2007 Asian Festival of 1st Films Call for Entries kicks off at Cannes2 min read

Reading Time: 2 minutes

3rd Annual Festival in Singapore to Promote Excellence in Filmmaking Launches its 2007 Campaign at Cannes to Filmmakers World Wide

21 May, 2007, Singapore – The acclaimed annual competition for first-time Asian film makers, the 2007 Asian Festival of 1st Films (AFFF), announces its call for entries with a road show at Cannes to promote the event as the definitive resource pool for “The Next Big Thing” in Film.

This year the festival has expanded its vision to include the Pacific countries including Australia and New Zealand.

The festival, now in its third year, accepts quality films and documentaries from filmmakers of Asian Pacific origin from across the world. Submission forms, rules and regulations are available on the AFFF website at http://www.asianfirstfilms.com. There is no entry fee and the final submission deadline is 31 August 2007.

Over 300 submissions were received last year from across the world. Hot on the heels of last year’s AFFF, that featured films and documentaries, including sell-out shows for local production, Becoming Royston, which went on to be acquired by Singapore distributors, Cathay-Keris Films. Teamwork Productions, the organizers of AFFF is kicking off their road show at the Cannes film festival this year.

In 2006 over 9 films and documentaries were received from Singapore and 2 productions were nominated for Best Documentary and Best Cinematographer, Best Script and Best Male Actor in the Documentary and the Film categories respectively. We hope to have an even better showing from Singapore in this third year of the Festival.

All entries are screened by a professionally-acclaimed selection committee from across the world who come together for one week to view films and nominate the best across the 9 award categories. These top nominated films will be announced in October and screened at the third Asian Festival of 1st Films in Singapore in December. A grand Jury comprising of world-renowned celebrity directors and actors will judge the nominated films and announce their decision at the glittering awards night on 5 December 2007.

“We are the launch pad to commercial success for first-time filmmakers. We believe there is incredible talent across Asia which needs to be recognized, awarded and their films distributed widely to the rest of the world,” says Sanjoy Roy, Festival Director for AFFF.

Roy adds, “The movie-making industry is always looking out for the next big thing. We believe AFFF is such a resource and this is why we are reaching out to larger number of distributors, studios and talent hunters in Cannes this year.”

The festival will recognize excellence in 9 categories that include:

· Best Actor in a Leading Role

· Best Actress in a Leading Role

· Best Cinematographer

· Best Director

· Best Director (Documentary)

· Best Documentary

· Best Film

· Best Producer

· Best Script or Screenplay

For more information on the AFFF, please log on to www.asianfirstfilms.com or visit the blog at www.afff2006.blogspot.com.