Miami International Film Festival (MIFF) ended its 10-day marathon of film premieres, special events and seminars yesterday, and this year's 30th anniversary festival was a remarkable success.
Ticket sales were robust and MIFF reported dozens of sold-out films, including No, A Gun in Each Hand (Una pistola en cada mano), Cubamerican, Gideon's Army and Everybody Has a Plan (Todos tenemos un plan), among others.
MIFF also received an impressive amount of local, national and international media coverage, and rave reviews from festival-goers regarding our diversity of offerings. Students and faculty were especially pleased with the educational components offered at this year's festival, including the Master Class Seminars.
Congratulations are in order to the winners of the coveted Knight Foundation Grand Jury Prizes, announced on the evening of Saturday, March 9. So Much Water (Tanta agua) by Ana Guevara and Leticia Jorge (Uruguay, Mexico, Netherlands) took top honors in the Ibero-American Competition, Gideon's Army by Dawn Porter (USA) captured the Documentary Competition Award, the cast of A Gun in Each Hand by Cèsc Gay (Spain) received the Grand Jury Best Performance Award and Ana Piterbarg (Spain/Argentina/Germany) of Everybody Has a Plan won the Grand Jury Best Director Award.
Ana Guevara and Leticia Jorge also received the Jordan Alexander Ressler Screenwriting Award. Solo by Guillermo Rocamora (Uruguay/Argentina/Netherlands/France) and The Swimming Pool (La piscina) by Carlos Machado Quintela (Cuba/Venezuela) tied as the winners of the Lexus Ibero-American Opera Prima Competition; Anna and Jerome by Mélanie Delloye (France) was the winner of the University of Miami Shorts Competition and Beijing Flickers (You-Zhong) by Zhang Yuan (China) captured the Miami Future Cinema Critics Award.
I would like to thank Jaie Laplante, the festival's executive director, and all of the MIFF staff and volunteers for making the 2013 festival so successful.
Thank you.
Eduardo
