2010 Hola Mexico Film Festival

Alamar (To The Sea)

Hola Mexico Film Festival, the biggest Mexican film festival in the world, is back again with a splendid collection of feature films and documentaries. Kicking off in Sydney tomorrow, Thursday 3 November, it will be showing at Dendy Newtown and Dendy Opera Quays until Sunday 14 November.

2010 marks the centenary of the Mexican revolution, and to celebrate this important milestone, 10 leading Mexican directors have joined forces and produced a compilation of 10 short films under the title Revolucion. The short films explore the idea of revolution and what it means to young Mexicans today.

My picks Alamar, Año Bisiesto and Norteado are all multi-award winning films, promising captivating stories about love, solitude and hope. With a selection of colourful and inspiring characters, these features are fueled with diversity, energy and passion staying true to its Latin American roots.

For more details and a full list of feature films and documentaries and their screening times, check the festival website.

Sydney Film Festival 2010

Exit Through the Gift Shop

This year’s Sydney Film Festival is jam-packed with some of the best in international and Australian features, shorts, documentaries and archive titles. The full program was announced a few weeks ago and the most popular choices such as Banksy’s Exit Through the Gift Shop, The Messenger starring Woody Harrelson, I Am Love starring Tilda Swinton and Roman Polanski’s The Ghost Writer with Ewan McGregor, Kim Cattrall and Pierce Brosnan, have already sold out. Also shown to be very popular and now sold-out are films like New Zealand’s Boy, beautiful animation The Illusionist and Australian feature Caught Inside.

No One Knows About Persian Cats

Because I love all things related to music, I am always very excited about the ‘Sounds on Screen’ selection of films and documentaries. This year, Sydney Film Festival brings an interesting mix of music genres to the screen. Definitely worth seeing is No One Knows About Persian Cats, an Iranian documentary on the underground indie rock scene in Tehran, and The Runaways, a film based on the 70’s all-girl band from LA.

In its 57th year, Sydney Film Festival’s selection of films doesn’t seize to impress. There are hundreds of other beautiful, moving and stimulating films to be discovered. For a full list and session times, check out the festival website. Sydney Film Festival kicks off on Wednesday 2 June and finishes on Monday 14 June.