On 26 and 27 of March of 2009, the famous Latin American Film Festival in Toulouse, France (Rencontres Cinémas d'Amérique Latine de Toulouse (ARCALT)) celebrated its yearly edition. Within it, a series of independent Latin American film industry professionals presented their films-in-progress to a very special and influential audience. This audience was made up of a group of industry professionals, festival programmers, distributors and members of cultural institutions in France who had the power to award enough funds to bring these film projects to a post-production stage or ensure that films would be seen widely in France and, therefore, by a much larger audience than most filmmakers outside the main Hollywood-dominated distribution channels might realistically expect.

Meanwhile, between 22 and 23 September, in the Basque city of Donostia/San Sebastián (Spain), as part of the 57th ‘Festival International de Cine de Donostia-San Sebastián/Donostiako Nazioarteo Zinemaldia' (18–26 September 2009; hereafter, Zinemaldia), different independent filmmakers had the opportunity to undergo the same process of being selected by a jury of film professionals and representatives of Spanish cultural institutions, including in this case, the Instituto Cervantes and Casa de América. There were also scouts for films from major festivals such as the Cannes International Film Festival.