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Film Descriptions and Directors' Biographies
AWARD WINNERSBest of Show and Best Foreign Film - Made in JapanSynopsis
“… My mother admitted that the man who I thought was my father was not my father”
Director BiographyCiro Altabas was born in Zaragoza, Spain, in 1977. He received his degree in Media Studies at the Universidad Europea de Madrid. After graduation, Ciro went to London to study film making at the London Film School.
While attending school in London, Ciro worked on numerous short films and videos in various roles as producer, director of photography, editor, art director, sound recording and director.
Phobia, the last short film Ciro made in London, received over 30 awards internationally, and was screened in the Official Selection on the 59 Mostra di Venezia.
Upon his return to Madrid, he directed the short films, DVD (winner of over 50 international awards),
Made in Japan, and
Manual Pratico del Amigo (Abreviado), as well as shooting the documentary
, Hobby, in Japan.
Ciro has also taken a course at the University of California, which promoted by the New York Film Academy. He has take numerous other courses in film making, taught college, and served as a translator, jury member, reviewer, and professional screenwriter for feature films and TV movies.
He currently lives in Madrid.
Best Animation - Invisible Master
Synopsis
An odd man in a strange world must complete a mysterious mission with mind-blowing consequences!
Director Biography
Mike Fisher has had a love of science fiction and comics books his whole life. He has been a cartoon contributor to
Starlog Magazine, which covers the world of science fiction, for over 15 years, he has also created full-page color cartoons for
Animation Magazine, featuring his character, 3-D Pete.
Mike lives in sunny San Antonio, where he woks as a new graphics artist/animator. He lives with his fabulous wife Margi, and their three children, Joe, Andrew, and Faith.
Best Music Video - Fashionable
Synopsis
Fashionable shows the raw energy of Quiet Company presented in a performance style that has been abandoned for novelty by other film makers.
Director Biography
Cameron McCasland is a native Texas, whose work reflects a sensibility that comes from being raised under pure blue Texas skies by an actress and an electrician. After attending East Texas Baptist University, McCasland began his work shooting live concerts and music videos for Grammy winners Don Henley, Audio Adrenaline, Sixpence None The Richer, and Newsboys, in Texas and California. He later moved to Nashville, Tennessee, working on feature films and television commercials, which included shooting a high profile ad for CD Warehouse.
Best Student - The IdiotSynopsis
They say you shouldn’t judge a book by its cover. Maybe sometimes you should.
Director Biography
Ben Jones was born in Austin, Texas, and soon after was transported to live in a religious cult in Wisconsin. As a child, he was allowed to watch very little television, and was envious of the shows his “non-cult” normal friends would describe to him.
Ben was forced to use his imagination to create his own entertainment (or “crazy-land” as the psychiatrists like to call it) to survive. Some say he went too far, but years later he continues to create his own entertainment as short films and animations.
Best Youth - No winner due to licensing issues…
Best Locally Produced Film - Forgotten Frames
Synopsis
The year is 1890. Al “Popcorn” Kane is a clown in a traveling circus, but in reality he is a hired assassin tracking a target. He’s been hired by Thomas Edison to assassinate Louis le Prince, a French chemist and inventor living in America, who is threatening Edison’s pursuit of the first patent for the motion picture camera. Edison must stop le Prince before his public exhibition of his new “motion picture camera” in New York on September 20, 1890, or the public exposure will force the patent office to grant le Prince’s patent request, which they’ve denied once before, thus dashing Edison’s aspirations to be the inventor of the very first “motion picture” camera.
Director Biography
Jeremy Snead is a creative director and producer at a multimedia production studio in Dallas, Texas. Snead is a film fanatic thrives on creative energy. He grew up in “deep” west Texas in the little oil and cotton town of Levelland.
Jeremy Snead loves the medium of film making. He admires those who do it well and strives to become a great film maker himself. Although some might label him too “popcorn” or commercial, his greatest mentor is the legendary Steven Spielberg. He also admires the work of Stanley Kubrick, Martin Scorsese, Francis ford Copolla, and George Lucas.
Best Documentary - Hero, Wings Are Not Necessary to Fly
Synopsis
Pascal Kleiman was born without arms, but this circumstance did not impede him with his career as a techno music disc jockey. This film is a clear example that will power is stronger than any obstacle, no matter what it may be.
Director Biography
When he was eighteen and in the middle of the “hustle and bustle” of the “Movida madrilène” (an important social movement among young people of Madrid, Spain, during the period of 1980-1990), Angel Loza began to experiment with Super 8mm, photography, and video.
He began to write as a consequence of a painful relationship. His first script was about life and death from three angles: childhood, adulthood, and old age.
He has written and produced the majority of his works, which have been internationally recognized.
“I write because I need it, I produce because I have to and I direct because it is my passion.”
Best Narrative - ZombabiesSynopsis
An eye-popping, zany, indie powerhouse,
Zombabies is a tongue-in-cheek journey to a baby nursery during the outbreak of a zombie apocalypse. Jennifer, the sitter, has been overpowered by the little undead tykes running around the nursery. They’ve devoured her boyfriend, and have her surrounded. But those undead babies have picked the wrong girl to mess with, and clearly, Miss Stiles, the nursery owner, hired the wrong girl for the job.
Zombabies is the first episode of an epic eight-part saga of short zombie comedies taking place in the same world with interlocking characters and stories. The next chapter,
Hazmat J and the Birth of the Apocalypse, is almost complete. Stay tuned!
Director Biography
An award-winning writer/director/editor of several effects-heavy short films, Justin Paul Warren is an alumni of Tarrant County College, where he received Best Film Portfolio of the Year for two years in a row. His former college professors still use his short films as models to new students.