GFDD Florida Will Host Dominican Film Festival in September

Florida, USA – The Florida office of the Global Foundation for Democracy and Development (GFDD), a sister institution of the Fundacion Global Democracia y Desarrollo (Funglode), will host during the month of September a Dominican film festival titled Dominican Film Showcase. The showcase will be featured in five Florida cities, announced Jose Zaiter, executive director of the GFDD/Funglode-Florida.

For the first time and after several years of the festival´s existence, the event will be held in five Florida cities. The schedule is the following: Friday, September 9, at the Miami Manuel Artime Theater, at 6:30 p.m.; Saturday, September 10, at Valencia College, in Orlando.

The showing in Miami will feature the film “Miss 500 Locos”, by Leticia Tonos. In Orlando, Tampa, Fort Myers and Paradiso, in Hollywood, the film shown will be “La Rasante”, produced by Hans García, a true story based on Garcia´s experiences.

Invitees to the upcoming showings include film director Hans García, Dominican actor Héctor Anibal and his wife, Ivette Marichal – former director of the country´s General Film Directorate (DGCINE) – and Omar de la Cruz, head of the Global Film Festival of Santo Domingo.

Zaiter expressed that “there is tremendous enthusiasm with the event, due to the quality of the films and because we had suspended the event for two consecutive years due to the pandemic.”

The festival coordinator also stated that Funglode president, Dr. Leonel Fernandez, has always been an enthusiastic supporter of the Dominican film industry. So much so, that during one of his Administrations was when the Film Incentive Law was passed in the Dominican Republic.

He further explained that one of the goals of the Law was to encourage the creation of a Global Film Festival in Santo Domingo where actors, actresses, producers and other industry members, many of international fame, would get together once a year in the Dominican Republic to support the event, considered to be one of the most important in the Caribbean.

In the past years, international actors, such as Andy García, Omar Sharif, Geraldine Chaplin, Liza Minnelli, Vin Diesel, Chris Rock, John Singleton and Danny Glover, among others, have participated in the Dominican film festival.

When the decision was made to establish a presence of the GFDD in Florida, former President Fernández instructed that within the office´s cultural agenda, be included the Dominican film industry.

Zaiter further explained that this was how the Dominican Film Showcase in Miami began in 2015, in collaboration with Latinos Unidos, a prestigious local not-for-profit organization, presided by Dominican Dr. Amada Vargasy and Mr. Bryan Peña, president of the well-known ad agency BP Media.

Approximately 100 guests attended the first showing, held at the time at the Koubek Theater. The second event took place at the Tower Theater, on the city´s iconic Eighth Street, and between 2018-2019, the event grew substantially and had to be transferred to the historic Manuel Artime Theater, where more than 900 hundred individuals attended the event.

President Fernández has also attended the film showings, as well as Dominican actors Danilo Reynoso, Pedro Urrutia, Archie Lopez and actress Dalisa Alegria.

For more information and tickets to the showings, please visit the following pages:

• September 9 (Miami) / https://dfsmiami.gfddfl.org/eventos
• September 10 (Orlando) / https://dfsorlando.gfddfl.org/events
• September 11 (Tampa) / https://dfstampa.gfddfl.org/events
• September 12 (Fort Myers) / https://dfsfortmyers.gfddfl.org/events
• September 13 (Hollywood) / https://dfshollywood.gfddfl.org/events