The MAIN ENTRY DEADLINE is December 15th, 2012
THE FINAL "BRICK-WALL" DEADLINE is: JANUARY 31st, 2013 - ENTRIES MUST REACH US BY THEN! We now accept PayPal for even greater payment security. The secure PayPal payment address is - entry@worldfest.org
The 46th Annual WorldFest-Houston - April 12 - 21, 2013
Ten Great Days in April!
“Before there was Sundance or SXSW, Before there was Toronto or Tribeca, there was WorldFest!”
The 46th Annual WorldFest-Houston International Film Festival continues its totally dedicated Independent Film screening format for the upcoming April 12-21, 2013 unspooling. WorldFest will screen just 50-60 feature film premieres, with a total and absolute emphasis on the American and International Independent feature films and a continuing annual spotlight on award-winning short films and documentary films. Entry forms & complete entry information are on our website (www.worldfest.org) – Click on Enter Film Festival, then on History, FAQ, Categories, Entry Form… The Main Entry Deadline is Saturday, December 15th, 2012 – A Mail-By Ship-By Deadline! Entries do not have to arrive by this deadline.
WorldFest Artistic and Program Director, Kathleen Haney, stated, “We are fiercely dedicated to the Indie Feature and Short Film and look for a quality selection of individual films to maintain a smaller, yet effective program rather than an overly large and unwieldy slate of 150-300 films. Haney continued, “For the 2013 WorldFest we continue to use‘A good story, well told’ as our time-tested approach to film selection”. (For complete winner info from the past 2012 WorldFest, go to – http://www.worldfest.org – click on View the 2012 Remi Winners).
After he received the WorldFest Grand Remi Award, Ridley Scott commented “WorldFest is in the business of validating excellence!” The mission of WorldFest is to recognize and validate creative excellence in film & video production in every facet and category of filmmaking. Many filmmakers report that a Remi Award from WorldFest opens doors to advance their careers.
WorldFest will continue with its annual Short Film Showcase, a special review of 100 new short and student films...from the festival that gave first top honors to Spielberg, Lucas, The Coen Brothers, Ridley Scott, Robert Rodriguez, Spike Lee, Gavin Hood, John Lee Hancock, Michael Cimino, Leslie Linka Glatter, Oliver Stone, Ang Lee, Atom Egoyan and David Lynch, among many others! Few other festivals have such a “Discovery” track record. WorldFest has emerged as the oldest continuous film festival management in the world with the same executive director, serving for 46 consecutive years. A few other festivals are older, but they have had as many as ten different directors. It is the oldest film festival in The South, and the 3rd oldest International Film/Video Festival in North America, after San Francisco & NYC.
The past 45th Annual WorldFest-Houston International Film Festival concluded with a good 20% upturn in box office. Highlights of the 45th Annual WorldFest-Houston were: several hit films, a Gala Awards Banquet with top honors presented to up-and-coming attending filmmakers from over 35 countries from round the globe, Indie Panels, a VIP tour of NASA and an exciting Houston Yacht Club Sailing Regatta & Texas BBQ. Attendance at the 10-day Fest was over 25,000, up from 2011 box office figures. The overflowing Awards Dinner at Houston’s Hotel Marriott Westchase hosted the WorldFest Gala, on Saturday night (April 21) with a record number of more than 550 international filmmakers, award winning international Russian & Mexican dancers, and a special hi-energy dance presentation by Shawn Welling’s ELCX Planet Funk.
The WorldFest 2012 Grand Remi Statuette Awards went to:
- BEST THEATRICAL FEATURE ~ CHINESE TAKE AWAY (Un Cuento Chino) Argentina, Sebastián Borensztein, represented by Stuart Strutin from Panorama Entertainment, NY who personally accepted the award.
- BEST FILM & VIDEO ~ STEVEN CARAS: SEE THEM DANCE, Deborah Novak, WITEK & NOVAK, INC., Huntington, WV, USA.
- BEST TV & CABLE PRODUCTION ~ THREE KINGDOMS, Xiaojun Yang, BEIJING ORIENT HENGHE FILM & MOVIE CO. LTD., Beijing, CHINA.
- BEST NEW MEDIA ~ AXI: AVENGERS OF XTREME ILLUSIONS, Shawn Welling, WELLING FILMS, Houston, TX, USA
- BEST EXPERIMENTAL FILM & VIDEO ~ TEN QUINTILLION, Romilly Spier, Director/producer, SWINBURNE SCHOOL OF FILM & TV, Prahran, AUSTRALIA.
- BEST SHORT SUBJECT ~ GOOD LUCK, MR. GORSKI, INSTANT FIRES, Taos, NM. USA.
- BEST STUDENT FILM, SHOOT THE MOON, Alexander Gaeta, CHAPMAN UNIVERSITY, Orange, CA., USA. (Actress Pamela Bower on hand to accept.)
- BEST MUSIC VIDEO ~ VUCCIRIA, Massimo Massara, NOTA PREZIOSA S.R.L.Palermo ITALY
WorldFest Best Actor Remi Awards go to Jed Rees, in Phil Volken’s Garbage, Filmmuse Prods. CA., USA; Gwendoline Yeo, Best Actress in Torque Entertainment’s, Heathens & Thieves, CA., USA; Alex Meraz, Best Supporting Actor in Camilo Vila’s City of Gardens, Four Fish Films, CA,USA: Nazneen Contractor, Best Supporting Actress (Séance: The Summoning, directed by Alex Wright, Berkshire Axis Media, BAM, Toronto, Canada.)
The Houston Film Critics Society presented two Critics Choice Awards selected from the World premieres submitted into competition Gotthard Schuh: A Sensual Vision of the Worldfor the Best Documentary and Three of a Kind directed by Gregory James Green, Abruzzo Prdns., Boise, ID, USA for Best Feature. Other HF Critic’s Choice Awards this year were Best Actress, Jodi Russell (Three of a Kind), Best Actor, John Savage (Caporale’s The Black Dove) and two new awards, to best young actors; Brandon Tyler Russell (Opening night’s Smitty, Michael Baumgarten, Writer/producer) & Grace Powell (Larry Wade Carrell’s, Jacob, TX, USA). The Closing Film, America– was acquired by Panorama Ent.
The Russian-American Publication sponsored the Best Foreign film award which went to Chinese Take Away (Un Cuento Chino) directed bySebastian Borensztein in Argentina and repped by Panorama Entertainment. NY. The Best Houston Production Remi Award went to Still Born, Thomas Jackson, Houston, TX. The Best Texas Production Award went to Damian Horan’s Children of the Air.
WorldFest began in August 1961, as Cinema Arts, an International Film Society. It began screening Independent, foreign & art films. It became an officially competitive International Film Festival seven years later, in April 1968, and has been in continuous operation since. It is one of the original three film festivals in North America, with San Francisco and New York as the first two events. Following WorldFest was Chicago, Cleveland, Dallas, and Seattle. Then Sundance and SXSW, Toronto and Tribeca. Now there are more than 2,000 USA film festivals of various types, levels and quality, most being simply non-competitive screening events! WorldFest is international, competitive and invites filmmakers worldwide.
The 46th Annual WorldFest offers International Competition in; Features, Shorts, TV production, TV commercials, unproduced Screenplays & Teleplays, Experimental, Student, Documentary, Business & Industry, New Media, and Music Videos. WorldFest is the largest film & video competition in the world, in sheer number of actual category entries, with more than 4,300 category entries received in 2012. There are almost 200 sub-categories for competition, allowing each film to compete in its own individual genre.
WorldFest-Houston is sponsored by the State of Texas, the City of Houston, HBU Fitness Center, Kodak, NASA, AMC Theaters, Tippit and Moo, Service, Inc., Premier IMS, the Houston Film Commission, Boxer Properties, Wagner Media, The HQ Hotel Marriott Westchase, The Houston Chronicle, Regent University Film School and the Houston Arts Alliance (HAA).