Emilio Mayorga: Last News

Emilio Mayorga Autour de Minuit, a co-producer of Annecy contender “Unicorn Wars,” has acquired international rights to another Annecy entry, the dialogue-free “Two Little Birds” (“Dos pajaritos”), a 20-episode series by Argentine animators Alfredo Soderguit and Alejo Schettini (2013 Bafici Audience Award winner “Anina”). The deal excludes co-production territories Argentina, Colombia and Uruguay.Produced by Luciana Roude at Argentina’s Can Can Club (“Teclópolis”), Soderguit at Uruguay’s Palermo Estudio (“Anina”) and pubcaster Señal Colombia, the ornithological slapstick comedy follows the hilarious situations lived by two little birds sharing the same tree.

Holly Jones Yasuo Nakajima and Mariona Carrera’s Barcelona and Tokyo-based b-mount have boarded “Maybe It’s True What They Say About Us,’ (“Quizás Es Cierto Lo Que Dicen De Nosotras”) from Chilean filmmaking duo Camilo Becerra (“El último sacramento”) and Sofía Paloma Gómez (“Quiero morirme dentro de un tiburón”), seen at San Sebastian’s San Sebastián WIP Latam competition. b-mount join a co-production between Carlos Núñez and Gabriela Sandoval at Chile’s Storyboard Media (“The Sky Is Red”), Cecilia Salim at Argentina’s Murillo Cine (“Chaco”) and Lucía van Gelderen at Argentina’s Morocha Films (“El Cinco”) alongside Becerra’s production venture La Jauría Comunicaciones.

Emilio Mayorga “Unicorn Wars” (Alberto Vázquez)Alberto Vázquez, the director of “Birdboy: The Forgotten Children,” a Gkids pickup for North America, delivers an apocalyptic anti-war parable narrating the ancestral war between teddy bears bigots and environmentalist unicorns with irreverent visual exuberance and moments of real horror.WIP’S“They Shot the Piano Player” (Fernando Trueba and Javier Mariscal)Trueba and Mariscal’s much-awaited new collaboration after their 2012 Oscar-nominated “Chico & Rita” is a co-production with France, Portugal, the Netherlands and Peru. Sold by Film Constellation, project threads “music, politics and documentary as well as fiction, thriller and memory,” Trueba has said.

Emilio Mayorga “The Once and Future,” a hybrid project directed by Yeo Siew Hua winner of Locarno’s top prize in 2018 with “A Land Imagined,” will open at the upcoming Singapore Festival of Arts (SIFA).Edson Sidonie’s Buenos Aires-based Bikini Films and Roger García’s General Film Services in the U:S: have teamed for this multi-platform  project which will be made as a feature, opera and performance show.Announced as an “expanded cinema experience,” the story is set in the  near future, when the planet has become unsustainable and humankind prepares for a planetary exodus to escape extinction.Unable to withstand the voyage, people must leave their bodies behind and upload the totality of human experiences into something called The Labyrinth. The human race is finally just one.

Emilio Mayorga Marc Recha, director of “Pau and His Brother,” which played in Cannes competition, is initiating post-production on “Wild Road,” a thriller produced by Barcelona-based director label Parallamps.Heaed by Montse Germán, a star in Cesc Gay’s “Fiction” and Sergi López” (“Pan’s Labyrinth”), “Wild Road” follows 50-year Ona, who is about to fulfill her dream of piloting a light aircraft. Then a chance encounter with some Serb ex-combatants will change her life and that of her loved ones, forcing her to face up to her own past.A Locarno Fipresci prize winner for “The Cherry Tree,” in “Wild Road” Recha aims for a “cinema d’auteur for a wider audience.

Emilio Mayorga New York-based Kino Lorber has acquired all North American rights to horror pic “Virtual Reality,” from Argentine director-producer Hernán Findling (“Impossible Crimes”).Other deals on the pic closed by FilmSharks include Media 4 Fun (Poland), AV Jet (Taiwan) and Laon-I (South Korea). Japan, Latin America, the U.K.

Emilio Mayorga 10 exciting Spanish directors to track in 2022:GABRIEL AZORÍN“I’m interested in films that move from intimacy to mystery exploring language without being solemn,” says shorts director Azorín (“Greyhounds”). Backed by Spain’s Dvein Films and Filmika Galaika, “Last Night I Conquered the City of Thebes,” his long-awaited first feature and a friendship tale straddling Roman and modern times, proved  a buzz title at Locarno’s 2021 Match Me forum.VERÓNICA ECHEGUILaunched as an actor by Bigas Luna in “My Name is La Juani,” the “Trust” and “Fortitude” thesp’s surprising first short “She Wolf Totem” earned her a director Goya.

Emilio Mayorga “Alcarràs,” from Catalonia’s Carla Simón, won Berlin’s top Golden Bear in February. “One Year, One Night,” from Catalan Isaki Lacuesta, also played in main competition.

Emilio Mayorga Fernando León de Aranoa’s Oscar-shortlisted “The Good Boss” and Argentine Netflix series “The Kingdom” proved the main winners Sunday night at the 9th Platino Awards, which also prized Javier Bardem for his lead performance in Leon de Aranoa’s workplace comedy.Already scoring an Oscar nomination, Penelope Cruz won an Audience Award for Pedro Almodóvar’s “Parallel Mothers” at the Platinos, the biggest kudocast for movies and series from Latin America, Spain and Portugal whose ceremony was held at Madrid’s IFEMA Palacio Municipal.In all, “The Good Boss” walked off with best film, director, screenplay and actor (Bardem), original music (Zeltia Montes) and editing (Vanessa Marimbert), adding new honors to a feature which cleaned up at Fenruary’s Spanish Academy Goya Awards, taking six major nods from a Goya record of 20 nominations. Starring Javier Bardem in one of the main achievements of his career, “The Good Boss” is a darkly humoured depiction of a seemingly benevolent but finally sinister patron as well as workplace power dynamics.   The feature was also shortlisted for the Academy Awards in the international feature film category.

Emilio Mayorga “Journey to Yourland,” “Lumières!” and “Sex Symbols” proved standouts  at Cartoon Next, a new event launched by European association Cartoon Media to explore the ever more hybrid reality of the animation industry as well as other current cutting edge trends.VR, Extended Reality (XR), cross-media and IP extensions were the event’s buzzwords.In a format similar to Cartoon Springboard, which focuses on a new generation of animators, at Next, creators and producers also pitch projects to a bevy of high-profile experts who offer suggestions on how to improve development or the titles’ completion.Among such experts at Cartoon Next’s inaugural edition were Japhet Asher­, founder of U.K. consultancy and IP creation company Polarity Reversal; Orion Ross, VP of original programming and animation at Disney EMEA; Aymeric Castaing, founder of French XR company  Umanimation; Luce Grosjean, who launched France’s Miyu Distribution, devoted to young talents and student films; producer Sébastien Onomo at France’s Special Touch Studios; and producer Anna Schur, head of content at Spanish gaming animation company ZeptoLab.

Emilio Mayorga Spanish director Alauda Ruiz de Azúa, who swept the board at March’s Málaga Festival, has wrapped shooting on her sophomore feature, “Eres Tú” (It’s You), a Netflix’ romantic comedy produced by Antonio Asensio and Paloma Molina at Zeta Studios ­­– the Madrid-based company behind phenomenon “Elite.” Miriam Rodríguez executive produces.After distributing Almodovar, and signing up J.A. Bayona, this is another move into director driven fare by Netflix in Spain, Ruiz de Azúa’s attachment to “Eres tú marks another association with a prestige director by Netflix in Spain which already distributes Pedro Almodóvar and has signed up J.A.

Emilio Mayorga “Son,” “Cosas de chicos,” “Votamos” and “36” are among eight shorts at this year’s Madrid en Corto, an increasingly key Spanish platform for new talent now in huge demand in a platform age.Recent past editions have included Carlota Pereda’s original “Cerdita,” whose feature version dazzled at January’s Sundance, and shorts from Alauda Ruiz de Azúa, director of Berlin Panorama player “Lullaby,” which swept the Málaga Film Festival on Saturday night, and Javier Marco whose “Josephine” proved a prominent feature debut at September’s San Sebastián. In all, over its 18 editions, titles in Madrid en Corto’s distribution catalog have earned 32 nominations for Spanish Academy Goya Awards. This year, the Goya fiction short winner (Verónica Echegui’s “Totem Loba”) doc short laureate (“Mama”) and “The Monkey,” which snagged best animated short, all feature in Madrid en Corto’s catalog.  Women look likely to make much of the running at this year’s edition, organised by ECAM Distribución, the distribution arm of the enterprising Madrid Film School (ECAM), whose Screen-Incubator has fast become one of the key industry development labs in Spain.

Emilio Mayorga Documentary short “Les Filles de Sète” (“Sète’s Daughters”) and series episode “Eva y el abedul del Edén” (“Eve and the Birch of Eden”) have secured funding through the Platino Crowdfunding platform, a new financing initiative launched last December.Initiated by the Platino Awards organization, the crowdfunding online platform for film, series and other formats was officially presented Thursday March 24 at Málaga’s Picasso Museum along with an array of industry activities at a Malaga Film Festival presentation under the motto, “Universo Platino.”Platform already has 26 ongoing projects, mainly shorts but also documentaries and mini-series.“Eva y el abedul del Edén,” from TV show “Nunca nos dijeron la verdad,” and docu short “Les Filles de Sète” are the first two productions to be completed through the platform. Young creators Andrés Ribagorda and Pablo Jimeno attended the event and explained that not only did they get the financing they needed but also the professional input to jumpstart their first work.

Emilio Mayorga Alba Sotorra has teamed with Miramemira’s Andrea Vázquez, Spanish pubcaster TVE and Catalonia’s TVC to co-produce “Sica,” the first fiction feature of documentarist Carla Subirana , a 2012 Málaga Golden Biznaga winner for “Kanimambo” and director of “Nedar.”The film is included in Malaga’s Spanish WIP showcase.The feature focuses on 13-year old Sica who lives on Costa da Morte, a Galician fishing shoreline known for its natural beauty and the danger of its coast. Passionate about the ocean, Sica waits for the waves to bring back the corpse of her father, a fisherman who perished at sea alongside her friend’s Leda.

Emilio Mayorga Emily Mortimer (“Transiberian,” “Match Point”) and writer-director Jim Cummings (“Thunder Road,” “The Beta Test”) boarded Miguel Faus’ feature debut “Calladita,” whose financing is expected to be raised entirely through NFTs and Web3 systems.It would mark the first time ever that a European film is backed by NTFs (non-fungible tokens) and decentralized web software handled by the crypto community Web3.Based on the eponymous short film which played at the Palm Springs Short and London Short Film festivals, “Calladita” will offer a character study of its protagonist and, through her eyes, a portrait of the Catalan high bourgeoisie with a mix of realism and satire. “I’m involved because I’m a big fan of Miguel, who’s short ‘Calladita’ I really loved,” Mortimer said in a statement.Joining Mortimer, cast members include Spanish Academy Goya Award-winner Antonio de la Torre (“The Endless Trench”) Susana Abaitua (“Patria”) and Paula Grimaldo, who played the lead in the original short.“Calladita” follows a young Colombian woman who works as a domestic laborer in a summer mansion in Costa Brava.

Emilio Mayorga “Ray and Manny,” “Witch’s Business” and “Worldoscope” feature among the five animation projects chosen for the 2nd Women Animation Directors Mentoring Program, run by Ventana Sur’s Animation!Launched with the aim to boost gender parity and build a more equitable and diverse animation industry, the initiative has been launched in alliance with the Annecy Festival’s MIFA market, Argentina’s Institut Français and, for the first time, the Quirino Ibero-American Animation Awards.Five projects will have access to a training program focused on production, scriptwriting and pitching techniques starting in early 2022. After training is completed, one selected project will participate at MIFA 2022.

Emilio Mayorga Mexican producer-director Iria Gómez Concheiro is unveiling at Guadalajara “Here Be Dragons,” a co-production between her own label Ciudad Cinema – alongside exec producer Rodrigo Ríos Legaspi – and Colombia’s Trilce Cinema, with Alejandro Rey and Claudia Sánchez.Set in a vaguely anachronistic 2040, “Here Be Dragons” is a sci-fi drama-adventure movie which follows 18-year old Candelaria as she tries to survive an uncertain, devastated country where sinister military forces rule.Fearing an imminent barbaric invasion, Candelaria flees from her father and a chaotic, brutal regime, while undertaking an initiatory trip to unveil the truth about love and this menace.

Emilio Mayorga ​Daniela Leyva at La Mitad del Continente (“The Howls”), Andrea Toca at Mexico’s Un Beso Cine (“Human Animals”) and Diana Bustamante at Burning SAS (“Buy Me a Gun”) have teamed to co-produce the vampire drama “The Day is Long and Dark,” the eighth feature from one of Mexico’s most important directors, Julio Hernández Cordón.“Working with Julio has always been an enthralling experience. With this film there is also a mixture of things that interests me on a narrative level.

Emilio Mayorga Executive producer Nuria Landete and Spanish production-distribution company Elamedia are teaming to co-produce the feature debut of Ainhoa Menéndez, “In the Flesh,” a romantic drama with dashes of terror.The project is being developed at Spain’s Incubator platform, a six-month producer mentorship initiative, which is part of The Screen industry program at the Madrid Film and Audiovisual School (ECAM).“Flesh” follows Mara, a woman almost in her thirties, working as a stock girl in a supermarket, who grew up in foster homes. Throughout her life all the people she has loved have abandoned her, so to get them to stay with her, she decides to eat them.

Emilio Mayorga Aardman Animations’ founder Peter Lord will receive the honorary Chinelo del Año at Mexico’s 10th Pixelatl animation festival, hosted by the city of Cuernavaca. Taking place in an online format, the event runs Sept.

Emilio Mayorga “Mister Crocodile,” “Corgi, A Royal Family” and “Piggy Builders” are among 84 TV series animated projects set to unspool at the 2021 Cartoon Forum which takes place in Toulouse, southern France, over Sept. 20-23 in an entirely in-person format.21 countries from Europe will introduce animated projects at pitching sessions and industry networking, the backbone of Cartoon Forum’s activities.