Burbank, CA – January 3, 2014: Today, Cinema Without Borders has announced the six nominees for HP’s Bridging The Borders Award at 2014 Palm Springs International Film Festival selected by Palm Springs International Film Festival Programers. The Bridging The Borders Award at the 2014 Palm Springs International Film Festival will be given to the most successful film in bringing the people of our world closer together.
The six nominees for HP’s Borders Bridging The Borders Award are selected by Palm Springs International Film Festival programmers are: CIRCLES (Serbia), MONK WITH A CAMERA (USA), PLOT FOR PEACE (South Africa), THE SQUARE (Egypt), UNDER THE SAME SUN (Israel, and WALESSA: MAN OF HOPE (Poland). The Bridging The Borders Award winning film will be announced on Sunday, January 12th, at the Palm Springs International Film Festival award ceremony.
2014 HP’s Bridging the Borders Award, is offered by Cinema Without Borders and Prize provided and Award sponsored by HP Workstations. Director of the winning film will receive an HP ZBook 15 with a built-in HP DreamColor display, an approximately $3000 value. The second place winner for Cinema Without Borders’ “Bridging the Borders” award will receive a certificate for an upcoming Method Acting Intensive provided by The Lee Strasberg Theater & Film Institute in West Hollywood, valued at $2000. A jury of Cinema Without Borders decides the winners.
Nominees:
Circles (Krugovi)
Serbia, 2012, 113 Minute Running Time
Additional Countries: Germany/France/Croatia/Slovenia
Program: Awards Buzz : Best Foreign Language Film
Language: Serbian English Sub-Titles
Bosnia, 1993: In the midst of the Yugoslav wars, Marko, a Serbian soldier, witnesses a brutal attack on Haris, a Muslim civilian, by three fellow soldiers. Marko intervenes and saves Haris, but must face the wrath of his countrymen.
Serbia, 2008: The war is over but the wounds of the conflict are still open, and the events of 12 years ago still reverberate for those who took part in them. Marko’s father is rebuilding a church in the countryside. When the son of one of the soldiers from the first episode offers his help, he hesitates. Marko’s friend, a renowned surgeon in Belgrade, faces terrible choices when told to operate on one of the three soldiers, now on the verge of death.
As for Haris, he now lives in Germany and is faced with a unique opportunity to repay his debt. “Circles is a film about guilt,” director Golubovic explains. “About whether it is only the ones who committed the crime who are culpable, or whether it’s also those who witnessed the crime and failed to prevent it.”
Winner: Special Jury Prize, Sundance Film Festival
DIRECTOR: Srdan Golubovic
Producer: Jelena Mitrovic, Alexandre Ris
Editor: Marko Glusac
Screenwriter: Srdan Koljevic, Milena Pota Koljevic
Cinematographer: Aleksander Ilic
Music: Mario Schneider
Principal Cast: Aleksander Bercek, Leon Lucev, Nebojsa Glogovac, Nikola Rakocevic, Marko Janketic
Filmography: The Trap (2007)
Absolute Hundred (2001)
Monk With A Camera
USA, 2013, 90 Minute Running Time
Additional Countries: India
North American Premiere
Language: English
Perhaps no one on the planet possesses a more beguiling or disarming laugh than the Dalai Lama. To be in his presence and hear his laugh directed at you must be truly overwhelming. Such is the case for Nicholas “Nicky” Vreeland, sitting in a non-descript hotel room in Long Beach across from His Holiness (and Richard Gere), as the Dalai Lama laughs and makes a request of Nicky that will change the course of his life.
If you recognize the name “Vreeland,” then you would be correct: he is the grandson of fashion icon Diana Vreeland (subject of the PSIFF 2012 hit “Diana Vreeland: The Eye Has to Travel”). So, why is Nicky, once on the path of becoming a high-powered photographer, now in this position?
This enthralling documentary by Tina Mascara and Guido Santi (“Chris and Don: A Love Story”), grants us intimate access to Nicky and his extraordinary spiritual journey. We see behind the curtain of Tibetan Buddhism and inside the heart and mind of a man whose every step takes him further away from one seemingly pre-ordained life and toward another.
DIRECTOR: Tina Mascara, Guido Santi
Producer: Vishwanath Alluri, Tina Mascara, Guido Santi
Editor: Guido Santi, Tina Mascara
Cinematographer: Ugo Lo Pinto, Ralph Q. Smith
Music: Pivio & Aldo De Scalzi
Principal Cast: Nicholas Vreeland, Khyongla Rinpoche
Plot for Peace
South Africa, 2013, 84 Minute Running Time
Topics: Documentary, Political
Program: True Stories
Language: English English Sub-Titles
The death of Nelson Mandela unleashed a torrent of tributes and reminiscences – but not many secrets.
In the fascinating documentary Plot for Peace, the French businessman Jean-Yves Ollivier lets out a doozy. Turns out that throughout the 1980s, this rather nondescript man traveled up-and-down the African continent, and back-and-forth to Europe with the goal of brokering a peace between warring African factions and Cold War combatants; in so doing, he made way for the end of apartheid in South Africa. That he succeeded at all is extremely impressive; the fact that he did so without diplomatic credentials and in virtual secrecy verges on the miraculous.
How did Ollivier manage to win the trust of African’s most bitter enemies? The only man to receive highest honors by both the last stalwart of apartheid, P.W. Botha, and the first President of the new South Africa, Nelson Mandela, Ollivier proves that his skills as a businessman and negotiator may be surpassed by his one true calling: that of master storyteller. Winner: Jury and Audience Awards, Galway, São Paolo, and Hamptons Film Festivals
DIRECTOR: Carlos Agulló
Producer: Mandy Jacobson
Editor: Carlos Agulló
Screenwriter: Stephen Smith
Cinematographer: Rita Noriega, Diego Ollivier
Music: Antony Partos
Principal Cast: Jean-Yves Ollivier, Thabo Mbeki, Pik Botha, Winnie Mandela, Chester Crocker
Filmography: Debut Feature
Print Source: Wide House
The Square (Al Midan )
Egypt, 2013, 99 Minute Running Time
Additional Countries: USA
Language: Arabic English Sub-Titles
“The people demand the downfall of the regime!” This slogan echoed throughout Cairo’s Tahrir Square during the revolutionary fervor of the Arab Spring that gripped Egypt and enthralled the world. But who were the people shouting the slogan, what drew them to “The Square,” and, given the convoluted events that followed, what did it all mean, anyway?
These questions are addressed in the most cinematic way possible in Jehane Noujaim’s revelatory documentary. From Mubarak’s fall to the removal from power of Mohamed Morsi, The Square focuses mainly on the lives of three charismatic activists. No mere chronological recitation of events, The Square provides all the elements of a great movie: compelling, complex characters; a propulsive and unpredictable plot; a succession of eye-popping images; and, most important, an emotional core that connects with our own inner lives and gives the movie its universal appeal.
“[The Square] puts you in the center of the action to the extent that the protesters’ passion is so contagious, it seems to leap off the screen and into your heart.”
– Stephen Holden, The New York Times
Winner: Audience Awards, Sundance and Toronto Film Festivals
DIRECTOR: Jehane Noujaim
Producer: Karim Amer
Editor: Christopher De La Torre, Mohamed el Manasterly, Pierre Haberer, Stefan Ronowicz, Pedro Kos
Cinematographer: Muhammad Hamdy, Ahmed Hassan, Cressida Trew
Music: H. Scott Salinas, Jonas Colstrup
Principal Cast: Khalid Abdalla, Magdy Ashour, Aida Elkashef, Ramy Essam, Ahmed Hassan, Ragia Omran
Filmography: Rafea: Solar Mama (2012)
Storm from the South (2006)
Control Room (2004)
Startup.com (2001)
Under The Same Sun
Israel, 2012, 75 Minute Running Time
Additional Countries: Palestine, USA
Topics: Drama, Environment, Middle East
Program: World Cinema Now
Language: English English Sub-Titles
As the Israeli-Palestinian peace talks gear up again, what better time for a savvy, surprising drama like “Under The Same Sun”? It follows two businessmen – one Palestinian and one Israeli – as they struggle to build a joint business venture, a new solar energy firm serving the needs of Palestinians in the West Bank. And who better to direct it than Sameh Zoabi (“Man Without A Cell Phone”, PSIFF 2012), a Palestinian citizen of Israel, whose multicultural studies and work allowed him to develop unique international perspectives as a writer-director.
Set in the near future – a future where old cultural hostilities are still an obstacle at every level, but where new technologies also offer fresh hope – Under the Same Sun seeks to humanize the “other” for both Israeli and Palestinian audiences, and aims to dispel the belief held by many that there is no partner on the other side.
Ultimately, it is grounded in the idea that for meaningful peace negotiations to succeed, the two publics need a vision worth striving for.
DIRECTOR: Sameh Zoabi
Producer: Amir Harel, John Marks
Editor: Eyas Salman
Screenwriter: Yossi Aviram
Cinematographer: Benjamin Chiram
Principal Cast: Ali Suliman, Yossi Marshak, Dirar Suliman, Levana Finkelstein, Lucy Aharish
Filmography: Family Albums (Doc, 2012)
Man Without a Cell Phone (2010)
Official Film Website
Walesa. Man of Hope (Walesa. Czlowiek z nadziei)
Poland, 2013, 127 Minute Running Time
Topics: Biopic, Family Friendly, History
Program: Awards Buzz : Best Foreign Language Film
Language: Polish English Sub-Titles
1970, Gdansk. The Communist authorities bloodily repress a workers’ protest. Among them: Lech Walesa, an ordinary shipyard electrician. Refusing to submit, he founds a new movement, Solidarity, and embarks on a “quiet revolution” that will not only topple the dictatorship in Poland, but eventually bring down the Iron Curtain and end the Cold War.
There could no more appropriate filmmaker for this biopic than Andrzej Wajda, the 87-year-old Polish master whose illustrious career includes such epochal works as “Kanal” and “A Generation”, important historical dramas like Danton and Katyn, and who gave cinematic expression to the ideals of Solidarity in his masterpieces, “Man of Marble” and “Man of Iron”.
Skillfully incorporating reams of archival material, the movie is structured around an interview with the famously tough Italian journalist Oriana Fallaci. It finds its focal point in the dichotomy between Walesa’s working class domestic life and the world-changing role he wound up playing, no doubt attributable to his bullish charm, conviction and charisma, all qualities very much to the fore in Robert Wieckiewicz’s brilliant portrait of the man.
DIRECTOR: Andrzej Wajda
Producer: Michal Kwiecinski
Editor: Grazyna Gradon, Milenia Fiedler
Screenwriter: Janusz Glowacki
Cinematographer: Pawel Edelman
Music: Pawel Mykietyn
Principal Cast: Robert Wieckiewicz, Agnieszka Grochowska, Maria Rosario Omaggio, Zbigniew Zamachowski, Cezary Kosinski
Filmography: Katyn (2007)
Danton (1983)
Man of Iron (1981)
Man of Marble (1977)
Ashes and Diamonds (1958)
Kanal (1957)
A Generation (1955)
Print Source: TVP SA