With the spirit of the independent filmmaker and the financial backing of Samsung, this year's Indiekino is sure to break barriers in the festival world. Although the fest is organized in Seoul, Korea, its films are screened all over the world -- thanks, of course, to the world wide web. All films are being screened uniquely at the Indiekino site and the fest even features a special prize to be awarded by web surfers.

From the 28 August to 27 September, Indiekino will screen 96 films from 22 countries. The festival is the brainchild of IndieKino President Jung-Ho Jang, who wanted to use the Internet to make it possible for net users around the world to attend a film festival together.

The result is this year's Indiekino, which will open with a screening of Valley of the Robots in the first section of films. After each screening, festival-goers will rate films on a score of 1 to 10, and the festival will follow an elimination system (based on the "Survivor" fury sweeping US television audiences) to determine which films advance to which sections.

The pics will be shown in four separate categories: Indie Wing, On the Bubble, Heaven, and Black Sun, in an elimination style format. In other words, all official films enter the preliminary "Indie Wing" section, which runs 31 August to 8 September. From here, the 20 movies that make the cut go on to screen for 12 days in the "Heaven" Section, while the best of the rest will proceed to the "On the Bubble" category. The top 10 movies to make the final cut will screen in the Black Sun section from 25 through 27 September. Schedule titles on the Indie Wing include: Last Chance, The Wedding Cow, Starving Artists, Kalin's Prayer, The Cold Sun, Daddy's Little Girl, and Eat Like a Winner.

Although Indiekino represents the cutting-edge of filmmaking, it looks to ancient history for the awards section and organizers have created honors inspired by Greek Mythology. Some of the awards are: the Daedalos Prize for Best Picture, given to the movie that is superior in all facets; the Athena Award for Best Director; the Eos award for Best Photography; the Argos Award for the film that is most creative and shows signs of ingenuity that surpasses all others; the Netizen Award for the film which is best loved by netizens; and the Filmfestival.com Award to be presented to the best feature among the selections.

Get your mousepad and modem (if you still use one) ready -- there's no excuse to miss this festival!