Capital of Galicia hosts the International Festival Curtocircuito

A selection of 135 shortfilms from the five continents, competes this year for the awards of the IV edition of the International Festival "Curtocircuito" directed by Tim Redford. The official week will take place from October the 16th to the 20th in Santiago de Compostela, turning the capital of Galicia into the world-wide showcase of shortfilms. During five days the last trends in videocreation, fiction, documentary and animation will be screened.

The International festival "Curtocircuito" is an initiative started four years ago by the Santiago de Compostela Film Commission and the City Council of Santiago through the Concellaría de Promoción Económica, Emprego, Comercio e Turismo directed by Xosé Manuel Iglesias.

Curtocircuito arrives to its IV edition consolidated as a festival with a great international promotion, which has increase five times the number of shortfilms submitted, growing from 500 films last year to 2.695 on 2007. And this Festival not only grows in quantity but in diversity, since the productions submitted came from countries as remotes and cultures as diverse as Kirghizistan, Burundi, Azerbaijan, Cambodia, Sri Lanka, Palestine or Burkina Faso.

From all the shorts submitted, the 135 selected as finalists will be screened in the Teatro Principal of Santiago from 16th of October, and they go in for the six awards for the best shorts in the modality of fiction, animation, documentary, micromovie, videocreation and best Galician shortfilms, which is found this year for the first time. Also the Audience Award will be voted by the attendants to the screenings. Altogether, the set of prizes is provided with an economic assignation of 18.200 Euros and a commemorative trophy of the Festival. There is also an Onda Curta award, granted by Radio Televisión Portuguesa, which will buy the rights of the winner for its exhibition.

The jury profile has been chosen based on the nature of every different award category and is formed by Alain Burosse, Sebastien Duclocher and Paz Sufrategui on the categories of best fiction, animation and documentary shortfilm; Roberto Barrueco, Silvia Longueira and Sinje Gebauer for the videocreation and micromovies award; Camilo Franco, Ana Cermeño and Manuel González for the best Galician short; and Joao Garçao Borges, Alfonso Pato and Guadalupe Arensburg for the election of the Onda Curta award winner.

II International Market: the business of commercialisation and distribution of shorts, set in the Fundación Torrente Ballester
A great opportunity to meet all the short film professionals, from all over the world that will be on those days in Santiago. The organization will celebrate within the framework of the Festival, and simultaneously, other meeting forums, highlighting the II International Shortfilm Market, that takes places from 18th to 20th of October at the Torrente Ballester Foundation. Understood as a meeting point, it will be the place to make business between scriptwriters, producers, programmers and international buyers, that will have access to the 3000 shortfilm catalogue, with all the movies submitted to the Festival. Among others, the presence of Dawn Sharpless (Dazzle Films), Guadalupe Arensburg (Canal + España), Alain Burosse (Canal + Francia), Sebastien Duclocher (Festival Clemont Ferrand), Mitsue Eguche (Open Art Tokio), Paz Sufrategui (subdirector of the program Versión Española), Joao Garçao Borges (Radio Televisión de Portugal), Rosana Ronconi (Vitagraph), Marie Amosee (Festival du Film Court de Lille) and Robert Barrueco and Michel Raluy (Mecal) is confirmed.

Besides, the International Shortfilm Market is completed with two round tables, at the Fundación Torrente Ballester. The first one takes place on October 18th and will put the creative talent in Latin America in the spotlight, chaired by Enrique Nicanor -producer, director and scriptwriter of cinema and TV- with the participation of Eduardo Cerveira -from Femina Short Film Festival-, Eva Morsh Kihn -from Rencontres Cinemas d´Amérique Latine, de Toulouse- and Fernanda del Nido -from Tic Tac Producciones-. On October 19th, the round table titled as "From Short to Feature Film", will be a debate among Rebeca Mark-Lawson -from LifeSize Pictures- and Alfonso Zarauza, Daniel Mulloy and Mario Iglesias -awarded shortfilm directors-.

Workshops trilogy: creativity, story board and videocreation
Other opprotunity offered by the organization in the framework of the IV International Festival Curtocircuito is a trilogy of workshops, in which professionals from the audio-visual sector will find an interesting formative offer, on subjects such as creativity, story board and videocreation. From October 16th to 19th, at Fundación Eugenio Granell, the workshop called "Pure creativity", given by Marga Iñiguez - adviser of the Ministries of Culture and Education of several countries and of successful TV programmes such as "La bola de cristal" or "Sesame Street"-. It will be a chance to stimulate the creative flairs of the participants, who will learn techniques to use their imagination, adapting to the continuous changes produced in the scenic and audio-visual arts. At the Galería Sargadelos, the workshop "The graphic script", directed by Raúl González Monaj, professor of the Universidad de Valencia, on 19th and 20th will offer an exceptional chance to know the technique for a proper architecture of the story-board, with theoretical notions perfectly complemented by the practical resolution of dialogue and action sequences. And, last, the "Live videocreation" workshop will be a real spectacle, on the afternoon of October 19th at the Sala Nasa. There, Frederic Elalouf, versatile artist, producer, radio presenter and multimedia spectacle manager, best known as VDJ Oof, will make an exhibition of his technique for live videocreation, using audio-visual tools and digital programmes as a new way of interaction between artist and audience. This workshop guarantees the most creative show, in which image and sound harmonizes, synchronize with movies sequences, musical videos and concerts, with the most diverse musical styles.

More than a festival
The IV edition of the International Festival Curtocircuito completes its offer with a thematic program of shorts, at the Caixa Galicia Foundation and organized in several seasons: gay & lesbian, teenagers, kids, selection of the Reencounters Cinemas d'Amerique Latine de Toulouse, and of counties such as Spain, Brazil and Portugal; as well as two selections of music videos, one of them in collaboration with the British label Warp Records. In addition, during the week of the Festival, there will be parties every night in several locals of the old city of Santiago: coctails, thematic parties and an spectacular show by VDJ Oof, on the night of the 19th.

This diversity turns Curtocircuito in more than a shortfilm festival. It is a fair in which you can find the latest stuff, a real party in which hundred of professionals and cinema lovers are going to meet to watch the best shortfilms of the moment and to know the most new tendencies of film creation.