NFB Goes To Sundance With Three Shorts

Canada's National Film Board of Canada (NFB) returns to the upcoming Sundance Film Festival, January 21 to 31 with three selected animated film shorts.

The films screening are Cordell Baker’s "Runaway", Bruce Alcock’s "Vive la Rose" and David Coquard-Dassault’s "Rains".

"Runaway" is Barker's third short film with the NFB. His previous films "The Cat Came Back" (1988) and "Strange Invaders" (2001) won 30 international awards and Academy Award nominations. "Runaway" was produced in Winnipeg by Derek Mazur for the NFB.

Bruce Alcock’s "Vive la Rose", puts into images the words of a plaintive song about lost love. Co-produced by the NFB and Global Mechanic, Alcock’s film is based on an 18th-century song by Newfoundland musician Émile Benoit, in a film that pays homage to the land, sea and the harsh lives of local fishermen, produced by Global Mechanic’s Tina Ouellette and the NFB’s Annette Clarke and Michael Fukushima.

"Rains" is a meditation on everyday life and man's relationship with nature, as seen by illustrator David Coquard-Dassault, produced by Folimage’s Pascal Le Nôtre and the NFB’s Julie Roy...

CFC Offers $10,000 For "The Reel Challenge"

The Canadian Film Centre have launched 'The Reel Challenge Contest', an initiative of the Canadian Film Centre, supported by the Copyright Collective of Canada.

The Reel Challenge is a contest for aspiring filmmakers to make a short compelling film about the importance of creators' rights and copyright protection for their work.

"...For contemporary artists, including filmmakers, the digital age brings extraordinary opportunities, yet at the same time, unprecedented challenges with respect to an artist's ability to control the distribution, use and reproduction of his or her work. The Reel Challenge Contest is an opportunity for artists to speak out on the importance of preserving and protecting copyrighted creative works..."

Eligible submissions should be approximately sixty (60) seconds in length and must not exceed three (3) minutes.

The contest runs December 7, 2009 to April 26, 2010.

Three prizes will be awarded:

first CDN$10,000
second CDN$2,500
third CDN$2,500.

"...All categories and genres of short film are accepted, including drama, comedy, animation, horror, sci-fi, documentary, experimental and music videos. Prizes will be awarded by the adjudicating committee to the creators whose submissions promote creators' rights and address the importance of content protection, from a creator's perspective, in the most compelling way, provoke the most thought and feeling in the viewer, and are considered the most engaging, imaginative and the most innovative in content and delivery..."