Argentina and Chile dominate the Toulouse Films In Progress titles

The Films In Progress event is run in Toulouse (March 24-25) and at the San Sebastian film festival in Spain and gives incomplete projects from the Latin American region the chance to obtain completion funding through awards and to attract the attention of potential buyers and producers. (The San Sebastian Films In Progress will be announced at a later date.)

This year’s line-up includes Cristian Jimenez’s [pictured] Chilean-French-Portuguese-Argentinian drama Bonsai about a young wannabe writer who misses out on the chance to work on transcribing someone else’s book and so instead copies a manuscript he saw in a job interview. The film stars Diego Noguera, Natalia Galgani and Trinidad González and is the follow up to Jimenez’ film IlusionesOpticas, which also featured at Toulouse in 2008.

There’s also Blas Eloy Martínez’s Argentinian film El Notificador, starring Ignacio Toselli, Guadalupe Docampo and Edda Díaz about a bored civil servant whose life is turned upside down one day; Julia Murat’s Brazilian-French-Argentinian drama Historias Que So Existem Quando Lembradas starring Sonia Guedes, Lisa Favero and Luis Serra about two people lives in a troubled 1930s Brazil; Mariano Luque’s Argentinian film Salsipuedes about a family’s problems brought to light in a remote campsite, starring Mara Santucho, Marcelo Arback and Mariana Briski; and Alejandro Fernández Almendras Chilean-German co-production Sentados Frente Al Fuego about a man who gives his dying wife symbolic gifts every season, starring Daniel Muñoz and Alejandra Yañez.

The final project is Rodrigo Marin’s Chile-Uruguay co-production Zoologico, following his Miami festival award winner Las Niñas. The new drama is about three adolescents living in a rich suburb of Chile who take very different paths in life, starring Alicia Luz Rodríguez, Santiago de Aguirre, Luis Balmaceda and Hector Morales.