Hollywood Brazilian Film Festival Announces Winners

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The Hollywood Brazilian Film Festival (HBRFest), which annually presents the best in new Brazilian independent cinema direct from the international festival circuit, concluded its fifth year on August 4 at the Egyptian Theatre in Hollywood featuring more than 30 Los Angeles premieres of Brazil’s best independent films.

Winners of the IndieBrazil Competition in the Fiction, Documentary and Shorts categories were announced by respective jury members at a ceremony on closing night prior to the Los Angeles premiere of HBRFest Guest of Honor Anna Muylaert’s debut award-winning comedy Durval Records.

Muylaert, AFI Fest and Sundance Programmer Dilcia Barrera and respected festival programmer and former LACMA film curator Ian Birnie announced The Moving Creatures, an extraordinary poignant drama exploring the grief over the sudden tragic loss of a loved one, as the winner of HBRFest’s Fiction award and commented:

“For its successful sculpting of time and its ability to deal with powerful emotions, the jury has unanimously decided to award The Moving Creatures by Caetano Gotardo the Best Narrative Fiction Award. For the creative use of CinemaScope and the captivating black and white cinematography, the Fiction Jury would like to give a Special Mention to Pedro Sotero for his work in Good Luck, Sweetheart by Daniel Aragao.”

Monica Chuo, former Paramount Pictures VP of Worldwide Acquisitions and Co- Productions, Paul Malcolm, film programmer for the UCLA Film & Television Archives and filmmaker Helvecio Marins Jr., winner of last year’s HBRFest grand prix with Swirl, were unanimous in their selection of Mr. Sganzerla – The Signs of Light as Best Documentary: a dazzling re-appropriated and recreated assembly of underground pop film imagery narrated in first person by the award-winning iconoclast Rogerio Sganzerla, the iconic Brazilian experimental filmmaker whose last film The Sign of Chaos was about Orson Welles’s failed attempt to make a film in Brazil in the 1940s.

The Documentary jury also gave Gabriel Mascaro’s Housemaids a Special Mention and stated, “We would like to commend Gabriel Mascaro for incorporating high school students into his method of storytelling and shedding light on this labor force that is endemic to the social/economic fabric of Brazilian society.”

Bernardo Rondeau, film curator at LACMA, producer Rafael Sampaio and respected Brazilian journalist Mariane Morisawa announced Ebb and Flow, which is about a young deaf man who works installing car stereos, as the winner in HBRFest’s Shorts category.

The jury said:

“The jury awards this beautiful film for the masterful economy with which it depicts a complex life and for how writer/director/cinematographer Gabriel Mascaro translates a series of simple exchanges into a cinematic mosaic of understated poignancy. We are also giving a Special Mention to About a Month by André Novais.”

In addition to other Festival guests in attendance, twelve filmmakers came to Los Angeles to support their competition films:

Gabriela Amaral (The Comforting Hand); Sergio Andrade (Jonathas ́ Forest), and Marcelo Caetano (By Your Side), among others.

HBRFest 2013 ran from July 31 through August 4 and is dedicated to addressing the cultural and commercial exchange between Hollywood, the world film industry and the Brazilian film community. This year’s offerings of fresh discoveries featured Portugal as Guest Country in addition to presenting a night of gay-themed films.

The Hollywood Brazilian Film Festival is presented by Riofilme. Sponsors include One Digital and Copa Airlines. Cultural support comes from the Ministry of Foreign Relations (Itamaraty), Ancine (Brazilian Cinema Agency) and the Consulate General of Brazil in Los Angeles.

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