FACE|OFF

During which curators and filmmakers are invited to trace the face of their cities, latitudes, topographies or psychogeographies­of origin, exile, transit, or residence. As these faces stare at each other, or stare each other out, it's possible that features and expressions will be mirrored, distorted, swapped, coalesced, or repelled.

Despite the confrontational implication of the term, face|off is not meant to be a duel. Nor does it intend to survey the filmic scapes conjured by the guest programmers. Its concern as a yearly program is to assemble a set of sociopolitical and aesthetic interfaces, and to attempt a reconnaissance, from crevice to crack, from grimace to grimace.

This year, Iranian-American filmmaker Bani Khoshnoudi gently excavates the "hidden," non-traditionalist layers of contemporary Iranian short cinema; NY-based programmer and US Correspondent to International Film Festival Rotterdam, Ralph McKay navigates us across the worldly drifts of Holland's Filmbank, a brand new non-profit distribution initiative; while Dutch filmmaker and curator, Joost Rekveld, composes "music for the eye," in his extraordinary survey of abstract animation film, synthetic video and light performances throughout the 20th century.

-- Athina Rachel Tsangari

I TRY AGAIN

New works from the Netherlands, presented by Ralph McKay in cooperation with The Filmbank, Amsterdam.

• Hideout Up, Friday, 7:300PM
• Hideout, Sunday, 6:30PM

In response to an international appetite for Dutch experimental works and to place these works on more screens at home, a non-profit distribution initiative was born this year in Amsterdam -- The Filmbank. "I Try Again" is The Filmbank's first foray onto North American screens. Positioned in Cinematexas' "face|off" section, perhaps a few uplifting words about the challenger are in order. Holland's navigating tradition has evolved into a genuine worldliness that is both individualistic and socially engaged, as the affinity with Asian, Arab and African cultures that drifts between these works suggests. Never lacking vision over the centuries, in living memory Dutch artists have worked in an incredibly informed cultural climate -- enriched by festivals, publications, museums, galleries, stages, etc. -- known for defining the edges of contemporary thought and creativity. Or maybe it's just the money, the rain, the beer and the industries of vice.

-- Ralph McKay serves as US Correspondent to International Film Festival Rotterdam.

TEHRAN NOW

A program of Iranian shorts curated by Banafsheh Khoshnoudi

• Hideout, Saturday, 5:45PM
• Hideout Up, Sunday, 2:30PM

Iranian cinema is complicated, as its society is, and as its politics and religions are. I chose to curate this program of Iranian short films in order to show part of this complexity, to show that the stereotypes of a slow and poetic cinematic tradition are not valid visions of Iranian cinema. Through this selection of seven short films, I want to show a part of what is unknown to foreign audiences, as the films try to show us what is unknown of their country.

This idea of finding non-"traditionalist" filmmakers explains why my choices do not rely on any apparent similarities among the films, or on explicit or implicit thematic ties. The only common tie among the films, and what was part of my criteria of selection, is the fact that these films are made by talented filmmakers, not all of whom are young, and none of whom have had worldly success. I chose these films because they are pure products of Iranian society, that is, that either alone or together, they show the complexity of life and politics in Iran.

-- Banafsheh Khoshnoudi