Tuesday, September 27, 2011

La Casa de las Conchas - Manhattan Shorts in Salamanca

Tomás sent me this picture of "the house of the shells" in Salamanca, Spain where he's going to see the Manhattan Short Film Festival Wednesday.  He's a  serious film buff as well as a wickedly good artist/cartoonist.  His blog is listed on the right - Waldo Walkiria.  He's also put up a new website. 


This an idea of a world wide film festival, where everyone sees the same ten films at the same time around the world, along with internet technology, means that Tomás and I will be able to discuss these films even though I live in Alaska and he lives in Spain. I'm interested in finding out which film he votes for as the best and what he thinks about them all.

If anyone else has a photo of your local Manhattan Short Film Festival venue - send it in and let me know which films you liked.

The website doesn't show the different cities well.  When you find the country - or state - the cities are listed on the top.  The brochure we got shows some Alaska locations and dates.  The website shows venues but not dates.  So here are the Alaska ones:
  • Matsu folks - it says Strange Bird (venue) online and in the brochure in Palmer on  October 1 and 2 
  • Petersburg  is on the brochure for September 29 and online  at the Arts Council at 12 Nordic Drive at 7pm.
  • Juneau isn't in the brochure, but online it says it's at the Gold Town Theater Sept. 29, Oct. 1 and 2. 
  • Talkeetna and Anchorage - it's already over in these places.  
Then let's chat here about which films you liked and why.

    5 comments:

    1. No luck with it in London. Locations are quite a long ways from us, so we won't be seeing them. BFI launches their film festival soon so it may not be good timing here.

      ReplyDelete
    2. Steve, Paula, herminia and I were yesterday at the festival and our decision was unanimous: "Sexting". I like the story for a short film, its simplicity and efectiveness, the final twist and the performance.
      In my opinion, the egyptian "Martyr Friday" was innappropiate for a film festival (it's really a report too much known). It was the worst. "Mak" and "A Doctors Job" were of little interest too.

      ReplyDelete
    3. Interesting. I agree with you completely on Martyr Friday. It seemed like it was only there because it was a current event. The other one that I wasn't excited about was Beaver Dam.

      But I like Doctor's Job. But that was in Spanish so you didn't need subtitles. There were lots of interesting aspects - do Peruvian doctors really need to have second jobs? Should he keep the money to pay for his mom's long term care? Should he save the thief's life? Should he call the police? I liked it.

      I don't understand why you didn't like Mak either. It was more impressionistic and too long, but I thought it gave a realistic feel for what the young woman was going through.

      I voted for, after much indecision, "Incident at a Bank." I thought is was interestingly constructed with a story in a story. But I also liked "Dik" which was very funny.

      I'm curious. I assume the programs were in Spanish. It would seem a lot of work to get subtitles for all the countries the films were shown.

      ReplyDelete
    4. At least in Salamanca, the projection was through a DVD equipment, in a 4/3 format. This was unsatisfactory, of course. Part of the image of "Incident in a bank" was lost and it bothered a lot.
      Maybe we aren't in the mood for the drama of "Mak".
      You're right. The films were with Spanish subtitles (except the peruan one, with English subtitles superimposed).

      ReplyDelete

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