Ver Cine Colombiano: Noticias | Proimágenes Colombia

The festival will take place in Vancouver, Canada, from September 5 to 15, 2024. Its goal is to promote and showcase Latin American cinema in Vancouver and to foster cultural dialogue. The event celebrates not only Latin American cinema but also contemporary Latino-Canadian and Indigenous films.

This year's edition includes Colombian films in the official short film selection, starting with Disfonías (Dysphonies) by Manuela Giraldo Londoño and María Camila Pulgarín Zapata, produced by Lúcida Cine. On his small farm, Juan is disturbed by the unusual song of a momoto bird, which foretells death. His misfortune is realized with the loss of his voice. Manuela, his daughter, embarks on a journey to find him through an intimate story that delves into the past, new dimensions, and the silences of a man who is not the same anymore.

The selection continues with two short films from the Refresh catalog, Proimágenes Colombia's strategy to increase its distribution at national and international film festivals: Estamos en el mapa (We Are on the Map) and La noche del minotauro (The Night of the Minotaur). Estamos en el mapa, directed by Santiago Rodríguez Cárdenas and produced by María Paula Carvajal Agudelo, explores the question: What does it mean to be on the Map? Residents of the La Estrella neighborhood, who built and still live there, come together to share and remember their stories. This includes the neighborhood's origins, its development, the processes around basic needs, and the dynamics of "social cleansing" - events that reflect the history of Ciudad Bolívar.

La noche del minotauro is directed by Juliana Zuluaga Montoya and produced by Tomás Campuzano and Daniel Cortés. People wonder where birds go to die. -In my grandmother's village, there was a lighthouse among the mountains, a forest full of creatures, and an echo that sounded like the warm wind at night. That's where the birds went to die. This fantastic tale uses archival footage to tell the story of Luz Emilia García, a pioneer of porn cinema in Colombia. The film was awarded Best Short Film in the Latin American Competition at the Mar del Plata International Film Festival (Argentina, 2023).

The Colombian short film selection concludes with Fieras (Beasts), directed by Andrés Felipe Ángel and produced by Juan Miguel Gelacio Ramírez. After leaving school, Fabián, a pre-teen from a neighborhood in Ciudad Bolívar, Bogotá, spends a rainy afternoon playing soccer and riding his bike with his older brother's friends, led by the most mature boy, nicknamed "La Comadreja" (The Weasel). The afternoon's lethargy is interrupted when the boys find a dead cub from the litter, which "The Weasel" jealously guards. As they search for a place to bury the dog in their adult-free world, Fabián faces the emergence of an unfamiliar impulse: the first stirrings of his shameful and intrusive sexual desire, triggered by the leader of the group. Fieras won the Santa Lucías for Best Fiction Short, Best Direction, and Best Screenplay at the National Fiction Competition of the Bogotá Shorts Film Festival / Festival de Cortos de Bogotá - Bogoshorts (2023).

Meanwhile, the film selected for the festival's opening night is La suprema (2023) by Felipe Holguín, with the filmmaker present at the event. The film has won several awards, including the Audience Award at the 63rd Cartagena de Indias International Film Festival (FICCI, 2024), the Coral Award for Post-Production at the Havana International Festival of New Latin American Cinema (Cuba, 2023), the Silver Colon Audience Award at the Huelva Ibero-American Film Festival (Spain, 2023), and the Ecumenical Jury Award for Best International Feature Film at the Fribourg International Film Festival (Switzerland, 2024), among others.

The festival will also host the world premiere of the experimental documentary Fields of presence (Canada, Colombia), directed by Jorge Lozano and Briana Sarita Lozano. The film is a tribute to the multifaceted life of the director's daughter. It blends fictional film archives, acting, and photographs to evoke memories and bring moments and events to life. Her singing acts as a unifying thread, offering parallel interpretations. Exploring events since 1978, the film uses a non-chronological and non-linear approach to provide a unique artistic perspective. Filmed in Colombia, Spain, and Costa Rica, the film ends in Victoria, BC, where she was tragically murdered.

Finally, in the New Directors Competition, seven films are vying for the Best New Director Award, including La piel en primavera (Colombia, Chile) by Yennifer Uribe Alzate. This film had its international premiere in the Forum section of the Berlinale (2024) and was the opening film of the Cartagena de Indias International Film Festival (FICCI, 2024).