The MIFF XXX awards

The 30th Annual Miami International Film Festival (MIFF XXX) came to a close Sunday night, March 10. This year the film festival treated their monumental anniversary with a fantastic plethora of great films, guests, seminars and parties. An easy argument can be made that this was their best year ever!

On Saturday night, at the National Historic Freedom Tower at Miami Dade College the awards for this year’s films were announced. Taking home the Lexus Audience Award were two films, “Gideon’s Army” directed by Dawn Porter who also received the Grand Jury prize in the Knight Documentary Competition category and “7 Boxes” (7 cajas) directed by Juan Carlos Maneglia and Tana Schémbori. If you saw these films you know they were very well deserved.

“MIFF’s 30th Anniversary edition was even more successful than we could have ever dreamed,” exclaimed MIFF Executive Director Jaie Laplante, from a press release by MIFF. “As we close this 2013 edition, we can’t help but look forward to 2014.”

Here is a list of other awards handed out at MIFF XXX according to the press release.

KNIGHT IBERO-AMERICAN COMPETITION:

• Knight Grand Jury Prize: So Much Water (Tanta agua), produced by CTRL Z FILMS, Uruguay, by Ana Guevara and Leticia Jorge (Uruguay/Mexico/Netherlands), will receive USD$15,000. If the film's sales agent, Alpha Violet of France sells the film to a US distributor within 30 days, that US distributor will also receive $15,000. If not, the additional USD$15,000 will be added to CTRL Z FILMS' prize.
• Grand Jury Best Performance: The cast of A Gun in Each Hand (Una pistola en cada mano), by Cèsc Gay (Spain), will receive USD$5,000.
• Grand Jury Best Director: Ana Piterbarg of Everybody Has a Plan (Todos tenemos un plan) (Spain/Argentina /Germany), will receive USD$5,000.

JORDAN ALEXANDER RESSLER SCREENWRITING AWARD:

• Ana Guevara and Leticia Jorge for So Much Water (Tanta agua) by Ana Guevara andLeticia Jorge (Uruguay/Mexico/Netherlands) will receive USD$5,000.

KNIGHT DOCUMENTARY COMPETITION:

• Knight Grand Jury Prize: Gideon’s Army, by Dawn Porter (USA) will receive USD$10,000.

LEXUS IBERO-AMERICAN OPERA PRIMA COMPETITION:

(The jury selected two films to tie as winners in this category)

• Solo, by Guillermo Rocamora (Uruguay/Argentina/Netherlands/France), will receive USD$2,500.
• The Swimming Pool (La piscina), by Carlos Machado Quintela (Cuba/Venezuela) will receive USD$2,500.
  • Honorable Mention: Special recognition by the jury goes to Villegas, by Gonzalo Tobal (Argentina/Netherlands/France)

UNIVERSITY OF MIAMI SHORTS COMPETITION:

• Best Short Film: “Anna and Jerome”, by Mélanie Delloye (France) will receive USD$2,500.

MIAMI FUTURE CINEMA CRITICS AWARD:

• Beijing Flickers (You-Zhong), by Zhang Yuan (China)

The above award winning films joined completion winners in other categories, announced earlier in the week at the Festival. On Sunday, March 3rd, All About the Feathers (Por las plumas) by Neto Villalobos was awarded the $10,000 Miami Encuentros prize, sponsored by EGEDA, and it was also awarded the 6 Sales representation contract. On Thursday, February 28th, at a pre-event kick off to the Festival, “CANT” by Sam Shaib won the Cinemaslam Grand Prize, which included USD$500 fromFilmFlorida, an artisan award from Miami-based Artist Robert McKnight, custom one-year download membership to VideoBlocks, one complete set of footage video (57 DVDs) courtesy of Footage Firmand all-access pass to the Festival.

Here’s looking forward to MIFF XXXI in 2014!