29/03/2019 - The UK-Spanish production Those That, at a Distance, Resemble Another by Jessica Sarah Rinland has come out on top at the market of the Las Palmas de Gran Canaria Film Festival

MECAS director Lorena Morín (left) with the winners of the third edition of the market (© Quique Curbelo/Las Palmas de Gran Canaria Film Festival)

The third MECAS (International Market Dedicated to Almost-finished Films) unspooled between 24 and 26 March, during the 19^th Las Palmas de Gran Canaria International Film Festival. The market, headed up by Lorena Morín, aided by former director of the Ourense International Film Festival Fran Gayo, and produced by Ico Sánchez-Pinto and Rocío Rodríguez, is a meeting point that allows industry professionals to provide advice to nine high-quality, aesthetically courageous works in the post-production phase, which adhere to, and engage in a dialogue with, the festival’s specific line of programming. 

(The article continues below - Commercial information)

This year, nine projects were selected to be introduced in front of 20 film-industry experts. After three days of screenings, meetings, master classes and round-tables revolving around the sector, the market drew to a close with the handing out of the MECAS Award, worth €8,000, to one of the works in progress. The jury, comprising former The Match Factory associate Brigitte Suárez, Swiss photographer-producer Luciano Rigolini, Galician filmmaker and director of the Novos Cinemas Festival in Pontevedra Ángel Santos (The High Pressures [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Ángel Santos
film profile]) and Festival Scope project manager Eglė Čepaitė, bestowed the award upon the upcoming film by Argentinian-British filmmaker Jessica Sarah Rinland, Those That, at a Distance, Resemble Another [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile]. Her feature debut will be a UK-Spanish production financed by Galician outfit Filmika Galaika (managed by Beli Martínez), which is also currently staging the forthcoming movie by Eloy Enciso, Longa noite [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Eloy Enciso
film profile], the feature debut by Samuel M Delgado and Helena Girón, They Carry Death [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Samuel M Delgado and Helena…
film profile], and a film set to be co-directed by Lois Patiño and Matías Piñeiro, which bears the working title Ariel. 

The other unfinished films selected for MECAS were the Spanish-UK production Work, or to Whom Does the World Belong [+see also:
film review
film profile] by Asturian director and editor Elisa Cepedal; the upcoming project by France’s Pierre Creton (Va, Toto! [+see also:
trailer
film profile], Maniquerville [+see also:
trailer
film profile]), A Beautiful Summer [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile]; the second documentary by Galicia’s Diana Toucedo (Thirty Souls [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Diana Toucedo
film profile]), Puerto deseado; the Italian-Mexican production Tony Driver [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Ascanio Petrini
film profile] by Ascanio Petrini (which also won an award at the latest edition of When East Meet West in Trieste); the sophomore feature by Spaniard Miguel Llansó (Crumbs [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile]), Jesus Shows You the Way to the Highway [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Miguel Llansó
film profile]; the future debut by Tenerife-born Miguel Mejías, The Wanderer [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile]; the third feature by Argentina’s Edgardo Castro, Las ranas; and the next production by Argentinian outfit El Pampero Cine, Las poetas, which will be co-directed by Laura Citarella and Mercedes Halfon.

Furthermore, the market dedicated one more day to regional productions in the middle of the development phase. The projects selected in this section were vying for the ISLA MECAS Canary Island Films Award, worth €1,200, intended to enable their participation in a lab or a co-production forum at an international festival. The winner of the prize was El mapa para tocarte by Mercedes Afonso, while Voy a desaparecer by Coré Ruiz took home the OpenECAM Award provided by Madrid-based film school ECAM. 

Here is the full list of award winners at the third edition of MECAS at the Las Palmas de Gran Canaria Film Festival:

MECAS Award
Those That, at a Distance, Resemble Another [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile] – Jessica Sarah Rinland (Spain/UK)
Producer: Beli Martínez (Filmika Galaika)

ISLA MECAS Canary Island Films Award
El mapa para tocarte – Mercedes Afonso (Spain)

OpenECAM Award
Voy a desaparecer – Coré Ruiz (Spain)

(Translated from Spanish)