Author: Bijan Tehrani

The amazing Palm Springs International Short Film Festival and market opens on June 18th and like every year we have a chance to see the work of emerging filmmakers and talented filmmaking students. To learn more about 2014 festival we interviewed Kathleen McInnis, new director of Palm Springs International Short Film Festival and market. Kathleen McInnis is a Film Strategist with a distinctive background in film festivals and publicity consulting. Her company, See-Through Films LLC, offers business development for emerging filmmakers. She is a veteran of the global film festival circuit and has been at such festivals as Seattle Int’l…

HELI, a film directed by Amat Escalante is an amazing and interesting film that has won the Best Director award at Cannes Film Festival 2013. Heli is a young man working in a car assembly factory; he lives with his father who also works there, his wife Sabrina, his baby son Santiago and his sister Estela. His life is normal, slow, and without prospects. Estela is revealed to be in a relationship with Beto, a cadet who at 17 is much older than her. Estela, despite Beto’s enthusiasm for engaging in sexual relations, is firm in her refusal of him,…

HOLA MEXICO Festival attracts nearly 25,000 people, and continues to be about bringing the best films, food and music from Mexico to Downtown Los Angeles–this year is no different.Festival opens the portal of Mexico to the entire LA community, so that they can experience more of Mexico’s cultural gems. 2014 is the sixth Hola Mexico anniversary and to celebrate it, festival has something for everyone! For starters, it offers its first ever FREE event in celebration of Dia de Las Madres (Mother’s Day) on May 10th, which is open to the entire community.Hola Mexico starts the day before on May…

THE GIRL AND DEATH, Winner of Best Picture at the Netherlands Film Festival,  is the latest film from Jos Stelling (THE POINTSMAN, THE ILLUSIONIST, THE FLYING DUTCHMAN). THE GIRL AND DEATH is a story about the impossible love between Nicolai and the courtesan Elise; a love that is obstructed by materialism, wealth, and the threat of death. In Russia of the post-WWII era, aging doctor Nicolai returns to an old, abandoned hotel, the place where he first met his great love 50 years ago, and relives his romantic tragedy, a tragedy that happens in the late nineteenth century, and embodies…

New HP’s Z Displays are promising higher quality and better performance for the filmmakers and editors. To learn more about this matter we interviewed Larry Mahoney, the worldwide product manager for HP’s Z Displays, stationed at the HP Workstation headquarters in Fort Collins, CO. Larry is responsible for the feature definition and lifecycle management for all HP Performance Displays – the HP Z Displays and HP DreamColor Display. Bijan Tehrani: I think the new announcement from HP is a very important announcement for filmmakers. As always, color accuracy is an important part of film editing and when you are getting…

Florian is half-German, half-French and owns “Le Flo” – a French delicatessen in Berlin that specializes in salami. Go With Le Flo explores what true love is, with plenty of twists and turns (some on a vespa). The romantic comedy was shot in Berlin by the award winning film-team (and music group), Bright Blue Gorilla. Go with Le Flo is an international labor of love with cast & crew from 20 different countries, starring fresh new faces, many from the legendary Bertolt Brecht theater, Berliner Ensemble. Go With Le Flo is written and directed by Michael Glover and produced by…

Shani Rigsbee (Shani) is a woman with convictions. Beautiful, feisty, a force of nature, and a remarkable achiever, and a cancer survivor. she is currently at the red-hot epicenter of a rising power pack of new American stars that are equally at ease producing, directing on stage and screen, in acting and in recorded music. Whether singing in her native language of English or fluently in French, Farsi, Arabic, Spanish or Italian, Shani has left many people shocked to know that her roots are American, actually from Bill Clinton’s hometown – Hot Springs, Arkansas and not from the outer reaches…

Actiontec Electronics develops broadband solutions that connect people to the Internet, and a few of them such as ScreenBeam Pro, are in interest of film fans and film makers. To learn more about Actiontec products we interviewed Mike Ehlenberger, Vice President, Channel Sales at Actiontec.Mike Ehlenberger has over 15 years of sales and management experience, he is responsible for developing sales, channel, and go-to-market strategies for Actiontec’s retail, distribution, VAR, SMB, and CLEC businesses. Joining Actiontec in 2002, Mike spearheaded partner driven channel initiatives, including Retail CPE programs, which helped launch Qwest’s mass-merchant business. Prior to joining Actiontec, Mike was…

In 1975, Chilean director Alejandro Jodorowsky, whose films EL TOPO and THE HOLY MOUNTAIN launched and ultimately defined the midnight movie phenomenon, began work on his most ambitious project yet. Starring his own 12 year old son Brontis alongside Orson Welles, Mick Jagger, David Carradine and Salvador Dali, featuring music by Pink Floyd and art by some of the most provocative talents of the era, including HR Giger and Jean ‘Moebius’ Giraud, Jodorowsky’s adaptation of Frank Herbert’s classic sci-fi novel DUNE was poised to change cinema forever. For two years, Jodo and his team of “spiritual warriors” worked night and…

Love has no borders and therein lays the premise of the hilarious, new Iranian-American romantic comedy “Shirin in Love.” Nazanin Boniadi plays Shirin, an absent-minded, young Iranian-American living in “Tehrangeles” (the large Iranian community in Los Angeles) with her overbearing mother and empathetic father. Despite being engaged for years to a successful Iranian plastic surgeon in Beverly Hills, Shirin finds herself breaking loyalty and tradition when true to herself she falls in love with a mysterious young man who lives in a lighthouse in northern California. As her secret unravels and cultures clash, Shirin discovers what it ultimately means to…