The International Film Festival Rotterdam announces the first five films selected for its Tiger Awards Competition 2012. Polish-American co-production IT LOOKS PRETTY FROM A DISTANCE by Anka and Wilhelm Ankal ventures into the darker sides of country life. Midi Z’s RETURN TO BURMA is a rare contemporary fiction from the Southeast Asian country. Eduardo Nunes’ black and white, fairylike SOUTHWEST from Brazil has been supported by IFFR’s Hubert Bals Fund. A FISH from South Korea is the first 3D-film in the Tiger Awards Competition. Focusing on the plights of a young adolescent girl, Huang Ji’s EGG AND STONE from China will receive its world premiere at the festival.
Only first or second films can be selected for IFFR’s Tiger Awards Competition. All the films mentioned here are first fiction features. A jury will decide on three equal Tiger Awards, each with prize money of 15,000 Euro. The Tiger Awards Competition will comprise approximately fifteen titles.
The first five films selected in the Tiger Awards Competition 2012 are:
JIDAN HE SHITOU (EGG AND STONE) by HUANG Ji
China, 2012, World premiere
Huang Ji shot her feature début drama in her Hunan province hometown with a cast of non-professional actors. Like numerous others in China, the 14 year old protagonist is living with relatives because her parents are working a big city. She has few friends, and at home she tries to keep her door shut.
Z DALEKA WIDOK JEST PIEKNY (IT LOOKS PRETTY FROM A DISTANCE) by Anka & Wilhelm Sasnal
Poland/USA, 2011, International premiere
In their début feature film, renowned visual artists and painters Anka and Wilhelm Sasnal explore the dark and antisocial sides of life on the beautiful Polish countryside, where in a hot summer everything seems to fall apart.
GUI LAI DE REN (RETURN TO BURMA) by Midi Z
Burma/Taiwan, 2011, European premiere
Film maker Midi Z, born in Burma and raised in Taiwan, shot his début feature film in his native country, working with non-professional actors. A realistic and authentic portrayal of daily life in the least known and least accessible Southeast Asian country, RETURN TO BURMA will see its European premiere in Rotterdam.
SUDOESTE (SOUTHWEST) by Eduardo Nunes
Brazil, 2011, European premiere
Eduardo Nunes made several successful short films, three of which were screened at IFFR. A tale of fantasy and mystery shot in stunning black-and-white, his fiction feature début SUDOESTE is situated in a sleepy Brazilian coastal village. Here, a baby, a girl and a woman named Clarice seem to live their (or is it her?) life in one single day.
MULGOGI (A FISH) by PARK Hong-min
South Korea, 2011, International première
Park Hong-min’s first feature film A FISH will be the first 3D-film in the Tiger Awards Competition. Produced for only about 100,000 Euro, A FISH tells a tragic absurdist tale of a professor who travels South in search of his wife who apparently has deserted him to become a shaman.