Monday, June 9------Dutch director Paul van den Boom was born in the Netherlands in 1973 and studied film and visual arts in Brussels. Since 1999, he has been living in Canada, working on many Canadian and American film and television projects. In 2004, he completed his first documentary, ACROSS THE ATLANTIC, and is presenting his newest film AMERICAN PSYCHE at Festroia."I wanted to meet everyday Americans, those that we don´t see on television or hear on the radio. I wanted to grasp the A...
Monday, June 9------Celebrated Israeli director Amos Kollek arrives at Festroia later today, in preparation for the screening of his new film RESTLESS in the Official Competition here.The director, the son of long time Jerusalem mayor Teddy Kollek (about whom he made a documentary in the 1980s) was born in Jerusalem in 1947, a year before the State of Israel was declared. He is a renaissance man, who has directed feature films and shorts, written five novels and is a regular contributor to news...
Sunday, June 8------One of the most celebrated American Independent films of the past year has opened the American Independents Competition at Festroia: Troia International Film Festival last evening. STARTING OUT IN THE EVENING, a character drama set in the literary world of New York City, features an award-winning performance by veteran stage and screen actor Frank Langella, who won the Best Actor prize from the Boston Film Critics last year. Langella's performance was critically hailed by maj...
Saturday, June 7-------The Troia International Film Festival (Festroia), known as the "Cannes of Portugal" opened last evening with a Gala Screening of the Oscar nominated Polish film KATYN. The film, directed by European screen legend Andrezj Wajda, is a dramatic recreation of the one of the great human crimes of the Second World War.....the mass slaughter of Polish army officers by the Russians in the beginning days of the conflict. Wajda brings his customary sweep mixed with intimac...
Sunday, June 10------The 23rd edition of FESTROIA: Festival Internacional de Cinema came to a dramatic close last evening as awards were announced in a dozen categories at the concluding ceremonies of the Festival in the Forum Luisa Todi in the coastal resort of Setubal, Portugal. BORDER POST, a wry political satire set in a small border post on the Yugoslav-Albanian border in 1987, won the Golden Dolphin as Best Film of the Festival. The film, written and directed by Rajko Grlic, also won a Sil...
Friday, June 8--------Six American independent films are competing for a juried prize in the Independentes Americanos section of FESTROIA. The Festival has been a long supporter of American independent films and is one of the few in the world that showcases the work in a seperate section of its own and with a separate prize of its own. "America has always been a source of inspiration for world cinema", FESTROIA director Fernanda Silva explained. "We feel it is important to let ...
Friday, June 8-------On the (regrettably) long list of top-flight performers who (quite astonishingly) have never even been nominated for an Oscar, Christopher Plummer is certainly among the most neglected in this respect. Awards aside (and he has won his share), the veteran actor has a long list of film credits going back to the 1960s, which includes such classics as THE SOUND OF MUSIC (1965), INSIDE DAISY CLOVER (1965), THE ROYAL HUNT OF THE SUN (1969), SOMEWHERE IN TIME (1980), MALCOLM X (19...
Thursday, June 7-----The Official Section of FESTROIA: Festival Internacional de Cinema is dedicated to films from countries that produce fewer than 25 films per year. While these individual countries have more modest outputs, the films they produce are choice gems. Films from Scandanivia have always figured strongly in the Festroia lineup (and have won many top prizes here over the years). This year's representation from Scandinavia is equally impressive, with the Oscar-nominated Danish fil...
Wednesday, June 6-----Even though he has acted in almost 300 films, ranging from comedies to westerns to sci-fi epics, it is hard to think of Christopher Lee and not instantly conjure up the image of Count Dracula stalking another victim for fresh blood. Lee, now aged 85 and a refined gentleman of the old school, appeared at a Press Conference today at Festroia, slighly scolding the press for typecasting him in the horror genre, which admittedly made his career some 50 years ago. "I tel...
Wednesday, June 6------Film festivals are all about discovery......of newly emerging filmmakers or the latest films from acknowledged film masters. However, the best festivals also take a look backward, to celebrate the accomplishments of cinema giants long since past, and through this showcase bring to light "lost" films for a new generation of film lovers. Such is the case with Festroia's program of ten classic German feature films, a collaboration between the Festival and the G...
Tuesday, June 5--------Even though the film was screening in Portugal, many thousands of miles from its setting in Austin, Texas, the audience was remarkably the same. "There is always a strong core of teachers who come to our screenings", director Mike Akel said of his film CHALK, one of six American independent films screening in competition here at Festroia. When polling the audience during his introductory remarks, to see how many teachers were in the audience of 250, nearly 30 p...
Monday, June 4-------British actor Charles Dance (GOSFORD PARK) is the President of the Official Jury of the 23rd edition of FESTROIA: Festival Internacional de Cinema. Dance and his fellow Official Section jurors will determine the Dolphin Award prizes, which will be given out at a gala awards ceremony on Saturday, June 9. Dance is joined by Hungarian director Karoly Makk, Polish producer Joanna Kos Krauze, Finnish actress Maria Jarvenhelmi, Valladolid Film Festival director Juan Carlos Fr...
Monday, June 4---------Festroia 2007 is the first CarbonoZero® international film festival. The environmental organization CarbonoZero will quantify the greenhouse gases (GHG) emissions produced by the festival’s activities, and will offset these emissions by the creation of an equivalent amount of carbon dioxide (CO2) by a new indigenous forest area in Portugal, thus compensating its effect on the climate. Festivals are becoming more environmentally conscious of the energy consumption they...
Sunday, June 3-------Now that gay coming-of-age films have become a (slight) cinematic cliche, what are the new areas that gay filmmakers want to explore as the community continues to evolve and become (somewhat) more mainstream. The answer in the excellent American indie film BOY CULTURE is love.....not as a substitute or an extension of sex, but as an adventure all its own. That is the provocative theme explored by director Q. Allan Brocka, who is attending the FESTROIA this week. His film i...
Sunday, June 3-------Audiences and visitors to the FESTROIA: Festival Internacional de Cinema have been treated to a Spanish film weekend. Not only did the Festival open on Friday evening with the documentary film INVISIBLES followed by the historical epic ALATRISTE, there have been celebrations of Spanish cinema all weekend long. On Saturday, the Argentine/Spanish co-production EL CAMINO DE SAN DIEGO (The Road To San Diego, 2006), by director Carlos Sorin, screened to great audience acclaim a...
Saturday, June 2--------It seems inconcievable to me that the current generation of filmgoers (and possibly even most of the filmmakers) do not know who Billy Wilder was. Or is, for his style of filmmaking remains remarkably fresh and current. For myself, Wilder is one of the giants, who combined the pace of Hollywood filmmaking with the sophistication of his European roots. His movies remain decidedly adult and deal with human emotions that are still very much in style. For local audiences who ...
Friday, June 1-------The 23rd edition of FESTROIA: Festival Internacional de Cinema, Portugal's oldest and most prestigious event, opens this evening with back-to-back screenings of new films from Spain. The honor of a double Opening Night attraction from Portugal's neighbor (and frequent rival) is the Tribute To Spanish Cinema that is the centerpiece of this year's event. Over 20 Spanish films will be screened....most in the special Hommage section, but others interspersed in the ma...
Thursday, May 31------The 23rd edition of Festroia: Festival Internacional de Cinema, which opens tomorrow evening in the seaside resort of Setubal, Portugal, is dedicated to Festival founder Mario Ventura, who passed away last year. Ventura founded the Festival in 1985 after a celebrated career in both Portugal and Spain as a respected journalist and writer. He had published more than fifteen books, including short stories, novels and biographical works. The Public Library in Setubal, where t...
