" The Scent Of Oak " spearheads 1st Travalling Carribbean Film Showcase : April 14-18 at Unesco, Paris.

This new travelling film showcase from the Caribbean region, chaired by Cuban filmmaker, Rigoberto Lopez, at Unesco, recently showed a selection of features and shorts chosen among 21 participating Caribbean countries.

The film Der Golem is a classic film – doubly so.

First, it has long nestled comfortably within the list of titles that make up the German Expressionist movement of the 1920s. Teachers of survey history courses are more likely to show Das Cabinet des Dr. Caligari, but a serious enthusiast will make a point of seeing Der Golem as well.

From the start, reviewers recognized Der Golem as Expressionist. In 1921 the New York Times' critic wrote, "Resembling somewhat the curious constructions of THE CABINET OF DR. CALIGARI, the settings may be called expressionistic, but to the common man they are best described as expressive, for it is their eloquence that characterizes them." (Spellbound in Darkness, p. 362) In 1930, Paul Rotha's The Film Till Now, the most ambitious world history of cinema in English to date, appeared. Highly influential in establishing the canon of classics, Rotha adored Weimar cinema, including Der Golem.

"Why does one constantly mimic herself in front of the lens all the time? In any case, her image will appear as someone else. Photograph seems like a mirror with memory. What happens if herself never coincides with her image…"

The prolific Cuban filmmaker, Humberto Solás, founder and conceptor of the Festival Internacional del Cine Pobre, inaugurated at the end of the year 2000, in the picturesque port of Gibara, CUBA, which has matured to become an original and successful film event for young talents, passed away on September 18th, in his residence in Miraflores, Havana, after a short bout with cancer.

One of Solas' colleagues described the cause of his death as "sadness from seeing CUBA develop in a way he would not have liked it to".

Gibara, Cuba

Over a Hundred Films Will Compete at the International Non-Budget Movie Festival. As always, the Festival will be held at the small, beautiful northeastern city of Gibara.

The Late Humberto Solas, Founder & Creator Humberto Solás. Photo Archive. Mildrey Ponce.

The Hottest Latin Film School: International School of Film and Television San Antonio de los Baños- CUBA

As a filmmaker, deciding what film school to go to is quite a difficult task. You want to pick the best place possible to prepare you for your career, and then several other things go into play, like your budget and your family situation. When I was in the process of choosing an undergrad film school, it all came down to four schools for me: USC, NYU, U of Miami and EICTV. USC was crossed out because California seemed too far from my family in NY and South America. NYU I excluded because I wanted to try living in a new place from where I had grown up, so my last two choices were

University of Miami and EICTV in Cuba.

Brazilian Film festival in Paris. Spring is around the corner, bringing with it the eleventh Festival du Cinéma Brésilien de Paris to be held as usual in the Latin Quarter at Nouveau Latina theatre from 29 April through 12 May, 2009.

Discover new fiction film from 29 April to 5 May) and documentaries (May 6th-12th).

Fiction Awards designated by a professional Jury will go to Best Film, Best Actor and Best Actress at a ceremony to be held on May 5th.

Festival de cinema do Brasil in Paris.

The first week of this 9th two-prong event (feature competition and then documentaries) has ended at the L'Arlequin Cinema in Paris 'trendy Quartier Latin with the presence of top-knotch Brazilian filmmakers, actors and producers, flown over for the event to present each of the two dozen films in competition.

Big names of Brazil's 'cinema novo' period such as Miguel Farias, Carlos (Caca) Diegues, Sergio Rezende, Joao Batista de Andrade boasted a vigorous older-generation slate of works to compete with talented newercomers like Tata Amoral, the only female feature director, Heitor Dhalia, Karim Ainouz and Cao Hamburger.

I'm writing this Cineblog about the new film by one of my all-time favorite directors, Pedro Almodóvar, whom I had the honor of meeting the week before he won an Academy Award for All about My Mother back in 2000.

Los Abrazos Rotos, or Broken Embraces, is the name of his new film. It premieres on March 18, and there is already buzz that it will play at Cannes. The teaser is very short, but leaves no doubt that this is a film by the one and only Almodóvar.

Hello from afar, my fellow bloggers. I write my final Oscar-themed blog of 2008 from the capital of the best coffee in the world, Quindío, Colombia. On my week away from the Openfilm headquarters (located in an undisclosed Cyberfilm Paradise), I had two major topics running through my head. #1: Coffee, and #2: the 81st annual Academy Awards. As a Colombian filmmaker, I was in heaven this week. First of all, because I came to this beautiful country to shoot a video of the entire coffee cultivating-to-packaging process, from growing the coffee beans on the lavish Colombian fields 1400 feet above sea level in the beautiful lands just above the vast Amazon, and finally to the final smile of happiness of the java junkies sipping some of the best coffee in the world.

Latinos in the 2009 Award Season

The only quasi Latino thing to celebrate on the Oscar nomination list is Penelope Cruz's performance as best supporting actress in Woody Allen's Vicky Cristina Barcelona, as you can read about in my previous blog, "Will Penelope Be Wearing Gold?" But even though Cruz is the only Hispanic name on the list, we come to consider if the Academy is being a bit racist in not nominating any more Latino talent in the recent year's Latin cinema. Is it because there is no other Latin talent out there? Nope, because talent there sure is! The Sundance Awards were recently announced, giving six Awards to Latino filmmakers and Latino films! How come none of these were recognized by the Academy?

It really has been a complicated and difficult year for Spanish film, without any blockbuster success in the billboards, different than in 2007 when The Orphanage or [REC] made box office smash numbers very close to Hollywood super productions.

A list of Spanish movies were added in the first quarter of 2008, international productions like Asterix at the Olympic Games and The Oxford Crimes that made some waves and increased the number of spectators attending premieres.

Following this wake some co-produced films were added as national films like Vicky Cristina Barcelona, Che, the Argentine, Transsiberian or El Greco, but their box office figures turned out to be really regrettable. These are not 100% Spanish produced, so they don't really count as exclusively Spanish films in my Opinion. Anyway, as 2008 is just past us, I made a couple of lists of 5- 100% Spanish films that, in my opinion, represent the best and the worst films of 2008. In this Cineblog you will read the Best and in the next Cineblog I will bring you the Worst.

After many years spent in my bed dreaming as a child, the only walk in life that could suffer me was the entertainment business. I studied, worked, ate, drank, and slept theatre, photography, art, and film all the live long day while growing up and now that I'm in it... I'm not content... I'm not fully satisfied with my work up until now, which reminds me of a famous quote I was given once by a dear professor of mine in college. It comes from a letter written by Martha Graham to Agnes De Mille:

"There is a vitality, a life force, a quickening that is translated through you into action, and because there is only one of you in all Time, this expression is unique. And if you block it, it will never exist through any other medium and be lost. The world will not have it. It is not your business to determine: how good it is; nor how valuable it is; nor how it compares with other expressions. It is your business to keep it yours clearly and directly, to keep the channel open. You do not even have to believe in yourself or your work. You have to keep open and aware directly to the urges that motivate you. Keep the channel open ... no artist is pleased...there is no satisfaction whatever at any time. There is only a queer, divine dissatisfaction; a blessed unrest that keeps us marching and makes us more alive than the others."

Latin Nominees for the 2009 Independent Spirit Awards

As we approach the end of the year, the award season begins for the best in film of 2008. One of the first ceremonies that just announced its nominees is the Independent Spirit Awards, the awards show for North America's independent film community. As for Hispanic and Latino nominations, we have four major nominees. On the Spanish side, the talents of Penelope Cruz and Javier Bardem were recognized, as both got nominations for their collaborative work in Woody Allen's flick Vicky Cristina Barcelona

Searching the Internet on a daily basis for high quality short films & videos can be an arduous & strange task at times. Let’s face it: there’s a lot of crap out there. On average, you have to watch about 50 bad videos in order to find just one good one. From tutorials on how to make a peanut butter & jelly sandwich to a man giving his dog a haircut, there are no shortages of completely pointless, unwatchable videos populating the Internet today.

Noticia de un Secuestro or News of a Kidnapping, from the renowned author and credited Colombian Nobel laureate Gabriel García Márquez, will be embodied in a film version next year and reach cinemas in 2010. This is not the first work of Garcia Marquez (or Gabo, as he is popularly known) to be brought to the cinema. Of Love and Other Demons and Love in the Time of Cholera also had their big-screen adaptations.

Welcome one, and Bienvenidos Todos(Welcome All) to the most original Spanglish Cine Blog, exclusively on Openfilm.com. This CineBlog is called "Junior's CineBlog", Junior being yours truly, Me!...... and "...CineBlog" meaning "...FilmBlog" in our neighboring tougue, and second official language of the United States, Spanglish! That is right. This unique bilingual film blog is going to bring you the latest scoops on the hottest topics in the Hispanic film industry, bringing you stories on film releases, Latin film personalities as well as film events all over the world, all with the particular thread of the Spanish/Latin/Hispanic inclination.