Mediterranean: Special Montpellier's Cinemed
MEDITERRANEAN SHORT FILMS
21st, May 2007
The 29th International Festival of Mediterranean Film of Montpellier, France will take place from October 26 through November 4, 2007.* Nearly 30 years already! Created in 1979 by a group of passionate film lovers and unapologetic Mediterraneans, all volunteers in the Jean Vigo Film Club, the “Encounters with Mediteranean Film” has since then grown and in 1989 became an International Festival with a competition for full-length and short fiction films.
But the conviction and goals have stayed the same, to discover and to promote cinema from the countries in the Mediterranean basin, the Black Sea, from Portugal and Armenia. In these times of globalization, of surges in fundamentalism and reduced sense of community, it is more vital than ever to generate, in a spirit of tolerance and open-mindedness, the greatest possible number of gatherings, exchanges, and debates for directors from these countries, the public and the press, in order to bear witness to the links and proximity that make up their common history and heritage, beyond the differences in governments, languages, religions, traditions and, of course, production conditions...
Montpellier is a general festival where the best in recent Mediterranean production of full-length and short films, documentaries, experimental films, and animation are presented and generously awarded. A transversal approach that makes it possible to follow and support the careers of young directors who are making the jump from short to full-length films, often by way of a grant for the development of full-length projects. In 2006, 248 films from all genres were presented for some 75000 curious and eager spectators, not to mention the 5500 school children at the educational "festival for young audiences" organized just before the festival, and the 400 high school students from all over France who attended hands-on film classes. That is the how the "history” goes, in a few figures and dates.
Last year, Oscar de Julián, the director of “Almería en corto”, had the good idea and kindness to invite me to the jury of his international festival. Then he came to Montpellier, also as a jury member, and with his characteristic enthusiasm, made a proposal for a Special Mediterranean Short Film of Montpellier, which I of course accepted gladly and without thinking twice. In Mediterranean (as elsewhere...), the more it moves around and gets exchanged, the better!
Squeezing the best in cinema from twenty-some countries into fourteen films is more difficult than squaring a circle… We had to make some difficult choices and some sacrifices unfortunately, but the tour of the Basin to which we invite you should seduce you, for at least three reasons:
- firstly because of the discoveries in store for us at the multiple and varied layovers in each place: films and performances from a Mediterranean close to home (Spain, France, Italy), passing through places further away and lesser known in the Balkans (Greece, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Slovenia, Romania), from the Middle East (Israel, Palestine, Egypt) and from Morocco, to close the circle with Northern Africa.
- secondly, because most of the films selected are comedies, and were the most widely awarded at Montpellier (9 out of 14, a nice score) by the jury members, by Canal+ and by the public. We realized after the fact, once the selection had been made, something that clearly confirmed a fact: to take on often painful issues that make up and tear apart the Mediterranean --wars and occupations, religious conflicts, exiles, exoduses, misery, exclusions of all kinds, imprisonment of women, racism, etc. - by way of comedy is proof of high quality in screenwriting and direction, since it is the most difficult to pull off and indisputable evidence of distancing one's suffering through humor, one of the characteristics and traditions in Mediterranean film.
- lastly because there is a common theme uniting all these films: They are all related to borders, real borders delineated by checkpoints, and other borders, those on which one can die and/or kill, mental as well as cultural and ideological borders that can imprison just as much as any other. How can we raise them, how can we break them, how can we cross them, to where and at what price?
For it is also freedom—of movement, of thoughts, of living and believing—that is at issue in these excellent short films, which invite us to move and to open our minds, a key issue in the Mediterranean and the world today. Enjoy your journey!
Michèle Driguez
Cinemed Montpellier