Aretha Franklin’s spine-tingling and uplifting Amazing Grace, a rare gem in the crown of the late musical genius, will open this year’s 27th Pan African Film & Arts Festival. The documentary film was originally directed by Sydney Pollack in 1972 at New Temple Missionary Baptist Church in Los Angeles, California but remained unreleased due to technical and rights issues.
The 31st edition of Filmfest Dresden lures film-loving audiences to the capital of Saxony, Germany from April 9 to 14, 2019. Filmfest Dresden is already proving a foretaste of several of this year’s special programs.
Noir City, the world’s most popular Film Noir festival, returns to the legendary Egyptian theater in Seattle, Washington, from February 15 through 21, 2019 for a week-long indulgence of danger, desire, and despair. The 2019 festival presents 20 classic films covering the years 1949 to 1959, as they were experienced on their original releases, pairing a top-tier studio “A” with a shorter, low-budget second feature, or “B” film. Many of the films will be presented in glorious 35mm. Czar of Noir and host of TCM’s “Noir Alley,” Eddie Muller, will host the week-long Festival.
Ronny Sen’s Cat Sticks, captured in amazing black and white visuals, about junkies in Kolkata, released the official poster and trailer. The film which is set to world premiere at the 2019 Slamdance Film Festival, stars Tanmay Dhanania, Sumeet Thakur, Joyraj Bhattacharjee, Rahul Dutta, Saurabh Saraswat, Sreejita Mitra, Raja Chakravorty, and Kalpan Mitra
Neighboring Scenes, the annual festival of contemporary Latin American cinema organized by the Film Society of Lincoln Center and Cinema Tropical, returns for the 4th edition in New York City with 13 features and 10 shorts with seven filmmakers in person, from February 22 to 26.
The 49th edition of Forum as part of the Berlin International Film Festival will consists of 39 films, 31 of which world premieres. The festival notes, that the Forum 2019 main program doesn’t consider itself some sort of ‘best of’ list, but rather gathers together a selection of films that try things out, take a stance and refuse to compromise.
20 celebrated and revered expert voices across film, art, culture and science will award feature-length and short films shown at the 2019 Sundance Film Festival with 12 prizes, announced at a ceremony on February 2. Short Film Awards will be announced at a separate ceremony on January 29; both award ceremonies will be livestreamed. The Festival takes place January 24 through February 3 in Park City, Salt Lake City and Sundance, Utah.
The Berlin International Film Festival today finalized the lineup for the 2019 Competition and Berlinale Special sections. In the Competition, 17 of a total of 23 selected films will be vying for the Golden Bear and Silver Bears. 20 of the films will be celebrating their world premiere at the festival.
The Cleveland International Film Festival (CIFF) unveiled its marketing campaign for the 43rd edition under the theme: WELCOME. The simple yet powerful theme is a nod to the inclusive nature the CIFF has built over its 43 years through its diverse on-screen programming and on-site programs. The campaign is also a celebration of the hospitable nature the northeast Ohio community has shown to the thousands of guest filmmakers who have visited Cleveland to take part in the Festival over the years.
The first-ever COVEN Film Festival, San Francisco’s new world-class short film festival featuring films made by women, will host a full day of curated short film screenings, complete with filmmaker Q&A’s on Saturday, February 9th, 2019 at the New People Cinema in San Francisco’s historic Japantown neighborhood. A private networking event will take place the evening before on Friday, February 8th for filmmakers and sponsors.
South by Southwest® (SXSW®) Conference and Festivals announced the features and episodic premieres lineup for the 26th edition of the Film Festival, running March 8-17, 2019 in Austin, Texas.
The 13th Culinary Cinema in the Berlin International Film Festival will be held under the motto “A Taste for Balance” from February 10 to 15, 2019. Ten documentaries and two fiction films focussing on the relationship between food, culture, and politics are being presented this year.