Cannes - Saatchi & Saatchi presents the best new directing talent from around the world at the 21st Saatchi & Saatchi New Directors' Showcase (NDS) at the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity.

The Saatchi & Saatchi New Directors' Showcase is one of the highlights of the Festival, and has become one of the most popular events during Cannes week. Again this year, it takes place in The Grand Auditorium, with overspill into the Debussy.

To find the featured directors, Saatchi & Saatchi invites submissions from directors across the globe and uses its Network of some 140 offices worldwide, as well as relationships with key on-line sources. From an initial line up of several hundred directors, The Saatchi & Saatchi Worldwide Creative Board chose the final selection, and only 17 directors made the cut.

Kate Stanners, Creative Director of Saatchi & Saatchi London, and worldwide spokesperson for the NDS, commented, "As the media landscape constantly evolves, the skills required of a great director are still based on an ability to tell a story, to engage their audience, be that through new techniques or skilled performance."

Directors selected for the New Directors' Showcase reel 2011 are listed below, with the title of the submitted work:

Andreas Roth - ‘Dirt Devil'
Andrew Ruhemann/Shaun Tan - ‘The Lost Thing'
Daniel Wolfe - ‘Prayin'
Gary Shore - ‘Cup of Tears'
Jonathan Higgs Everything Everything - ‘Photoshop Handsome'
Lernert & Sander - ‘Elektrotechnique'
Michal Socha - ‘Chick'
Mikey Please - ‘Eagleman Stag'
Neil Dowling and Nils Clauss - ‘Senior Living'
Polynoid - ‘Loom'
Robin Goode - ‘Let's Date'
Sandro Miller - ‘Butterflies Feat'
Tell No One - ‘Seaweed'
thirtytwo - Chase and Status ‘Let You Go'
The Daniels - ‘Dogboarding'
The General Assembly - Grum- ‘Through the Night'
Tomi D @ Punga- ‘Assland'

Tom Eslinger, Creative Director - Digital, Saatchi & Saatchi Worldwide said:  "Social media and online video channels have sliced the time that it takes for new directors to be noticed. Instead of just consuming reels, we throw more and more nets out, but smaller, narrower and more finely woven ones. Several of the directors were spotted through social chatter, discussions on video and film blogs and the humble 'old' viral."

Past Showcases have featured internationally acclaimed directors including Tarsem, Michel Gondry, Mark Romanek, Spike Jonze, Ivan Zacharias, Kinka Usher, Danny Kleinman and Jonathan Glazer.

The Showcase continues its rich heritage of drama and surprises. The concept of this year's theme, ‘Hello, Future', was dreamt up by Saatchi & Saatchi senior creative team Jonathan Santana & Xander Smith. Santana and Smith have taken the baton from Bob Isherwood, former Worldwide Creative Director of Saatchi & Saatchi, and Richard Myers, former Creative Director, Global Culture and bring the concept of the Showcase to the next generation of creatives.

"We wanted to create an idea ambiguous enough to incorporate lots of different themes and talents. Essentially we're commenting on the directorial talent of tomorrow, but also the future reality of the communications field," commented Jonathan Santana & Xander Smith.

'Hello, Future' metamorphosises into a technically innovative, retro-futuristic theatrical spectacle. It is a collaborative effort combining the talents of a stellar group of people. These include; leading independent Producer Juliette Larthe; Warp Records musicians Jamie Lidell and Clark; Aaron Meyers, who developed innovative performance software creation; Turner Prize nominated artist Mark Titchner; and visual FX and video designers Marshmallow Laser Feast. It is the first collaboration for this eclectic group, and the result is a multi-disciplinary, sensory spectacular.

The theatrical introduction to the New Directors' Showcase reel takes kinect camera technology one step further. Marshmallow Laser Feast's projected visuals respond to the movement of performer Jamie Lidell; Juliette Larthe is the Producer of the theatrical piece, whilst Aaron Meyers has created interactive performance software for the show. Clark was instrumental in bringing to life the digital host/ voice from the future; Gary Card is the Set Designer, and the Animators are Andrew Osborne and Raffael Ziegler. Mark Titchner is the art director, and created unique typography for ‘Hello, Future' using his signature style and palette, as well as animations that were worked on by Milkshake Laser Feast.

As part of the 21st NDS, Saatchi & Saatchi partners with Vimeo and Moby, to discover fresh filmmaking talent with the ‘Hello, Future' Music Video Challenge.

Along with acclaimed musician, composer and photographer Moby, and international video sharing community Vimeo, Saatchi & Saatchi invited the next generation of young filmmakers with a unique Music Video Challenge based on the theme of this year's New Directors‟ Showcase - ‘Hello, Future'.

The brief was to visualise the concept of ‘Hello, Future' in the form of a standout music video inspired by one of three tracks selected from Moby's new album, 'Destroyed'. The winner of the competition, Alberto Gomez, will be offered the chance to work on a project in a key office in the Saatchi & Saatchi Global Network.

At the Showcase, an edit of the 10 finalists is screened: Frank Beltrán, David Evan Bowers, Alberto Gomez, Brian McCann, Lindsay MacKay, Antonin Pevny, Oden, Martin Rodahl, Alexey Terehoff, and Roland Wittl. Followed by the winning promo by Mexican director Alberto Gomez.

In 2010, Saatchi & Saatchi partnered with aniboom.com and created a competition to find a new director of animation. Yannick Puig won the competition through a combination of audience votes and voting by the Saatchi & Saatchi Worldwide Creative Board, and went on to direct a film for Saatchi & Saatchi Los Angeles for Toyota.

The Showcase will once again be webcast on the Cannes Lions website and on the NDS Channel on YouTube.

www.canneslions.com
www.youtube.com/nds
http://destroyed.moby.com
http://mobygratis.com/film-music.html
http://www.youtube.com/user/MobyStuff