Advertisement

Bogota’s IndieBo Film Fest Embraces Technology

Technology has taken root in Bogota’s fledgling indie film fest IndieBo, which wrapped its second edition Sunday. Its free virtual reality showcase IndieBoX touted a record attendance on its second iteration, expanded to run the entire 10 days of the fest, in contrast to the three days of last year. Installed in the capital’s monolithic national Heroes Monument, IndieBoX lured 10,000 visitors compared to some 3,000 in 2015.

The enthusiastic reception of technology and film in Colombia’s capital is no surprise given the upsurge in national filmmaking and Colombians’ propensity to adopt the latest advances in technology. Some tech-savvy locals have already been playing Pokemon Go, the augmented reality smartphone app reportedly downloaded by more than 40 million people worldwide, even though it has yet to be launched in Latin America.

Sponsored by the Ministry of Information Technology and Communications (MINTIC), Telco ETB and the mayor’s office among others, IndieBoX underscores the government’s commitment to boost the economy through the arts and technology.

“It’s what we allude to as the orange economy,” said IndieBo co-founder Paola Turbay in reference to the common perception that the color orange is often associated with culture, identity and creativity.

“We have received a lot more support from the government on federal, state and local levels,” said Turbay, who co-founded the festival with her husband Alejandro Estrada, a marketing and advertising maven, and programmer Juan Carvajal who returns to New York to found a new Latin American Film Festival in November next year.

“It also helps to have a celebrity like Paola heading the festival just as Robert de Niro is at Tribeca and Robert Redford at Sundance,” said Estrada. Turbay is a model, actress, TV presenter and a former Miss Colombia. Running it close to BAM (the Bogota Audiovisual Market) has also been a strategic decision. “We hope to further strengthen our collaboration with the market,” said Estrada. Attendance is projected to spike from the 37,000 admissions reported last year.

IndieBo also embraced “WhatCine” an app developed by MINTIC for visually and aurally impaired moviegoers, for an international selection of films which included Iciar Bollain’s “El Olivo,” “ Ira Sach’s ”Little Men” Harold Trompetero’s “Perros,” Garrett Zevgetis’ “Best and most Beautiful Things,” and Mohamed Hamidi’s “La Vache.”

A series of talks included a master class by “Irrational Exuberance” VR creator Ben Vance who discussed the evolution of virtual reality, and workshops by three-time Oscar winning sound engineer Chris Newman whose credits include “The Exorcist,” “The Silence of the Lambs” and “The Godfather.”

“Out of the 100+ international films in the festival, all are Colombian premieres while 80 are Latin American debuts,” said Carvajal, who cherry-picked the choicest films from festivals worldwide.

As part of the festival’s bid to “democratize” culture, it sent out its roving cinema, the IndieBo CineBus, to around 15 districts in Bogota, including schools, plazas and even a prison. The retrofitted bus holds 30 people at a time but in some places, it set up a projector in plazas and parks for bigger auds.

Plans for the next year will hopefully include a cable TV network dedicated to the festival in the run-up to its inauguration and during the festival.

“We also hope to introduce juried awards, and become a showcase for indigenous films, in whatever format: documentaries, shorts, features, etc.” said Estrada. Short “El Canamo” by Rafael Loayza Sanchez won the only juried award this year. IndieBo ran from July 14 – 24.

Related stories

Colombia's Capital Hosts Two New Film Festivals

Get more from Variety and Variety411: Follow us on Twitter, Facebook, Newsletter