17 WORLD AND INTERNATIONAL PREMIERES AT 3 CONTESTS INCREASES FESTIVAL’S PRESTIGE
18 FIRST WORKS SHORTLISTED TOGETHER WITH GREAT NAMES OF CINEMA AS ISABEL COIXET OR DANIEL SÁNCHEZ ARÉVALO
The official section of the 45th Huesca International Film Festival will consist of 80 short films: 31 shorts at the International Contest, 32 at the Iberoamerican and 17 at the Documentary. Works, selected among 1,658 entries, come from a total of 31 countries from Europe, America, Asia and Africa. Spain is the most represented country, with a total of 19 shorts; France, Germany, Belgium and Brazil lag behind, with 5 works each. Other cinematographies strongly attached to the festival, as Mexico’s or the United States’, also have an outstanding representation with 3 shortlisted shorts each. In relation to last year, the present edition has increased the number of represented countries which were 24; doors have been opened to the cinematographies of countries like Costa Rica, Israel, Iran, Indonesia, South Africa or South Korea; evincing the universality of the High Aragonese rendezvous.
The festival, that will take place from 9 to 17 June, maintains its prestige premiering at a worldwide/international level a total of 17 short films. The success of this prestige, gained in 45 years of history, is based on the combination of great names and new talents that emerge with strength. In 2017, together with 18 debut works, there are to be found works by fillmmakers as acclaimed as Isabel Coixet, who is going to compete with the documentary No es tan fría Siberia; Daniel Sánchez Arévalo with Cheimaphobia; or Santiago Zannou with Vernon Walks, a short film written by Ray Loriga, last Alfaguara Novel Award. There is also room for multi-awarded works as Il Silenzio by Iranian Ali Asgari and Farnoosh Samadi, that collects almost twenty awards among which stands out Cannes Selection and the Espiga de Oro of last Seminci of Valladolid.
The three contests, awarding best works with the Danzante Prize, share out a total of € 24,000 and shortlist directly for the Oscar Awards of the Hollywood Academy and the Goya Awards of the Spanish Academy of Cinematographic Arts and Sciences at the category of Best Fiction Short Film. Regarding the list of awards, one of the novelties of this edition is the Best Script Award within the Iberoamerican Contest. This recognition, created thanks to the funding of Anselmo Pie Foundation and the collaboration of Huesca Province Bookshop Association, is endowed with € 800 and goes directly to the scriptwriter in person. On the one hand, the Jinete Ibérico Award (€ 2000 cash prize), launched last edition to award Best Animation Short Film within the International Contest, is maintained. On the other, spectators at the movie theater will keep on voting the Aragón Television Audicence Award among all the official section.
The online festival format, ‘HuescaFestival at Home’ is consolidated one more year as a service for those spectators who cannot come to the Aragonese city, as it allows them to watch on demand a great part of the selection just as it is screened at the Olimpia Theatre, the main venue.
For many works presented, Huesca International Film Festival works as launching or consolidation with respect to festivals and awards, inside as well as outside Spain. In the last edition of the most important cinema awards of our country, two out of five finalists at the fiction category, had been at the official section of the Upper Aragonese Festival. All the while, at the documentary category, the short 9 Days from my Window in Aleppo, won the European Film Awards at its category months after having been screened at Huesca capital city.
