Celebrated with an Awards Ceremony held at the National Palace of Culture, the 18th edition of
Sofia International Film Festival came to an end after presenting a total of 212 films from 54 countries all around the world. Over 300 international guests visited the Bulgarian capital, amongst them directors, producers, festival directors as well as media and film experts. The festival will now travel the country with additional events and screenings.
Focusing on the Balkan awarded films.
The president of the
Balkan Competition jury, Georgian director Kakha Kikabidze along with members Srinivasa Santhanam -festival director and programmer from India- and actor
Stephan A. Shterev, handed the
Domaine Boyar Award for Best Balkan Film to director
Mahmut Fazil Coskun and his
Yozgat Blues (Turkey – Germany, 2012).
Mahmut Fazil Coskun with Boyar Award for Best Balkan Film
Bulgarian Guild of Film Critics granted its award to the
Balkan Competition documentary
SaroyanLand (France-Turkey-Armenia, 2012) by
Lusin Dink.
We had also the
Sofia Award of the Sofia Municipality given to directors
Goran Paskaljevic,
Georgi Djulgerov and Slovakian Dusan Hanak for their contribution to world cinema.
Svetoslav Stoyanov receives the Audience Award for The Last Black Sea Pirates
The 11th edition of
Sofia Meetings co-production market, the annual parallel event of Sofia IFF, also closed its doors after three days of workshops, lectures and a programme presenting young and promising artists on their 1st, 2nd or 3rd project. Four of them were awarded this year. Two of them come from the Balkans:
The project
Never Let It Go (Romania) by
Paul Negoescu was given the
Hungarian Filmlab Award for best project in the ‘Second Film Projects’ Programme and 10,000 Euro in post- production services.
The Synchro Film, Video & Audio Award – Special Mention for project in the ‘Second Film Projects’ Programme granted 5,000 Euro in post-production services to the production of the project
Nanook by
Milko Lazarov, also given the
Mediterranean Film Institute Award scholarship to participate to
MFI Script 2 Film Workshops!