Miami Film Fest announces

The 28th Miami Film Festival promises a smorgasbord of film fare

A scene from 'Chico & Rita' which opens the 28th Miami International Film Festival

Member rating: 4

By Rene Rodriguez, The Miami Herald1/19/2011

Attention South Florida movie junkies: Get ready for your annual fix of international cinema. More than 100 films from 40 countries, including new movies by acclaimed directors Fernando Trueba, Francois Ozon, Liz Garbus and Alex de la Iglesia, will unspool at the 28th Miami International Film Festival, to be held March 4-13.

The program was unveiled at a press conference Wednesday by Miami-Dade College, which organizes and presents the venerable event. The event will kick off with the opening night selection Chico & Rita, the newest film by festival veteran Trueba (Belle Epoque), an animated musical about the romance between a piano player and a singer who meet in Cuba in 1948 and go on to travel around the world. The closing night film will be Incendies, director Denis Villenevue’s drama about a pair of twins who make a trek to the Middle East to find their family roots.

Esteemed Danish filmmaker Susanne Bier (Brothers, After the Wedding), whose latest film In a Better World just won the Golden Globe for Best Foreign-Language Film, will be the recipient of this year’s Career Achievement Tribute. Director Morgan Spurlock (Super Size Me) will present his new picture, The Greatest Movie Ever Sold, and participate in "A Conversation With …" Q&A seminar.

Other high-profile titles in the lineup destined to become hot tickets: the French comedy Potiche, about a woman who takes over her husband’s umbrella business after he falls ill, co-starring legendary screen icons Catherine Deneuve and Gerard Depardieu; Things Fall Apart, director Mario Van Peeble’s drama about a promising football running back in his final year in college, starring Ray Liotta and rapper 50 Cent (who also co-wrote the screenplay); Magic City Memoirs, the story of three Miami high school seniors who engage in wild antics that become increasingly dangerous, executive-produced by Andy Garcia; No Return, a thriller from Argentina about a man accused of a crime he didn’t commit, starring Leonardo Sbaragalia (Burnt Money); The Last Circus, a raucous comedy from Spanish bad-boy filmmaker de la Iglesia about the wild goings-on at a traveling circus during the waning years of Franco’s regime; and The First Grader, the fact-based story of an 84 year-old Kenyan villager fighting for his right to attend school for the first time, directed by Justin Chadwick (The Other Boleyn Girl).

This year’s festival will also feature a heavy emphasis on documentaries, including Bobby Fischer Against the World, an exploration of the late chess master’s incredible life; The Interrupters, director Steve (Hoop Dreams) James’ look at the efforts of a group of former street-gang leaders, now middle-aged, trying to combat urban crime in Chicago; Page One: A Year Inside the New York Times, a year-long study of the famed newspaper’s attempts to survive the leap from old media to new; and Flamenco, Flamenco, the latest celebration of a historic dance form by the esteemed Spanish director Carlos Saura.

Returning to the festival are previous programs such as Encuentros, which assists up-and-coming and independent filmmakers secure funding and distribution for their projects, and Florida Focus, which showcases movies shot in South Florida by local filmmakers. A new competition, Cinemaslam, will celebrate the work of Miami undergraduate and graduate film school students.

Executive director Jaie Laplante, who replaced former festival director Tiziana Finzi after the college decided not to renew her contract, says he is proud of this year’s lineup, because "it’s really solid and covers a lot of things. What I like about it the best is that it feels like a film festival specifically designed for this city. There are aspects of film and art culture, food, sports, nightlife - everything that Miami is about is summed up in the program this year."

Laplante, a veteran of the Miami Gay & Lesbian Film Festival and South Beach Food & Wine Festival, oversees every aspect of the event, from programming to sponsorship to fiscal responsibility. "I like to leave my fingerprints on everything, so I spent considerable time with every department, focusing on how the festival is represented - not just locally, but internationally."

Tickets for the festival will go on sale in February. For more information, including a complete lineup of this year’s program, visit www.miamifilmfestival.com