The Amazonas Film Festival – Mundial de Filme de Aventura ("World Festival of Adventure Films") kicks off in the Brazilian city of Manaus, located in the heart of the Amazon jungle, on November 4 with a screening of Lasse Hallström's An Unfinished Life starring Robert Redford, Jennifer Lopez, and Morgan Freeman. Expected guests include Italian actress Claudia Cardinale, the female star of Werner Herzog's
1982 Amazon epic Fitzcarraldo; Polish-born director Roman Polanski, and Spanish actress Victoria Abril.
The festival will be held at the Amazonas Opera House, a renaissance-style theater built in 1896 during the boom years of the region's rubber plantations. Eight international adventure films will vie for the top award, and there will also be a competitive sidebar featuring 8 "ethnic and/or wildlife" documentaries, plus a competition of Brazilian short films. Canadian director Norman Jewison will head the feature-film jury.
The weeklong festival, whose chief objective is to "alert the public of the need to protect and defend" the Amazon ecosystem, ends on November 10.
Note: To date, the official Amazonas Film Festival website only has information pertaining to the 2004 event.
Is this festival located in the middle of the jungle? How do people get there? Is it safe?