SHORT TO THE POINT – MARCH 2017 AWARDS
BEST FILM
Black Ring
Director: Hasan Can Dagli
Country: Turkey
Duration: 14:58
Synopsis: A group of people organizes a special event in an abandoned mansion.
BEST DIRECTOR
THE PECULIAR ABILITIES OF MR MAHLER
Director: Paul Philipp
Country: Germany
Duration: 29:00
Synopsis: East Germany, 1987: The special investigator Mahler is said to have paranormal abilities. The police assigns him to solve the case of the 6-year-old Henry Kiefer, who is missing for weeks now, before this issue leads to political tensions with the West. But then he brings something to light that makes this family tragedy especially political…
BEST SCREENPLAY
STATE OF EMERGENCY MOTHERFUCKER!
Director: Sébastien Petretti
Country: Belgium
Duration: 05:34
Synopsis: This is the story of two young guys without any trouble who just want to « screw » without being disturbed.« State of Emergency motherfucker» is a surrealistic comedy
that depicts a society where police violence and invasion of privacy are daily routine, normal, tedious. The victims themselves are used to it. Even the police is used to it!
Every day, they get back at it. Samy and Mehdi aren’t even paying attention to it anymore… the viewer neither. The real question of the movie is to finally discover if
Samy did get some on the night of Valentine’s…
BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY
KING GRANDPA
Director: Martin Grau
Country: Germany
Duration: 13:00
Synopsis: Clemens lives and breathes his grandfather’s stories. When his grandfather passes away, it is difficult for him to understand that it is now his turn to continue telling his stories. Story-telling becomes a way for him to not only keep the stories but also the memory of his grandfather alive
BEST EDITING
BACKSTORY
Director: Joschka Laukeninks
Country: Germany
Duration: 08:00
Synopsis: As a young child our protagonist is left by his mother and has to live with his violent father. He fights his way through adolescence and falls in love with the woman of his dreams and just as everything seems to be finally working out for him, a sudden event changes the course of his life forever. A story about how everything we love, everything we learn, everything we build, everything we fear, will one day be gone.
BEST NARRATIVE SHORT FILM
NICOLE’S CAGE
Director: Josef Brandl
Country: Germany
Duration: 15:57
Synopsis: The big wheel in the most exciting area of the city is the perfect real estate for Jakob and Nicole, a young, ambitious and firmly in the event culture anchored couple. When one of the popular gondolas becomes free, they do not hesitate to move into their first common flat. Unfortunately none of them both has taken the time to get to know his partner before.
BEST STUDENT SHORT FILM
EVERYTHING WILL BE OKAY
Director: Patrick Vollrath
Country: Austria
Duration: 30:00
Synopsis: Michael stands in front of a house. He rings the bell. He waits. Nobody opens. He rings again. But nothing happens. Then suddenly Lea, a little eight-year-old girl, exits the house. She is followed by her mom. Lea jumps into Michael‘s arms happily: „Daddy!“ He hugs her. Then the two drive off. It pretty much seems like every second weekend. But after a while Lea can‘t help but feel that something is just not right.
BEST YOUNG DIRECTOR
WOLF’S SKIN
Director: Louise De Groef
Country: Belgium
Duration: 26:00
Synopsis: Soo Min, a young South Korean woman, is struggling to find a balance between her family and her career as a cellist. After a long absence, it is hard for her to resume her
place in the family and she feels she has to compete with her six-year-old daughter for her husband’s love.
BEST DOCUMENTARY SHORT FILM
I’m Still Here
Director: Stuart Edwards
Country: United Kingdom
Duration: 14:30
Synopsis: I’m Still here, tells the story of Callum, a 30-year-old sports reporter, who tackles his mental health conditions on a daily basis. Although the harrowing traumatic events of Callum’s past linger in his memory, his love of sport & his strength of character has enabled him to manage his anxiety and forge a successful career as a sports reporter.
BEST ANIMATION SHORT FILM
Tokri (The Basket)
Director: Suresh Eriyat
Country: India
Duration: 14:46
Synopsis: Two insignificant lives lost and found in time.
BEST EXPERIMENTAL SHORT FILM
RUAH
Director: Flurin Giger
Country: Switzerland
Duration: 18:00
Synopsis: Nine characters, four stories, one situation. How to act while knowing that something big, something irreversible, something that you can’t run away from or fight against, is going to happen. Something bigger than anything humans have ever experienced.
BEST AMATEUR SHORT FILM
On the Road Again
Director: Loghan Stong
Country: United States
Duration: 06:15
Synopsis: A man finds himself looping the same haunted road, and he’s not alone.
SPECIAL JURY AWARD
SILENCE
Director: Dejan Mrkic
Country: Australia
Duration: 14:39
Synopsis: A sensuous portrait of a young musician who begins to tackle the fragility of her own identity when her hearing starts to fade into a seemingly muted existence.
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HALIM
Director: Werner Fiedler
Country: Austria
Duration: 30:00
Synopsis: Elias is a shy boy who likes to talk to his bird rather than playing with other kids. When he meets the quirky artist Halim, a tender friendship develops between them but Elias’ mother does not approve. The unusual relationship comes to an abrupt end as Halim suddenly has to flee and it seems as though there is nothing Elias can do to help. But the refugee has left the boy a valuable gift… A film about friendship, escape and captivity in apparent freedom.
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GOLIATH
Director: LOÏC BARCHÉ
Country: France
Duration: 18:06
Synopsis: Nicolas is madly in love with Charlotte, a girl he barely knows yet fantasizes about through the pictures she posts on Facebook. With a friend, he decides to prove his love for her by accomplishing an exploit.
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SO BE IT
Director: Cristina Spina
Country: Italy
Duration: 19:00
Synopsis: In the Villa of a once noble Italian family, a nine years old girl hoping to make it to her first Holy Communion, is thrown by her parent’s separation and her mother’s departure. She goes looking for reconciliation, only to find a “communion” she never expected.
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SERVAL AND CHAUMIER: MASTERS OF SHADOWS
Director: Arthur Goisset , Bastien Daret
Country: France
Duration: 20:00
Synopsis: 1896. In a small French village, Jules Chaumier, professional magician, runs into Marcel Serval, his former disciple who left 10 years ago with his wife Jacqueline. They get into a fight, which should lead them to know who actually is the true “Master of Shadows”…
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Cain’s Shadow
Director: Antonio De Palo
Country: Italy
Duration: 29:20
Synopsis: November 5th, 2025. Western metropolis. Young inspector Abel is grappling with the umpteenth disappearance: Angela, a 9-year-old girl, of whom there has been no news for two days. For more than ten years there have been many disappearances of children . Numbers assume alarming proportions; the police are indicted. Ada is a young woman of thirty whose daughter was kidnapped some years before. From that day on she has led a personal investigation searching for the truth. Eddi, a transsexual in his sixties, is the host of a late night radio programme. Together with Agnes, he founded an association that through various propaganda activities, including the radio, struggles to find the truth. On the night of November 5th the stories of these characters will be inexorably intertwined, leading us to a bitter and shocking discovery.
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DIAZ
Director: Benoit Desjardins
Country: Canada
Duration: 26:58
Synopsis: Dr. Diaz was expelled from his country because of is involvment in the defense of human and environmental rights. He now lives in Canada and works at the General Hospital. In addition to the hours spent in the hospital, he practiced medicine at home helping illegal immigrants. Aware of the dangers that this entails, Dr. Diaz is, nevertheless, unable to remain idle. His life story push him to help the needy. In truth, they need as much of him that he needs them.
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WINTER’S JOURNEY
Director: Susanne Boeing
Country: Germany
Duration: 26:00
Synopsis: Walter is waiting at the last station of his journey through life. His family and friends all know what is best for him. But in the end they have to understand that his ending belongs only to him.
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Vindicte – RETALITATION
Director: Ange-Régis Hounkpatin
Country: Benin
Duration: 26:00
Synopsis: Awa, 18 years old, goes to class in the military high school of Natitingou. One day, she learns that her father has just been murdered. Has she just joined her family in Cotonou
than a popular prosecution is put together in order to avenge the memory of the deceased. Facing the helplessness of the police, Awa decides to take part in it.
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Crossing Fences
Director: Annika Pampel
Country: Germany
Duration: 13:40
Synopsis: 1974, a young East-German couple is desperate to leave their restricted, communist lives behind and attempts to escape into the West on a hand-made boat across the Baltic Sea.
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The Rifle, The Jackal, The Wolf And The Boy
Director: Oualid Mouaness
Country: Lebanon
Duration: 18:53
Synopsis: Two brothers cross the line when they use a household rifle without their father’s consent to unexpected consequences. Set in contemporary rural Lebanon, a country with a porous border threatened by hostile infiltration, this contemporary political parable tries fraternal trust and brings into focus the ethics of man’s relationship with himself, family, nature and violence.
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FOOD FIRST
Director: Pol Ponsarnau
Country: Germany
Duration: 10:52
Synopsis: Food first, then morals! A comedy about two couples in a stylish Berlin Tapas restaurant. Tension grows with each dish. All seems lost when the question “who waters your plants?” comes on the table.
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THE RETURN OF ERKIN
Director: Maria Guskova
Country: Russian Federation
Duration: 29:00
Synopsis: Erkin gets out of prison and wants to return to his former life. But everything has changed and he does not know if he can live as a free man.
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FOREST OF ECHOES
Director: LUZ OLIVARES CAPELLE
Country: Austria
Duration: 30:00
Synopsis: A teenager, Christina, loses her friends in the forest. Looking for them she finds the bodies of three drowned kids on the shore of a lagoon. On summer holiday, deep in the woods, three kids, cousins, are playing around a lake when they find a drowned young woman drifting in the water. Games, lies and rituals unfolding into a circular time in which death loses its ultimacy. What is real and what is a mirage? Who is dreaming and who is being dreamed?
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THE STATE IS A LADY
Director: Anna Gates
Country: Germany
Duration: 14:28
Synopsis: In this surreal political fable, the creature Security is back with the charms and claws to unsettle even the most jingoistic of Chair Leaders.
The them-and-us divisionism that saw “security” become a euphemism for a permanent state of war is turned on its makers. Sometimes, a lady is the worst thing you could wish for.
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GOLDFISH
Director: Facundo V. Scalerandi
Country: Germany
Duration: 29:59
Synopsis: When Gertrud, the beloved mother of twins Agnes and Otto suddenly dies, theier father August is unable to accept it and tells the kids she is actually on vacation. The
lies seems to work, bit soon as other members of the family die, he has to readjust it to protect the children from the cruel truth of death. The years pass and it will be too late
when August finally realizes the children had not just discover his lie but improved it.
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Time for Tea
Director: Bob Yang
Country: Brazil
Duration: 22:00
Synopsis: A retired Chinese general gets an unusual visit from his grandson.
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City of Walls
Director: Eneos Çarka
Country: Albania
Duration: 22:11
Synopsis: This documentary gives an insight on the street art & graffiti culture in Tirana, Albania. During the shooting process, City Hall interferes in the art scene with their own project and creates a conflict with a political street art collective.
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FLORIAN
Director: Dario Bukovski
Country: Croatia
Duration: 29:59
Synopsis: A musician, a clown and a performer share the same dream – to escape the comformistic lifestyle by following their vision of life. Their stories form a symbolic path of idealism, self doubt and struggle as they balance between dreams and reality in Croatia, a country plagued by existential angst.
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CHIKA THE DOG IN THE GHETTO
Director: Sandra Schießl
Country: Germany
Duration: 16:21
Synopsis: Chika the dog and the five-year old Mikasch are the heroes of this story which is set in a Jewish ghetto in an unnamed Polish city. The little dog helps Mikasch to develop as a child despite the persecution of the Jews and the threats of the 2nd World War. During World War II it was forbidden for Jews to keep their pets. One day the official orders decreed that Jews have to deliver all dogs. Mikasch refuses to obey this command. His parents help him to find a solution to save Chika. Mikasch’s father hides the dog outside the ghetto at a non-jewish friends house.
Then one day a soldier knocks on the door of the families apartment and delivers a command. The family has to gather with all other Jewish families to be deported. Father, mother and child do not obey, instead they hide in the cellar. Mikasch realizes how important it was to take Chika outside the ghetto. In the small hiding place Chika would have started to bark and that would have revealed the hideout of his family.
With the belief to see Chika again one day, Mikasch overcomes the difficult times in the hideout without serious damage. At the (happy)-end Mikasch and Chika actually find each other once again. There is peace.
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UNSATISFYING
Director: de Fournas Thibault, Lefaucheux Nicolas, Pineill Yann
Country: France
Duration: 01:17
Synopsis: During the summer of 2016, We created and directed a video about unsatisfying situations: the frustrating, annoying, disappointing little things of everyday life, that are so painful to live or even to watch. We quickly realized that there are a lot of other situations that would be fun to see animated, so we decided to run an animation challenge around this idea.
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Never Without My Denture
Director: Hugo Favre
Country: France
Duration: 05:12
Synopsis: Four pensioners in a nursing home were watching their favourite soap opera when the evil nurse confiscated them the TV remote.
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Noiré
Director: Robert Odegnal
Country: Hungary
Duration: 18:41
Synopsis: “Justice without force is powerless; force without justice is tyrannical.”At daytime Ervin works as a teacher in a suburban school where he tries to survive among the deviant students and apathetic teachers. At night he spends every minutes to finish his first comic book for a little publishing house. He tirelessly draws his noir world where gangsters and corrupt policemen fight the local man of justice, the private investigator. One day he finds one of his students with serious injuries in the school-yard and he suspects that’s not an accident. Ervin tries to investigate the case while the atmosphere around him begins to change, it seems the noir-world from his comics starts to appear beyond the school walls and his character slowly turns into his protagonist, the private investigator.
