Festival Data:

• Established: 1977
• Genre: General
• Attendance: 350000
• Media Attendance: 300
• Accredited Industry Attendance: 1000
• Total Number of Films Submitted: 2000
• Total Number of Films Screened: 439
• Total Screenings: 750
• # of Shorts Screened: 157
• # of Features Screened: 282
• Accreditations: AMPAS, FIAPF, FIPRESCI

• Competitive
• Students Section
• Has Panels

Festival Website:

Festival Description:

The Montreal World Film Festival is considered the largest fully independent film festival in the world. It is affiliated with no group, organization, company, association or brotherhood. This independence entails a freedom from interference by funding agencies or commercial sponsors. The program that the MWFF offers is marked by cultural diversity, a cinéma d’auteur, an innovative cinema, and by talent. The success and renown of the World Film Festival is firmly based on these principles.

MWFF's goals are: to encourage cultural diversity and understanding between nations, to foster the cinema of all continents by stimulating the development of quality cinema, to promote filmmakers and innovative works, to discover and encourage new talents, and to promote meetings between cinema professionals from around the world. Every year, films from more than seventy countries, including from well-known and first-time filmmakers alike, are selected. The Festival welcomes cinema professionals and the general public.

Montreal World Film Festival sections:

The WORLD COMPETITION includes world and international premieres. An international official Jury awards prizes for the feature films of this section: Grand Prix of the Americas, Special Grand Prix of the Jury, Best Director, Best Actress, Best Actor, Best Screenplay, Best Artistic Contribution, Innovation Award. The same Jury awards two prizes for the short films of this section.

The FIRST FILMS WORLD COMPETITION gives the opportunity to authors of selected first feature films to be recognized. A separate jury awards the Golden Zenith, Silver Zenith and Bronze Zenith to the winners of this section.

The Festival includes an "HORS CONCOURS" (World Greats, out of competition) category.

The festival section FOCUS ON WORLD CINEMA (Americas, Europe, Asia, Africa, Oceania) reflects the vocation of the Festival as a "World Film Festival".

Montreal World's "DOCUMENTARIES OF THE WORLD" section includes non-fiction films reflecting the subjects and concerns of filmmakers from countries around the globe.

Audiences are invited to vote for the films they liked best in different categories, such as: People's Choice Award, Award for the Most Popular Canadian Film, Glauber Rocha Award for the Best Film from Latin America, Best Documentary Film Award, Best Canadian Short Film Award.

The Montreal International Film Market is part of the Montreal World Film Festival and is a meeting place for film and television professionals from around the world. It serves as a port of entry into the North American market for professionals from abroad, as a link to the rest of the world for North American film and television people and as a site for international exchanges and discoveries. Access to the MARKET is restricted to film and television professionals registered at the World Film Festival.

The Montreal International Film Festival was founded by Serge Losique who runs his event as a private company, even owning its principal venue, the Imperial Theater. Losique has been described as "a maverick, pugnacious and unpredictable" by Variety's Shane Danielson (August 24, 2007) who also wrote "For many attendees, the chief virtue of the World Film Fest -- and the reason for its enduring importance on the fest landscape -- is the sheer unpredictability of its programming. Where Toronto, true to its origins as the Festival of Festivals, essentially culls a greatest-hits lineup from Berlin, Cannes and Venice, the Montreal slate comprises many off-the-radar pics from across the globe... filmmakers from Chad to the U.S. will compete on equal terms for the Grand Prix of the Americas, the event's major award. Many of these will be world premieres. As such, it's a distinct change from the homogenous, shopping-list selections of most festivals...Or as Losique puts it: "Our goal is to find the best films from as many countries as possible. We are not looking for 'names,' because even great names can produce bad films. In some festivals, you see the parade of stars and starlets offered by the marketing junket machine of Hollywood. We are not here to please dubious merchants, but to display the gems of the film industry."

Film Submissions:

• Call for Entry: http:/ / www.ffm-montreal.org/ en_info_insc.html

Curent Film Previews:

• Fortress