Tuesday, December 2------As part of the Baltic Event professional sidebar of the Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival, the newly launched website of the International Film Guide was presented yesterday to an assembled group of film industry professionals at the Nordic Hotel Forum, the Festival's main hq. Yoram Allon, the publisher of the International Film Guide and editorial director of Wallflower Press (www.wallflowerpress.co.uk) , the UK's largest independent film book publisher, gave a short presentation, introducing aspects of the 2009 Guide and the recently launched film website.

The International Film Guide, which will publish its 45th edition in January 2009, has an unrivalled reputation as the most authoritative and trusted source of information on contemporary world cinema. The new edition will feature digests of the output of local cinemas in 130 countries, as well as offer news and information from the international film festival circuit and various special feature articles on new trends in technology and distribution. The Guide will first be distributed at the Berlin Film Festival and then at numerous film festivals and trade events in Europe, North America and Asia. It will also be available in retail book shops and via Wallflower Press online (www.wallflowerpress.co.uk).

The publication will name its Five Directors of the Year and will devote a special section to the explosive cinema output of Israel (with the award-winning film WALTZ WITH BASHIR as its cover image). In addition, the 2009 IFG will have a special section devoted to the cinema stories of the nations who joined the European Community in the past five years, including many of the Eastern European and Baltic nations who are present in force at this Festival. The dedicated website www.internationalfilmguide.com will not only reprint the authoritative content of the  International Film Guide, but will offer original news from the worlds of international and independent cinema and the film festival circuit.

The site will draw from the more than 80 international contributors around the globe to offer a comprehensive and unduplicated resource for film professionals and film buffs alike. In addition, by mid 2009, the site will have digitized 45 years of data from all the previous International Film Guides since 1963 to provide a searchable database that will be an invaluable resource for filmmakers, distributors, programmers, archivists, academics and film students.

The website, hosted by Cineuropa (www.cineuropa.org) is open to your suggestions, comments and editorial contributions. Please visit www.internationalfilmguide.com and let us know what you think.

Sandy Mandelberger, Tallinn Black Nights FF Dailies Editor