NYICFF Plays MIA & THE MIGOO and NY Premiere of CRIMSON WING at IFC

New York International Children's Film Festival presents Weekend at IFC (323 Avenue of the Americas) with MIA & THE MIGOO and the NY Premiere of THE CRIMSON WING: MYSTERY OF THE FLAMINGO. MIA & THE MIGOO plays Saturday, May 22 and Sunday, May 23 at 11am. THE CRIMSON WING runs Saturday, May 28 and Sunday, May 29 and Saturday, June 5 & Sunday, June 6 at 11am. Tickets are $8.50 for kids and $12.50 for adults. For more information and to purchase tickets visit http://gkids.tv/intheaters.cfm.

Last weekend for MIA & THE MIGOO(France, Jacques-Rémy Girerd, 2008, 92 min. In French with English subtitles - Recommended Ages 7 to adult) Winner of Best Animated Feature at this year's European Film Awards, MIA is both a thrilling eco-adventure and a work of art, like a Miyazaki film painted by Van Gogh. A brave, wild-haired young girl goes on a quest to find her missing father - and ends up befriending a family of gigantic forest spirits whose job is to protect the Tree of Life.

Winner "Best Animated feature" at this year's European Film Awards. Created from an astounding 500,000 hand-painted frames of animation, the gorgeous second feature from French animator Jacques-Remy Girerd is a work of art, breathtaking to behold. Figures are outlined in pencil and then bathed in rustic watercolors, for a stunning, handcrafted look with backgrounds that burst at the seams with painterly detail, like a Miyazaki film painted by Van Gogh.

One night Mia has a premonition. So she bids goodbye to her elderly aunt caretakers and sets out on a cross-continent journey to find her father, who has been trapped in a landslide at a disaster-plagued construction site on a remote tropical lake. In the middle of the lake stands the ancient, gnarled Tree of Life, watched over by stone-like forest spirits, called Migoo - innocent, almost bumbling creatures who can grow and change shape as they please, morphing from small childlike beings to petulant giants. It is the Migoo who have been sabotaging the construction to protect this sacred site - and now together with Mia, they join in a fight to find Mia's father and save the Tree from destruction.THE CRIMSON WING: MYSTERY OF THE FLAMINGOS - NY PREMIERE - Dinseynature, creators of the groundbreaking nature films Earth and Oceans, take us to the never-before-filmed landscapes of northern Tanzania's Lake Natron, where 130 degree temperatures, high salinity, and volcanic activity make it one of the most unique and inhospitable terrains on the planet. This remote wilderness serves as breeding ground for the flamingo, and the grace and beauty of these crimson-winged creatures are captured in an epic and exquisitely filmed adventure story unlike anything you have ever seen.

THE CRIMSON WING: MYSTERY OF THE FLAMINGO, NY PREMIERE
France, Matthew Aeberhard and Leander Ward, 2008, 78 min
In English - Recommended Ages 7 to adult

Dinseynature, creators of Earth and Oceans, take us on an awe inspiring trip to the never-before-filmed landscapes of northern Tanzania's Lake Natron, where 130 degree temperatures, high salinity, and volcanic activity make it one of the most unique and inhospitable terrains on the planet. This remote and forgotten wilderness serves as breeding ground for the flamingo, and the exquisite grace and beauty of these crimson-winged creatures are captured in an epic and stunningly filmed adventure story.

The film opens at the kick-off of a kind of spring break for flamingos, with literally millions of the beautiful birds flocking to the salt islands of Lake Natron to take part in exotic dance rituals, form pink conga-lines, and engage in other highly stylized romantic frolicking (it turns out ALL of Africa's lesser flamingos begin life in this two week annual get-together.) Nature takes its course and it is not long before the lake is hopping with fuzzy baby flamingos, whose clumsy movements and juvenile antics are simply too cute for words. But soon the million-strong flock of parents and babes must begin a treacherous migration on foot to seek out more hospitable environs and escape encroaching dangers. Like March of the Penguins and others of the genre, the film features a small cast of predator villains. Of these, the marabou stork comes across as particularly sinister - a dinosaur Darth Vader whose inexorable slow-motion attack and massive pointed head make it seem like evil incarnate. This remarkable film, set in an extraordinary and alien "other world", shows us that here on Earth there still remain secrets and mysteries waiting to be discovered.