YYC - In Competition #1 (Year Juan)

This is the first film in Competition at the 3rd Annual YYC Competition. 

Take a look and see if you can do better!

Best of Alberta

Launched four years ago, this popular, always sold-out event screens the Top Ten short films that have been submitted from Alberta’s most compelling emerging talent – from first time filmmakers to established local directors in both Live Action and Animated formats. The event has profiled and launched many local success stories in a few short years, including Calgary animator Cam Christiansen’s back to back annual award-wins for his original and mesmerizing “The Real Place” and “I Have Seen the Future” which also screened at Sundance and sibling filmmakers Devon and Kirsten Bolton’s live action short “Shipwrecked,” which became one of the most internationally successful Alberta short films in history – winning more than seven “Best Short” awards around the world, including a British Academy Award for Short Film. Both groups remain active in the Alberta filmmaking and commercial community, hiring locally, and promoting filming, technology, and business in Alberta.

Who will be the next Alberta filmmaking star? Support emerging talent and the local film entertainment community!

For the first time in Calgary International Film Festival history, the “Closing Ceremonies After Party” will be scheduled following the Best of Alberta screenings in combination with the International Mavericks and Award Dinner – bringing both local and international filmmakers and industry together! Including tickets sold to the public, there are 800 potential industry, public, and media party goers – providing logo and exposure opportunities at the venue, on big screens, signage, and give-outs!

Mavericks

What is a ‘maverick’?
…a person who thinks independently, a lone dissenter, a non-conformist or rebel

In the film industry and in reference to filmmakers, the term “maverick” is applied to those who forge new ground in filmmaking and create signature, personal films outside of the normal parameters of narrative storytelling. These dissenters are often recognized for challenging traditional boundaries of technology, business models, structures of style, as well as normative or narrow societal views. What they redefine today in cinema becomes the standard of tomorrow.

Early pioneering filmmakers such as Orson Welles and Jean Luc Godard paved the way for celebrated “mavericks” of our time to personally express themselves in movies and develop a filmmaking ouvre all their own. Directors such Jia Zhang Kia, Wes Anderson, and Michael Haneke create films that have a recognizable approach to making movies that reflect a visionary aesthetic universe. Their originality is remarkable and trail blazing. They are the Mavericks of contemporary cinema and we, as audience, cannot wait to see what they release next.

What is Mavericks?

Mavericks celebrates independence of spirit, thought, and execution in filmmaking. At CIFF we want to champion those who forge new ground in cinema and create signature, personal films outside of the normal parameters of narrative storytelling. These dissenters are often recognized for challenging traditional boundaries of technology, business models, structures of style, as well as normative or narrow societal views. What they redefine today in cinema often becomes the standard of tomorrow. We endorse and identify with those that have done things the hard way. “Original isn’t easy” is not only the message for the Maverick series, but our own internal mantra as a Canadian destination film festival fighting to institutionalize our own position and voice. CIFF will showcase the difficult art of auteur filmmaking, maintaining creative integrity, defending independent vision, and honour the maverick approach necessary to forge new cinematic ground. We have raised the bar on this ideology by supporting it in official competition, with a substantial $25,000 prize, to emerging visionaries early in their filmmaking careers. The criteria will focus on voice and style and seeks to reward directors who exemplify confident, distinct expression and have a streak of the rebellious in their work. Taking its inspiration from Alberta’s rich frontier heritage, past prairie challenges, present glory as the Heart of the New West, and future promise of Calgary as an international hub for economic and cultural relevancy, CIFF will celebrate and pay tribute to the seminal role of the ‘maverick’ attitude in the advancement of the motion picture industry. Mavericks is a competitive body of 10 international films featuring emerging directors to be juried by a visiting cinematic celebrity and rewarded with a sizeable cash prize. The films will play over the 10 days of the festival, delivering the ten Maverick filmmakers throughout at their individual screenings, culminating in an awards banquet on Saturday, October 3rd. There the marquee Maverick Jury President will receive his/her Honourary Maverick award and one of the ten finalists for the inaugural Maverick Award will be given their $25,000 prize. The Mavericks campaign aims to be the defining identifier for the festival to distinguish us from other film festivals so we can be both internationally distinct and still connected to our cultural history and roots as a region.
The Mavericks campaign is designed to further specify the mandate and personality of CIFF and to find a central belief that all of Calgary can get behind culturally to grow and develop the festival to the next stage. Our festival is entering its tenth anniversary in 2009 and we are striving to develop more international relationships, industry partnerships, and to carve out a niche in Canada’s film festival circuit that can be decidedly Calgarian, identifiable, and successful. CIFF is committed to making the festival world class and touching upon the requests and feedback of our viewership to make the festival as meaningful and conceptually realized as possible. It is a step we feel is necessary in our growth. Mavericks is the tool to rally around and take existing partners (ie. American Express, The Film Foundation) with us and build momentum with a singular flagship idea.

Youth By Youth Cinema Competition

Youth By Youth Cinema Competition

Presented by the Calgary International Film Festival

Submission Form 

"If you think you have a good idea, film it and if it turns out crappy, edit it"

- '08 YYC Finalist

The 3rd Annual Youth By Youth Cinema Competition is here and promises to be bigger and better than ever. We're looking for young directors who have made a film over the past to submit their work and compete in the 2009 YYC Competition!

Youth By Youth Cinema (YYC) is an open competition for young filmmakers from grades 4 through 12. Over $2000.00 in cash and prizes will be awarded in the following categories:

• Best Short Film - Grades 4 - 9
  
• Best Short Film - Grades 10 - 12
  
• Young Maverick
  
• Audience Favorite
  

The Calgary International Film Festival (CIFF) screens exceptional films from around the world to Calgarians. With the YYC Competition, we take the film-viewing experience to a new level by celebrating the best of youth filmmaking. 

Our Programming Committee will pick the top films from all the entries, with the selections making up the program for a special CIFF screening during the 10th Annual CIFF (September 25th - October 4th, 2009). A Jury will choose the winner from each category with prizes and awards being given out at the event. 

Please read the following guidelines before submitting your film:

• FIlms must be between 30 seconds and 7 minutes in length.
• Both fiction and non-fiction films are accepted.
• Films must have been competed after August 2008. 
• Films must be directed by youth aged 9 - 18 at the time of the film's completion. 
• Any one applicant may submit up to three films (including group projects).
• All applicable copyrights (music/image/text sources) must be secured by the filmmaker(s).
• Preview screeners accepted ONLY on DVD formats.
• Preview screeners must be labeled with title, director name, contact email address, and running time. 

There are no submission fees for this competition. 

Submission deadline is Friday, July 31st, 2009.

For more information regarding the YYC Competition, please contact the YYC Coordinator, Juan Delgado, at 403.209.4958 or juan@calgaryfilm.com.