NEWS

The Awards of 7th International Short Film Festival ‘In the Palace’, Balchik

Three juries of film professionals and the audience of 7th International Short Film Festival ‘In the Palace’ that took place in Balchik 20-27 June 2009, announced the award winning films of the six festival competitive programmes – main competition with categories for fiction, documentary and animation films; TV programme; commercial video and film; music video; students’ film with categories for fiction, documentary and animation films; and In Between competition for hybrid film forms and formats.

Balchik, 27 June 2009 – The 7th edition of the International Short Film Festival ‘In the Palace’ in Balchik was closed on 27th of June. The three film juries, in which took part internationally acclaimed Bulgarian and foreign filmmakers and artists, and the festival audience choose the award winners of this years film festival.

The International Jury, with president the USA/UK producer Sandy (Sandford) Lieberson and members the Russian DoP Sergey Astakhov and Bulgarian writer Nevelina Popova, pointed the winners of the Best Fiction, Best Documentary and Best Animation Film Awards in the Main Competitive Programme.

The Award for Best Fiction was given to HAMMERHEAD (UK) by Sam Donovan.

The Best Animation Film Award won MRS. G. (Czech Republik), directed by Michal Zabka.

In the documentary category of the Main Competition two films shared the Best Documentary Film Award: ROUGH CUT (Iran) by Firouzeh Khosrovani and THREE OF US (India) by Umesh Vinayak Kulkarni.

A Special Jury Award for a film in the Main Competition was given to Eric Magnusson for his film DAYS OF LOVE.

The jury has decided also to give a Special Mention to the fictions:
LOVE CHILD by Daniel Wirtberg
THE YELLOW SMILEY FACE by Constantin Popescu
THE TOES by Laurent Denis
TRUE BEAUTY THIS NIGHT by Peter Besson
FANATIC by Paul Robinson
CLAXON by Tak Kuroha
GOOD ADVICE by Andreas Tibblin
POP SWITCH by Jason Goode
DARIA by Aleksandra Urosevic
THE ONE IN CHARGE by Sergio Barrejon
THE TOURNAMENT by Michele Alhaique
JADE by Daniel Elliott


In the documentary category of the Main Competition Special Jury Mention received:
THREE FOOT CHARLIE by Marten Persiel
NYHARMA by Edgar Bartenev
MESSENGER FROM THE SOUTH by Roberto Lozano
THE TREASURED WATERS by Ilkka Rautio
VULTURES HAVE WINGS by Marcos Negrao and Andre Rangel
LESSONS FROM THE NIGHT by Adrian Francis

Special Jury Mention have also received the animations:
TOLERANCE by Ivan Ramadan
THE RE BORDOSA DOSSIER by Cesar Cabral
5 TIMES by Simeon Sokerov
RESURGENCE by Eric Belliardo
SEED by Asparuh Petrov
POST! By Christian Asmussen and Matthias Bruhn
CHICORY ‘N’ COFFEE by Dusan Kastelic
THE CABLE CAR by Claudius Gentinetta
HOT DOG by Bill Plympton

In the competition for TV Film the jury members Ivan Tokadjiuev, Antoni Tsonev and Plamen Maslarov gave the Best TV Film Award to Kanna Racheva for the second part of her TV series BULGARIA: THE TRACES OF TERRORISM (BTV).

Several films received award in the Student Film Competition:
1:0 by Johnatan Geva
A GREAT ABSURDITY OF A SMALL PRODUCER by Damyan Nikolov
BEHIND THE DUNES by Christian Bach
STRAHIL by Stoyan Tenev
BABY BLUES by Tami Ravid
BIRD SPOTTING by Zhivko Arsenov
CHUMP AND CLUMP by Michael Herm and Stephan Sacher
OUR WONDERFUL NATURE by Tomer Eshed
SHADOWS by Hanna Bergholm
SNEAKERS by Heikki Slaen

A Special Prize for Best Bulgarian Student Film given by Prof. Stefan Danailov was awarded to Milena Gramova for her film THE ROAD BACK.

The Best Commercial Video & Film Award was given to JAPAN CUTS by Motomichi Nakamura.

THREE ANGELS by Yulia Ruditskaya won the Best Music Video Award.

The Jury of the newly presented festival competitive programme ‘In Between’ for hybrid film forms and formats, presided by the French artist and ‘Oscar’ winner Pierre Bismuth, announced two Special Mentions for films presented in this programme:
RECORD OF LABOR by Mika J. Ripatti
HOW TO MAKE A TABLE by Lemeh42

The KODAK Award for best Bulgarian film was given to the young director Boris Nikolov and to the cinematographer Dimitar Skobelev for their film GROUND-SEA-SWELL.