Hivos to partner Tiger Awards 2012

41st International Film Festival Rotterdam
25 January – 5 February 2012

PRESS RELEASE 4 January 2012

Hivos to partner Tiger Awards 2012

From this year, the International Film Festival Rotterdam welcomes Hivos as a partner of the Tiger Awards for feature-length films. Fifteen first or second fiction feature films will compete for the three equal Hivos Tiger Awards in the Tiger Awards Competition. The full competition selection will be announced next week.

Rutger Wolfson, director of the International Film Festival Rotterdam: “The Tiger Awards Competition is the heart of the festival. This competition – like the festival itself – focuses on the filmmaker. Both the competition and the IFFR also have an extremely broad international orientation. It is therefore extremely important that, like us, the sponsor of the Tiger Awards looks beyond national boundaries. In Hivos, we have found a good, extremely committed partner for the next three years.”

Development organisation Hivos is proud of this new cooperation with the IFFR, which represents a logical extension of its existing activities. Hivos considers innovative cinema to be essential to free societies, and for this reason supports independent filmmakers around the world and platforms for voices that would otherwise go unheard, for example those assisted by IFFR’s Hivos-supported Hubert Bals Fund, which co-produces many films that screen at the IFFR. “The Tiger Awards Competition gives up-and-coming film talent a place in the international spotlight and a louder voice, even in countries where freedom cannot be taken for granted”, Manuela Monteiro, managing director of Hivos, says of the organisation’s new partnership with the IFFR.

Searching for new talent and innovative cinema has been in the IFFR’s blood since the very beginning. A search that is clearly illustrated by the Tiger Awards Competition, presenting promising new film talents at an early stage of their careers since 1995. The competition has now taken root at the heart of the festival and is a highly respected platform for starting filmmakers. Of the fifteen nominated directors, three will finally go home with a Hivos Tiger Award and a cash prize of €15,000.

The 41st International Film Festival Rotterdam will take place from 25 January to 5 February 2012. The festival programme is divided into the sections Bright Future (new work by new filmmakers, including the Tiger Awards Competition and the Tiger Awards Competition for short films), Spectrum (new films by well known and/or experienced directors, including the short film programme Spectrum: Shorts) and Signals (retrospectives and film programmes covering currently relevant or historical themes).

On Thursday, 19 January, the entire festival programme will appear as an insert in the Volkskrant newspaper, on www.filmfestivalrotterdam.com and as an app for i-phone and Android. Online ticket sales start on the evening of Friday, 20 January at 20:00 hours. For Tiger Friends and Unlimited Pass holders, online ticket sales start one day prior to the normal sales, therefore on Thursday, 19 January, at 20:00 hours.

Official festival website: www.filmfestivalrotterdam.com, you can also follow the festival on Facebook, YouTube and Twitter.

(End of press release)

Press information IFFR:
IFFR Press Office, Bert-Jan Zoet / Nancy van Oorschot, [email protected], +31 (0)10-8909090

Press information Hivos:
Hivos, Roman Baatenburg de Jong, [email protected], +31 (0)6-83798848