11/01/2007

The full line-up of Rotterdam's Tiger Competition has been announced. A total of 15 titles will compete for one of three Tiger Awards, approximately half of which are from Europe.

Northern Europe is represented by the Finnish comedy Rock’n’Roll Never Dies [+see also:
trailer
film profile] by Juha Koiranen, in which Samule Edelmann plays a man named Tiger (what's in a name?) who still lives with his parents though he is over 30 and loves rock music, and Danish director Morten Hartz Kaplers’s mockumentary AFR, which investigates the power of the modern mass media.

From the south come Spanish filmmaker Rafael Cortés’ directorial debut Yo (I), which he co-wrote with its star Alex Brendemühl, and Nora Hoppe's Italian/French/German co-production La fine del mare (lit. “The End of the Sea”), which tells the story of two illegal immigrant lovers in the Italian city of Trieste.

Also part of the competition are the Russia’s Chelovek bezvozvratny (The Man of No Return) from director Katya Grokhovskaya, which looks at the intersecting lives of the inhabitants of a small town; the previously announced Ex Drummer [+see also:
trailer
film profile] ( see news) by Flemish director Koen Mortier; Die Unerzogenen (The Unpolished) by German director Pia Marais; and Aneta Lesnikovska's Does It Hurt?, which is the first DOGME film from Macedonia and is also about making the first DOGME film from Macedonia.

Further titles include the La Marea (Tides) from Belgium-based Argentinean filmmaker Diego Martinez Vignatti; Ju-yon-sai (Fourteen) by Japan's Hirosue Hiromasa; Baixio das Bestas (Bog of Beasts) by Brazilian director Claudio Assis; Dutch-Malaysian co-production Love Conquers All by Tan Chui Mui; and Xiaolu Guo's Jin tian de yu zen me yang? (How Is Your Fish Today?) from China.

The opening film, Esteban Sapir's Argentinean media-satire La antena (The Aerial), is also part of the official competition.

The festival, known for its prestigious Tiger Awards Competition for first and second films as well as its general theme of independent, innovative and experimental cinema, will run from January 24-February 4, 2007 in the Dutch port city of Rotterdam.