Alessandro Raja and Mathilde Henrot sat down with Variety to discuss the section and this year’s lineup.
Q: Half of your films are by female filmmakers. Is there a conscious effort on your part to present works by women?
Henrot: It’s a conscious selection which doesn’t require too much effort. Since the beginning of Kinoscope we’ve always chosen to have a balanced...
- 8/17/2018
- by Ed Meza
- Variety Film + TV
The programme will screen 17 titles from around the world.
Sarajevo Film Festival (August 10-18) has revealed the 17 titles that will play in its Kinoscope programme, with China, Brazil and the Us all represented.
The Kinoscope section is open to films from around the world, excluding the Southeastern European territories which comprise the festival’s competition strand.
On the list is a special screening of Hirokazu Kore-eda’s Shoplifters, which won the Palme d’Or at Cannes in May this year. Screen’s review described it as ‘a masterful ensemble piece about a ‘family’ living on its wits’.
Also appearing after...
Sarajevo Film Festival (August 10-18) has revealed the 17 titles that will play in its Kinoscope programme, with China, Brazil and the Us all represented.
The Kinoscope section is open to films from around the world, excluding the Southeastern European territories which comprise the festival’s competition strand.
On the list is a special screening of Hirokazu Kore-eda’s Shoplifters, which won the Palme d’Or at Cannes in May this year. Screen’s review described it as ‘a masterful ensemble piece about a ‘family’ living on its wits’.
Also appearing after...
- 7/25/2018
- by Ben Dalton
- ScreenDaily
Icíar Bollaín, Isaki Lacuesta and Carlos Vermut to return.
The Spanish films that will be showcased at the 2018 San Sebastian Festival (21-29 September) have been revealed.
The competition titles includeYuli, directed by Icíar Bollaín, who has twice previously competed for the Golden Shellwith Take My Eyes (2003) and Mataharis (2007).
Isaki Lacuesta is also in competition with Between Two Waters. Lacuester’s The Double Steps won the Golden Shell in 2011. The new film stars the two Roma brothers who appeared as teenages in one of the his first films, La Leyenda Del Tiempo.
A further Golden Shell winner (for Magical Girl in...
The Spanish films that will be showcased at the 2018 San Sebastian Festival (21-29 September) have been revealed.
The competition titles includeYuli, directed by Icíar Bollaín, who has twice previously competed for the Golden Shellwith Take My Eyes (2003) and Mataharis (2007).
Isaki Lacuesta is also in competition with Between Two Waters. Lacuester’s The Double Steps won the Golden Shell in 2011. The new film stars the two Roma brothers who appeared as teenages in one of the his first films, La Leyenda Del Tiempo.
A further Golden Shell winner (for Magical Girl in...
- 7/20/2018
- by Orlando Parfitt
- ScreenDaily
As the Berlin Film Festival draws to a close, prizes are rolling out across the vast array of sections and titles. The main Golden and Silver Bears will come this evening, but in the meantime the Panorama section and the independent juries have set their winners (see running lists below). Notable among Competition and Forum pics that are scoring with the indie juries are Thomas Stuber's In The Aisles and Lola Arias' Theatre of War, respectively. In The Aisles is a love…...
- 2/24/2018
- Deadline
Julian (Dominic West) endures the actions of a performer named Oleg (Terry Notary), in Ruben Ostlund’s satire The Square. Photo courtesy of Magnolia Pictures (c).
Ruben Ostlund’s satire The Square was Cannes’ Palme D’Or winner this year but this ambitious film is a decidedly unusual winner. Ostlund’s previous film, Force Majeure, explored a single morally-bad choice in a caustically comic way. The Square turns a satiric eye on modern art, contemporary society, political correctness, homelessness, sex, income inequality and more, although it often focuses on the subject of trust. The Square, partly in English and partly in Swedish with subtitles, is sly, darkly satiric and sometimes laugh-out-loud funny film, when it is not just downright disturbing. This is not a film for everyone, but it has rewards for those up for its wild ride.
The story revolves around Christian (Claes Bang), the curator at a modern art museum in Sweden.
Ruben Ostlund’s satire The Square was Cannes’ Palme D’Or winner this year but this ambitious film is a decidedly unusual winner. Ostlund’s previous film, Force Majeure, explored a single morally-bad choice in a caustically comic way. The Square turns a satiric eye on modern art, contemporary society, political correctness, homelessness, sex, income inequality and more, although it often focuses on the subject of trust. The Square, partly in English and partly in Swedish with subtitles, is sly, darkly satiric and sometimes laugh-out-loud funny film, when it is not just downright disturbing. This is not a film for everyone, but it has rewards for those up for its wild ride.
The story revolves around Christian (Claes Bang), the curator at a modern art museum in Sweden.
- 11/17/2017
- by Cate Marquis
- WeAreMovieGeeks.com
I caught up with Argentine producer Gema Juarez Allen at the Panama Film Festival. Since seeing (and falling in love with) the Argentine road movie “Road to La Paz”/ “Camino a La Paz in Guadalajara and interviewing its director, Francisco Varone, I was interested in meeting her as well, even more so because her other film, the Colombian drama “Oscuro Animal” which premiered in Rotterdam and won four prizes at Mexico’s Guadalajara International Film Festival in March 2016, for Best Film, Best Director, Best Actress and Best Cinematography and has been sold to seven territories. “Oscuro Animal” is about three women fleeing armed conflict in Colombia. It was directed by Colombia’s Felipe Guerrero, an editor on “La Playa DC,” “Perro come perro” and “El Paramo”. It received funding from the Hubert Bals Fund and World Cinema Fund.
In Panama Gema was quite busy, not only with “Road to La Paz” but participating on the panel, Your Project in Motion: Coproduction and Financing along with Panamanian producers and directors, Delfina Vidal (“Caja 25”), Annie Canavaggio (“Breaking the Wave”) and Abner Benaim (“Invasion”) who also happens to be Gema’s partner.
As one of Latin America’s most active producers, Gema’s extensive experience international coproduction was invaluable and she shared it freely at the panel. Her participation in workshops in Europe, such as the Eave Producers Workshop and Eurodoc, has played a key role in establishing her international connections. While at Eave, she met Greek Boo Productions and Germany’s Ingmar Trost of Sutor Kolonko who came on board to coproduce “Oscuro Animal”.
“Road to La Paz” director, Francisco Varone said,
"In 2012 we submitted the project to Visions Sud Est in Switzerland. I was almost working by myself on the film at this time and then started working with a larger Argentinean production company, Concreto Films, owned by Juan Taratuto, a big film director who was directing TV commercials and said he’d help. They had a tough time finding investors so he introduced me to Gema Juarez Allen (whose recent film “Invasion” is the story of the U.S. invasion of Panama in the 1980s). She is a well-known documentary producer with experience in coproductions who knows how to find money and understands the value of going to festivals. She said she would do it as her first fiction film and went to San Sebastian Film Festival’s Foro de Coproduccion in 2013. There she had lots of one-on-one meetings and met Julius Ponten our Dutch coproducer who got funding from the Netherlands Film Fonds and Gunter Hanfgarn (“Bad Hair”) who applied to Ezef, an Evangelistic Fund for films from the south (one of the backers of “Timbuktu”). “
Read more on “Road to La Paz” here.
Gema continued this story when we spoke:
Juan liked the project but it was not in his domain so he sought me out. I read the script about two men and one car and thought, “This is easy”. But of course it was not. A road movie is the most difficult of all genres, and with animals, and covering two countries! Working with Pancho (Francisco Varone), he is the kind of director I like. I find the shooting is usually more important than the people, but with Pancho, the crew is important and he balanced the people and the shoot, so after all, it was ‘easy’.
The film is being sold internationally by FiGa. It is doing well in Argentina with 35,000 admissions, 20 copies and now in its fourth month in the cinemas. It is a ‘word of mouth’ film.
Sl: What are you working on now?
Gema Juarez Allen: I am now filming “Mapa Mudo”/ “Silent Map”.
A doc project by Felipe Guerrero, Nicolás Rincón and Jorge Caballero, based on video letters of three Colombian filmmakers who left their home country in the late 90s.
And I am developing a new project with the directors of our breakthough film from 2011, “Revenge of the Antipodes”/ “¡Vivan las antípodas!“ which screened in Venice. It’s called “Cro-goo-fant” and is a documentary for children, a funny story about animals. The director, Victor Kossokovsky, did a short doc for kids before.
I am also working with Andres di Tella, the most important documentary filmmaker and founder of Bafici in Argentina. It’s a very personal story about the avant garde art Institute lead by his father, the Instituto Di Tella.
And I am working on “Veterans” about the Falkland Islands War. Bertha Fund is backing it. Lola Arias is directing this documentary feature about the unexpected consequences of war on its protagonists, about the way memory is turned into fiction. I am looking for coproducers now. It is a different look at United Kingdom and Argentina vets that is at the same time both serious and humorous. We are creating a film around a theater play which will open in London this May. It began with the London International Theater Festival along with the Royal Court House Theater. It is not filmic; Lola Arias’ language is so refreshing; she is from the theater.
A winner of the 2015 Berlinale Co-production Market Pitch, Abner Benaim’s “Plaza catedral,” is also in the works. It is a tangled false friendship drama with thriller elements, set against the background of Panama’s social divide.
And I am currently producing Benaim’s doc, “My Name is Not Ruben Blades” with Ruben Blades.
Also in the works: the next film from Manuel Abramovich (“La Reina”), a Mar del Plata 2014 Works in Progress winner for “Solar” – a small but remarkable heart-warming doc-feature whose power struggle between director and subject adds unusually honest depths to a bio-portrait of someone who claims to come from the sun.
Sl: You are so prolific! How did you get started in this?
I studied anthropology at the University of Buenos Aires and the University of Rio de Janeiro but didn’t like academia and so I studied film at the National Film School and thought I would combine the two. In England I studied Visual Anthropology and worked as a P.A. and as a researcher for the BBC for a “Discovery Channel” type of channel and then I returned to Argentina.
Between 2003 to 2008 I worked at Cine Ojo the oldest doc company in Argentina and at Habitación 1520 Producciones (“Imagen Final”, “Criada”, “Los Jóvenes Muertos”, “Dulce Espera”) before creating my own company Gema Films in 2009.
Sl: You were coordinator of DocBuenos Aires until 2003, a training initiative as well.
Gema Juarez Allen: I have produced 17 films with lots of help.
I was a Sundance Documentary Fund grantee on two films. My projects have been supported by Visions Sud Est, Tribeca Film Institute, Hubert Bals Fund, Idfa Fund, Cinereach, Fondo Nacional de las Artes, DocStation Berlin, et al. I received the Arte/Bal Award in 2008 for Upcoming Producers at Bafici.
I coproduce with Wg Film (Sweden), Majade FilmProduktion (Germany), Gebrüder Beetz (Germany), Lemming Film (Netherlands) and Producciones Aplaplac (Chile).
I have received awards at Berlinale, Bafici, Roma, Guadalajara, Silverdocs, among many others. Gema is part of EuroDoc since 2010 and is a member of the Board of Adn, the Argentinean Documentary Filmmakers Network.
Sl: What advice do you have for young filmmakers?
Gema Juarez Allen: First find a good project. It is very competitive and you must have an original perspective on the subject. There are so many ideas everywhere, it must be good.
Producers should be highly-organized. Be sure to fully develop projects before presenting them to partners and funding decision makers. The key elements to present when the project is fully conceived are an overview, a synopsis, a director’s statement, a brief treatment, a financial plan, a budget, a production timetable and bio-filmographies.
Find a producer with experience. I’m always interested in new directors and new voices.
The best opportunities to find partners are at festivals, markets and above all workshops. These are good places to find colleagues and mentors to give you great feedback. Diana Elbaum is my mentor from Eave and she is always looking at what I’m doing. And most of my coproduction partners came from the Eave and Eurodoc workshops.
Beyond Eave and Eurodoc, which are very open to Latin American projects, other good workshops are Docmontevideo, Guadalajara, Typa, Cinergia Lab, Idfa Summer Academy, Chiledoc, Berlin Talent Campus, Documentary Campus, Morelia Lab among others.
Good international funding sources are Ibermedia and also the “Plus” schemes associated to funds such as Creative Europe, World Cinema Fund, Hubert Bals Fund and the Idfa Bertha fund. Other funds are Fonds d’Aide aux Cinémas du Monde, the Sundance documentary fund, Visions Sud Est, the Tribeca Film Institute, the Doha Film Institute and Sorfond, for co-productions with Norway.
In terms of leading international markets, Cannes, Rotterdam’s Cinemart, Berlin’s European Film Market, Ventana Sur and Guadalajara – and for documentaries – starting with Idfa Forum and Hotdocs, followed by Meetmarket Sheffield and Docmontevideo.
It is also important to choose the right festival to premiere a project since it’s virtually impossible to premiere a picture in a small festival and then get a larger fest to screen the film. It’s also important to explore the work-in-progress sidebars that now exist at most Latin American festivals, including Iff Panama’s Primera Mirada competition.
State funding sources in Latin America include Dicine, in Panama, Incaa in Argentina, Proimagenes in Colombia, Brazil’s Fundo Setorial do Audiovisual, the Fondo Audiovisual in Chile, and Imcine in Mexico. The selection criteria used by these national funds varies considerably. Proimagenes in Colombia, which only finances around 14 films per year last year had three pictures at Cannes.
Over the last three or four years many national funds have created specific lines of funding for co-productions, through bilateral agreements, such as that between Brazil’s Ancine and Argentina’s Incaa, which grants $250,000 per pic supported. As a result of such bilateral agreements Brazil, for example, is now a key partner for all of Latin America.
“I’d like to make the second or third films of my directors. They’ve all been such good experience. We’ve grown together,” Juarez Allen told Variety at the Mar del Plata Festival.
In Panama Gema was quite busy, not only with “Road to La Paz” but participating on the panel, Your Project in Motion: Coproduction and Financing along with Panamanian producers and directors, Delfina Vidal (“Caja 25”), Annie Canavaggio (“Breaking the Wave”) and Abner Benaim (“Invasion”) who also happens to be Gema’s partner.
As one of Latin America’s most active producers, Gema’s extensive experience international coproduction was invaluable and she shared it freely at the panel. Her participation in workshops in Europe, such as the Eave Producers Workshop and Eurodoc, has played a key role in establishing her international connections. While at Eave, she met Greek Boo Productions and Germany’s Ingmar Trost of Sutor Kolonko who came on board to coproduce “Oscuro Animal”.
“Road to La Paz” director, Francisco Varone said,
"In 2012 we submitted the project to Visions Sud Est in Switzerland. I was almost working by myself on the film at this time and then started working with a larger Argentinean production company, Concreto Films, owned by Juan Taratuto, a big film director who was directing TV commercials and said he’d help. They had a tough time finding investors so he introduced me to Gema Juarez Allen (whose recent film “Invasion” is the story of the U.S. invasion of Panama in the 1980s). She is a well-known documentary producer with experience in coproductions who knows how to find money and understands the value of going to festivals. She said she would do it as her first fiction film and went to San Sebastian Film Festival’s Foro de Coproduccion in 2013. There she had lots of one-on-one meetings and met Julius Ponten our Dutch coproducer who got funding from the Netherlands Film Fonds and Gunter Hanfgarn (“Bad Hair”) who applied to Ezef, an Evangelistic Fund for films from the south (one of the backers of “Timbuktu”). “
Read more on “Road to La Paz” here.
Gema continued this story when we spoke:
Juan liked the project but it was not in his domain so he sought me out. I read the script about two men and one car and thought, “This is easy”. But of course it was not. A road movie is the most difficult of all genres, and with animals, and covering two countries! Working with Pancho (Francisco Varone), he is the kind of director I like. I find the shooting is usually more important than the people, but with Pancho, the crew is important and he balanced the people and the shoot, so after all, it was ‘easy’.
The film is being sold internationally by FiGa. It is doing well in Argentina with 35,000 admissions, 20 copies and now in its fourth month in the cinemas. It is a ‘word of mouth’ film.
Sl: What are you working on now?
Gema Juarez Allen: I am now filming “Mapa Mudo”/ “Silent Map”.
A doc project by Felipe Guerrero, Nicolás Rincón and Jorge Caballero, based on video letters of three Colombian filmmakers who left their home country in the late 90s.
And I am developing a new project with the directors of our breakthough film from 2011, “Revenge of the Antipodes”/ “¡Vivan las antípodas!“ which screened in Venice. It’s called “Cro-goo-fant” and is a documentary for children, a funny story about animals. The director, Victor Kossokovsky, did a short doc for kids before.
I am also working with Andres di Tella, the most important documentary filmmaker and founder of Bafici in Argentina. It’s a very personal story about the avant garde art Institute lead by his father, the Instituto Di Tella.
And I am working on “Veterans” about the Falkland Islands War. Bertha Fund is backing it. Lola Arias is directing this documentary feature about the unexpected consequences of war on its protagonists, about the way memory is turned into fiction. I am looking for coproducers now. It is a different look at United Kingdom and Argentina vets that is at the same time both serious and humorous. We are creating a film around a theater play which will open in London this May. It began with the London International Theater Festival along with the Royal Court House Theater. It is not filmic; Lola Arias’ language is so refreshing; she is from the theater.
A winner of the 2015 Berlinale Co-production Market Pitch, Abner Benaim’s “Plaza catedral,” is also in the works. It is a tangled false friendship drama with thriller elements, set against the background of Panama’s social divide.
And I am currently producing Benaim’s doc, “My Name is Not Ruben Blades” with Ruben Blades.
Also in the works: the next film from Manuel Abramovich (“La Reina”), a Mar del Plata 2014 Works in Progress winner for “Solar” – a small but remarkable heart-warming doc-feature whose power struggle between director and subject adds unusually honest depths to a bio-portrait of someone who claims to come from the sun.
Sl: You are so prolific! How did you get started in this?
I studied anthropology at the University of Buenos Aires and the University of Rio de Janeiro but didn’t like academia and so I studied film at the National Film School and thought I would combine the two. In England I studied Visual Anthropology and worked as a P.A. and as a researcher for the BBC for a “Discovery Channel” type of channel and then I returned to Argentina.
Between 2003 to 2008 I worked at Cine Ojo the oldest doc company in Argentina and at Habitación 1520 Producciones (“Imagen Final”, “Criada”, “Los Jóvenes Muertos”, “Dulce Espera”) before creating my own company Gema Films in 2009.
Sl: You were coordinator of DocBuenos Aires until 2003, a training initiative as well.
Gema Juarez Allen: I have produced 17 films with lots of help.
I was a Sundance Documentary Fund grantee on two films. My projects have been supported by Visions Sud Est, Tribeca Film Institute, Hubert Bals Fund, Idfa Fund, Cinereach, Fondo Nacional de las Artes, DocStation Berlin, et al. I received the Arte/Bal Award in 2008 for Upcoming Producers at Bafici.
I coproduce with Wg Film (Sweden), Majade FilmProduktion (Germany), Gebrüder Beetz (Germany), Lemming Film (Netherlands) and Producciones Aplaplac (Chile).
I have received awards at Berlinale, Bafici, Roma, Guadalajara, Silverdocs, among many others. Gema is part of EuroDoc since 2010 and is a member of the Board of Adn, the Argentinean Documentary Filmmakers Network.
Sl: What advice do you have for young filmmakers?
Gema Juarez Allen: First find a good project. It is very competitive and you must have an original perspective on the subject. There are so many ideas everywhere, it must be good.
Producers should be highly-organized. Be sure to fully develop projects before presenting them to partners and funding decision makers. The key elements to present when the project is fully conceived are an overview, a synopsis, a director’s statement, a brief treatment, a financial plan, a budget, a production timetable and bio-filmographies.
Find a producer with experience. I’m always interested in new directors and new voices.
The best opportunities to find partners are at festivals, markets and above all workshops. These are good places to find colleagues and mentors to give you great feedback. Diana Elbaum is my mentor from Eave and she is always looking at what I’m doing. And most of my coproduction partners came from the Eave and Eurodoc workshops.
Beyond Eave and Eurodoc, which are very open to Latin American projects, other good workshops are Docmontevideo, Guadalajara, Typa, Cinergia Lab, Idfa Summer Academy, Chiledoc, Berlin Talent Campus, Documentary Campus, Morelia Lab among others.
Good international funding sources are Ibermedia and also the “Plus” schemes associated to funds such as Creative Europe, World Cinema Fund, Hubert Bals Fund and the Idfa Bertha fund. Other funds are Fonds d’Aide aux Cinémas du Monde, the Sundance documentary fund, Visions Sud Est, the Tribeca Film Institute, the Doha Film Institute and Sorfond, for co-productions with Norway.
In terms of leading international markets, Cannes, Rotterdam’s Cinemart, Berlin’s European Film Market, Ventana Sur and Guadalajara – and for documentaries – starting with Idfa Forum and Hotdocs, followed by Meetmarket Sheffield and Docmontevideo.
It is also important to choose the right festival to premiere a project since it’s virtually impossible to premiere a picture in a small festival and then get a larger fest to screen the film. It’s also important to explore the work-in-progress sidebars that now exist at most Latin American festivals, including Iff Panama’s Primera Mirada competition.
State funding sources in Latin America include Dicine, in Panama, Incaa in Argentina, Proimagenes in Colombia, Brazil’s Fundo Setorial do Audiovisual, the Fondo Audiovisual in Chile, and Imcine in Mexico. The selection criteria used by these national funds varies considerably. Proimagenes in Colombia, which only finances around 14 films per year last year had three pictures at Cannes.
Over the last three or four years many national funds have created specific lines of funding for co-productions, through bilateral agreements, such as that between Brazil’s Ancine and Argentina’s Incaa, which grants $250,000 per pic supported. As a result of such bilateral agreements Brazil, for example, is now a key partner for all of Latin America.
“I’d like to make the second or third films of my directors. They’ve all been such good experience. We’ve grown together,” Juarez Allen told Variety at the Mar del Plata Festival.
- 4/26/2016
- by Sydney Levine
- Sydney's Buzz
The Public Theater begins performances for the 10th Anniversary of the world-renowned Under The Radar Festival on Wednesday, January 8. A highly-anticipated program of The Public Theater's winter season, the 2014 Under The Radar Festival will include artists from across the U.S. and around the world, including 600 Highwaymen, Lola Arias, Edgar Oliver, tg Stan, SKaGeN, Andrew Ondrejcak, John Hodgman, Sekou Sundiata, Roger Guenveur Smith, Toshi Reagon, and Reg E. Cathey who has joined the cast of Feast. Check out a first look at the productions...
- 1/2/2014
- by BWW News Desk
- BroadwayWorld.com
The Public Theater has announced that single tickets are now on sale for the 10th Anniversary of the world-renowned Under The Radar Festival, running January 8-19, 2014. A highly-anticipated program of The Public Theater's winter season, the 2014 Under The Radar Festival will include artists from across the U.S. and around the world, including 600 Highwaymen, Lola Arias, Edgar Oliver, tg Stan, SKaGeN, Andrew Ondrejcak, John Hodgman, Sekou Sundiata, Roger Guenveur Smith, and Toshi Reagon. The late-night Festival Lounge will also include an eclectic mix of adventurous music and cabaret performances, including Champagne Jerry, DJ AndrewAndrew, Invincible, Ethan Lipton, Nick Hallett, Holcombe Waller, and Middle Church Jeriesse Johnson Gospel Choir.
- 12/3/2013
- by BWW News Desk
- BroadwayWorld.com
Programme for May's three-week arts celebration – released today – will feature Emil and the Detectives, Judith Kerr and Michael Rosen's orchestral work for kids, The Great Enormo
Emil and the Detectives – Erich Kästner's 1929 classic story about a boy who enlists the help of friends to foil a bank robber – is the book at the heart of this year's Brighton festival, which is guest-directed by author, broadcaster and former children's laureate Michael Rosen.
Rosen, who was read the book in weekly instalments by his class teacher when he was nine – and who remembers elaborating and acting out episodes of it with his friends – said the book was "very special in a variety of ways. It was the first of its kind: the first book in which children are detectives and solve a crime. And it was completely new in its attitude to the city. There's a tradition in literature of...
Emil and the Detectives – Erich Kästner's 1929 classic story about a boy who enlists the help of friends to foil a bank robber – is the book at the heart of this year's Brighton festival, which is guest-directed by author, broadcaster and former children's laureate Michael Rosen.
Rosen, who was read the book in weekly instalments by his class teacher when he was nine – and who remembers elaborating and acting out episodes of it with his friends – said the book was "very special in a variety of ways. It was the first of its kind: the first book in which children are detectives and solve a crime. And it was completely new in its attitude to the city. There's a tradition in literature of...
- 2/27/2013
- by Charlotte Higgins
- The Guardian - Film News
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