9/6/2000
KurzFilmFestival
Filmhaus, Hamburg
The International Hamburg Short Film Festival.
To Cut a Long Story Short...
... from the 10th to the 17th of June, the short film genre will be celebrated in Hamburg for an entire week.
During this time the "Zeise", "Metropolis" and "Lichtmesz" cinemas are screening 400 films, lasting anywhere
from 40 seconds to 20 minutes.
Just like other big festivals, the 16th International Hamburg Short Film Festival is presenting several world
premieres in the competition programmes as well as in other main programmes. "Ghost Trip" (USA 2000) by Bill
Morrison and "Silverstar" (Germany 2000) by Harry Flöter and Jörg Siepmann are just two examples from the
International Short Film Competition Programme. Of course, the directors will be present.
The No Budget Competition starts with the special programme:"No Budget Access". This will introduce the
public to No Budget films that often need a closer look to discover how sublime they are. There are five other
programmes, each with an amusing title and remarkable films from an impressing and creative world far
removed from the film industry. Similar to the No Budget Competition in terms of production and humour, are
this year's P&S-Three Minute Quickies, dealing with the theme: "My Favorite Song". Aside from an old man from
Iran singing a touching hymn of praise to the International Hamburg Short Film Festival there are two entirely
silent films and many other surprising films, not longer than three minutes.
The twin-programme Look at Britain / Glimpses of the USA shows films that until now were rarely if ever
screened in Germany. The documentary genre was not invented but established by the film movement going
back to John Gierson's films of the 30's. In the programme Look at Britain we get to see an impressive selection
of the most important examples of this school. Glimpses of the USA presents films by the designer couple
Charles and Ray Eames, best known for their chair composed of two parts. They also produced more than 100
short films from 1950 to 1978.
A second programme the festival focuses on, the Bit Film Festival, is dedicated to films entirely generated on
computer or digitally treated in a special way. One whole programme deals exclusively with the world of insects.
The Bit Film Festival can also be seen on the Internet at www.bitfilm.de. In addition, professionals from the
areas of production and distribution of digital films and videos will give an account of this growing film art at the
Bit Film Forum.
This year's Children's Film Festival again is presenting international short film for children. All over the world
there are "First Kisses", "Important Moments" and of course "Brave Girls".
To make sure we show enough German productions, we have created two special programmes: Made in
Germany and Made in Hamburg.
During the "Night of the Short Film" presented by the Hamburg Cultural Foundation, the audience votes for and
awards the two desirable prizes.
The recent political development in Austria inspired numerous filmmakers and video artists to create short and
more or less spontanous statements. This year's Diagonale, the festival of Austrian film, showed the best of
these in their programme "The Art of Time is Resistance", winning the "Prize for Innovative Cinema". The
International Hamburg Short Film Festival is proud to be showing a selection of these.
After the evening screenings we will celebrate in the Festival Club at the Fundbüro. There you can meet the film
directors and the organisers of the festival, listen to strange live-music and suffer more abstruse films. Most of
the time you can simply chat and meet new people, while the music plays softly in the background.
The Short Film Market will be organized in the foyer of the Filmhaus. During the day you can watch all 2300
films submitted to the festival on private moniters. Further more, the Hamburg Short Film Agency will make
available its archives, consisting of nearly 8000 entrances. So...
...short films ..go for it!
Jan Paulo (Pressereferent) c/o
KurzFilmAgentur Hamburg e.V.
Friedensallee 7 - Filmhaus -
D-22765 Hamburg
Fon: +49-(0)40-39 10 97 19
Fax: +49-(0)40-39 10 97 20