18/11/2003

The 11th edition of the Festival of Spanish and Latin American Cinema in Brussels has come to an end, with the award for Best Spanish Film being given to the film by Eduard Cortès , Nobody’s Life. A prize to help distribution was given to the film by Miguel Hermoso, Fugitives. The Prize for the Best Latin Ametican Film was awarded to Inheritance by Paula Hernandez (Argentina) and the Argentinean Marcelo Piñeyro’s Kamchatka was given a prize for distribution support. Kamchatka also went down well with audiences though they voted to award the Spanish films South from Granada by Fernando Colomo and El Viaje by Toni Bestard.

There were also two special events organised in Flagey during the Festival (November 12-14): the First Meeting of the European/Caribbean Audiovisual Industry and the Third European/Latin American Meeting. These included participation by Renaud Guillonnet (Al Invest Programme) and Giorgio Ficcarelli (MEDIA programme). There were speeches aimed at developing and collaborating in the audiovisual and cinematographic field. The events were attended by representatives of more than 130 European companies, including 40 Belgium companies, like the distributors CNC, Cinéart-Cinélibre, Libérations Films and Beeck Turtle, the producers Banana Films, Dub Films and Entre Chien et Loup, and the post-production companies Studio l’Equipe and Aniway.
At the end of the meetings, there were 12 contracts signed, two of which include participation by Belgium: GSARA has signed a co-production deal for a series of documentaries with the Argentinean company Didecom and the Spanish outfit Ola Nuevo Grupo, while Dub Films has signed a co-production contract for the documentary Cumbia, with the Argentinean Lescafilm, the Spanish Adivina Producciones and the Dominican Republic company, A Films.
The documentary market was run in parallel to the festival and meetings, and it was attended by around 10 European TV companies, including RTBF, France 5-Arte & Planète. The event was organised by ASBL Intercommunication and it has announced that the 4th edition of the Al Invest Meetings will be held in Buenos Aires, in April 2004.