Dear Friends: 

I hope this finds all of you well. On this occasion I shall (at least attempt to) be brief. 

Since 2011, I have been inviting film critics, festival programmers and directors and also filmmakers to choose the films of the year. From the very first list, I have sought to distance this undertaking from the quasi-sporting lists and also to avoid the inevitable homogenization that comes with consensus. In this truly international poll, people from many countries vote – people who make films, write about films and select films, people who are well known or unknown -, but all who are committed to what they do and whom I know personally.

The International Cinéfila has always tried to conjure up the idea of triumph. The idea that we make it known which film is the most named is different from believing that this is a contest with a winner. The insistence on a film offers multiple readings and is still a sign to decipher. That is why we add the mentions, but the significance of the numerical also has another meaning: gathering preferences in order to leave a map that can be read to conjecture the state of cinematographic taste, and thus be able to have more information in order to understand a little better the configuration of the cinematographic canon and, eventually, for those who want, to question it. 

Due to the request of some participants in recent years, the delivery date for selections will be December 23 up until 11:59 p.m. Argentina time (GMT-3). The results will be published on Monday, December 27 at 6 p.m. Argentina / 10 p.m. in Germany (where I shall be in those days).

A Lusitanian filmmaker told me a few days ago in Vienna that The Cinéfila International will serve in the future to study cinephilia in this century. I think he is exaggerating a bit, but I can feel with some modesty that there is some truth in his words. What I do not doubt is that in the last decade it has been a source of reference for discovering unknown films and counteracting the invisibility suffered by much of contemporary cinema. Readers from many countries have confirmed to me that this function is undeniable.

As always, thankful and (to translate literally from the Spanish) “entirely at your disposition”,

Roger Koza

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CATEGORIES AND RULES OF THE GAME

CATEGORY 1

The five films

Choose in alphabetical order or order of preference five titles released in 2021 in festivals, platforms or commercial cinemas. If necessary, films can be included even if they were released after September 1, 2020. In this selection it does not matter if it is a short, medium-length or feature length film. That is the duration of a movie does not matter.

Before or after completing the list, I suggest that you write some words that give an idea of the preferences or ideas that led to the selection.

Example (using an outdated title) 

Blind kind / Blind Child (Johan van der Keuken) 

It is not necessary to put the date or the country. If you want to write something below the title, it is very welcome. Ideally, you should not exceed 70 words per movie. (Remember that you can say something at the beginning that covers the entirety of the elections).

Then the other titles would follow (in order of priority, in alphabetical order or in random order).

CATEGORY 2

National film and first film

On top of the five films in the Category 1 list, the INTERNATIONAL CINÉFILA requests that you always add two more films and SEPARATELY (although a title from the list of five may be repeated here). These should be feature length films: fiction, documentary, hybrid all acceptable.

One film should be selected from the country where you live or were born, or both. And, separately, a first film by a director from any country.

Example (using an outdated title) 

Argentine film: El dependiente / The Dependent (Leonardo Favio)

First film: Les anges du péché / Angels of Sin (Robert Bresson)

CATEGORY 3 (exclusive for this year)

Emerging filmmaker

Select an emerging filmmaker, someone who does not have more than 3 or 4 completed films and that you consider to be a filmmaker whose career should be followed or to whom attention should be given.

Example (using an outdated title) 

Let us imagine that we are in 1992. 

Terence Davies

Roger Koza / Copyleft 2021