Bermuda International Film Festival Opens with “Ginger & Rosa”

*Poster's note-BIFF is a solid festival filled with the best in world cinema that is filled with wonderful people who possess the warmth of the island's wonderful weather!  Highly recommend!

To mark BIFF’s Sweet 16, the festival opens on Friday with “Ginger & Rosa,” a riveting coming-of-age story about two teenage girls growing up in the sixties in London. The two, played by Elle Fanning and Alice Englert, were best friends since they were toddlers until a scandalous betrayal drives them apart.

The backbone of the programme is the World Cinema category with narrative features from across Europe, the Middle East and North America. Leading the pack is this year’s Academy and Golden Globe ‘Best Foreign Language Film’ award winner, “Amour.” This universally acclaimed masterpiece paints a portrait of a Parisian couple dealing with old age that is as compassionate as it is merciless.

Other World Cinema narrative highlights include Cannes award-winners: “Beyond the Hills” (Best Screenplay, Best Actress); “The Angel’s Share” (Jury Prize); “The Hunt” (Best Actor) and “Laurence Anyways” (Queer Palm, Un Certain Regard). “The Attack,” set in Tel Aviv in the dramatic aftermath of a suicide bomb, rounds out the section.

The equally well-regarded World Cinema documentary selection covers a diverse range of subject matter: Indonesian paramilitary leader Anwar Congo and his dedicated followers in “The Act of Killing”; killer whales that kill in captivity in “Blackfish”; the persecution of albinos in Tanzania, “In the Shadow of the Sun”; the biased judicial system of West Bank, “The Law in these Parts”; Afghan television network, TOLO TV, in “The Network”; familial myths and memories in “Stories We Tell”; and gross miscarriage of justice in “West of Memphis.”

For the first time this year and in-keeping with a popular film festival custom, BIFF will be marking the middle of the festival with a Centrepiece Film. The touching and joyful “Unfinished Song” was selected for this honour. It brings together two icons of British cinema, Vanessa Redgrave and Terence Stamp, as a married couple struggling to cope with her terminal illness, but finding light relief and solace singing in the somewhat unconventional local seniors’ choir.

Also new this year is the Festival Jewels category for which BIFF’s programmers selected two recent big hits from the international festival circuit: “Chicken with Plums” and twice Golden Globe nominated “Rust and Bone.”

Our From the Onion Patch screening offers cinemagoers another chance to catch the latest offering from local filmmakers, Lucinda Spurling and Andrew Kirkpatrick, “In the Hour of Victory,” on the big screen. A documentary which tells a tragic love story set amid the turmoil of World War II, the film will screen for the first time at BIFF 2013 with a brand new soundtrack composed by Steve Gallant who was raised in Bermuda.

This year’s Special Presentation of “Femme: Women Healing the World” also has a local connection. Director by BIFF regular, Emmanuel Itier, it is a quest to find and interview the most important and influential women around the world. Among those interviewed are former Premiers of Bermuda, Dame Jennifer Smith and Dame Pamela Gordon (a long-time supporter of BIFF).

As BIFF is one of only a small number worldwide of Academy Award Qualifying festival for the Short Film – Live Action Oscar, there will also be a varied narrative shorts lineup screening in competition for the coveted Bermuda Shorts award presided over by an esteemed judging panel (to be announced). There will also be a number of though-provoking and highly regarded short documentaries for your viewing pleasure. The shorts will screen either in one of four themed packages or prior to feature presentations. The “Local Flavours” package comprises four short film from Bermudian filmmakers: Robert Zuill, Kara Smith, Karli Powell, Kev Lombard and Milton Raposo. Bermudian Bayard Outerbridge’s recently completed short film, “Machsom,” will also make its international film festival debut at BIFF 2013.

The festival will close with “Girl Most Likely,” a wildly quirky and optimistic comic comedy study featuring Kirsten Wiig, Annette Benning, Matt Dillon and Glee’s Darren Criss.

This year BIFF has partnered with Festival Genius, the premier scheduling platform, to offer a fully searchable and interactive online film guide at: http://bermuda.festivalgenius.com/2013. The guide offers detailed synopses and trailers and you can create a log-in profile in order to add films to your personal calendar, as well as rate and review films.

Created as a non-profit organisation in 1997, the Bermuda International Film Festival (BIFF) seeks to advance the love of independent film from around the world, and create a community welcoming to filmmakers and filmgoers. BIFF organises an annual film festival held in March each year. In addition, the organisation hosts a monthly film series, BIFFlixs, summer student camps to nurture young filmmaking talent on the island and filmmaking Labs for adults. BIFF is recognised as a qualifying festival for the Short Film Oscar® by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. The 16^th annual Bermuda International Film Festival will be held April 12-18, 2013.

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Website: www.biff.bm

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Twitter: @BERMUDAFILMFEST