INTERFILM 37 International Short Film Festival Berlin
16 - 21 November 2021

interfilm Awards & Winners 2021

International Competition

Maalbeek Ismaël Joffroy Chandoutis // France // 2020 // 16:00 min - International Competition 7

Berlin-Brandenburg Short Award - Best Film
6000,- €
Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg

Jury Statement
This film impressively joins animation and documentary to represent the ‘unrepresentable.’ Introducing the audience to Sabine, a survivor of the 2016 terrorist attack in Brussels, it relates her struggle with traumatic memory loss, but it also commemorates the tragic event for us the audience. Like Sabine’s attempts to recall, the film’s inspired visual techniques move from abstraction toward depiction while its soundtrack guides viewers in this search to make sense out of the senseless.
Al-Sit Suzannah Mirghani // Qatar, Sudan // 2020 // 20:00 min - International Competition 7

Best Live Action
3.000,- € (associated use of the non-commercial educational rights for the German-speaking region (Germany, Austria, Switzerland) for the film by KFW)
Katholisches Filmwerk
The prize-winning film will qualify for consideration in the
Short Film Category of the Annual Academy Awards® without
the standard theatrical run, provided that the film otherwise
complies with the Academy rules.

Jury Statement
Introducing us to the matriarchal structure of a small village, the film we have chosen for best live action, challenges not only our western concepts of modernity vs tradition but also gives us space to be empathic with both ideas. And it conveys all of that while being entertaining, smart and beautifully shot.
Beste Animation
Bestia Hugo Covarrubias // Chile // 2021 // 15:54 min - International Competition 4

Best Animation
3.000,- €
SAE Institute
The prize-winning film will qualify for consideration in the
Short Film Category of the Annual Academy Awards® without
the standard theatrical run, provided that the film otherwise
complies with the Academy rules.

Jury Statement
A film that keeps you holding your breath while it asks you to dive into the darkness; its main character profoundly represents the evil face of the dictatorship.
History of Civilization Zhannat Alshanova // Kazakhstan // 2020 // 15:00 min - International Competition 3

Best Cinematography
Postproduction worth 5.000,- €
D-Facto Motion

Jury Statement
This film offers stunning camerawork to convey the difficult decision to stay or go. Elliptical storytelling supported by strong cinematography helps us build sympathy for the main character, Indira. The film wonderfully frames her final decision to stay.
Pračka / Washing Machine Alexandra Májová // Czech Republic // 2020 // 05:02 min - International Competition 8

Best Sound Design
Ableton Live 11 Suite worth 600,- € and 500,- € in cash

Jury Statement
A film based on rhythm, tempo, and visual minimalism, the audience can join this graphic choreography to clean all their dirty thoughts, in the most romantic of all washing machines.

Special Mentions

Have a Nice Dog!
Jalal Maghout // Germany, Syria // 2020 // 13:14 min - International Competition 6

Jury Statement
This film shows a man falling into depression in a country at war. The only way to escape this violence is to obtain a visa which he resists, but his mental state gets worse and worse. It is only when he sees his dog destroy his favorite toy that he decides to flee, to save himself. This story comes to life with an impressive blend of media and especially with 2D sketch drawings overlaid on exaggerated CGI models. The technique defamiliarizes the sense of movement and the editing of the film is also brilliant: The Special Mention goes to Have a Nice Dog! by Jalal Maghout from Germany, Syria.

Tilapia
Jing An Hung // Taiwan // 2019 // 19:00 min - International Competition 8

Jury Statement
A tender portrayal of a man and his daughter facing the reality of climate change, living in a dying city. Addressing an urgent societal problem all over the world through the lens of a family conflict and thus making it relatable to us as an audience the Special Mention goes to Tilapia by Jing An Hung from Taiwan.

Confrontations Competition

Branka Ákos K. Kovács // Hungary // 2021 // 20:00 min - International Competition 2

1st Prize 2.000,- €
Bundeszentrale für politische Bildung

Jury Statement
A strong demonstration of the power of individual acts. Deciding to do what one knows is right when an entire system is wrong.
Outstanding directing combined with great casting and camera work brings us a clear and intense expression of a nation’s little spoken of trauma.
Bestia Hugo Covarrubias // Chile // 2021 // 15:54 min - International Competition 4

2nd Prize 1.000,- €
Bundeszentrale für politische Bildung

Jury Statement
Where could loneliness and isolation take us? The director offers us a scary and beautiful experience simultaneously. There is no safety in isolation. In fact it opens us up to normalising evil. We could all be Ingrid.

Special Mention

The Train Station
Lyana Patrick // Canada // 2020 // 02:08 min - International Competition 1

Jury Statement
The importance of small acts of resistance against continuous oppression and erasing of culture. It all started with our mother tongue.

Documentary Competition

Son of Sodom Theo Montoya // Argentina, Colombia // 2020 // 15:00 min - Documentary Competition 1

Best documentary film
1.000,- €
fritz-kola

Jury Statement
Starting with the early death of his close friend Camilo, who died 2017 from a heroin overdose, the director defoliates a filmic investigation with Camilo’s friends and lovers. In the tension between the static self-disclosures of the deceased and the dynamic visualizations of those who commemorate him, the film creates a magnificent imagery of a subversive anti-culture in poetic punk aesthetics. The still lingering violence of Medellins past and the resurrection of a ghost through archive material haunts survivors and viewers alike. The award for the best documentary short worth € 1000.- by Fritz-Kola goes to Theo Montoya for the film „Son of Sodom”.

Special Mention

Oro Rojo /Red Gold
Carme Gomila // Spain // 2021 // 12:00 min - Documentary Competition 2

Jury Statement
Based on the accusations of Moroccan women who pick strawberries as seasonal workers in dire conditions in the Spanish province of Huelva, a multi-voiced intersectional story is developed in a reductive papercut animation that sharpens the focus on the story. We as viewers are thus implicated as consumers, placed at the center of the field of tension and forced to think about its contexts and modes of action: Migration politics, sexism, struggles against the extractivism of the global North in the global South, racialized capitalism, and the need for situated alliances.

German Competition

Schichteln Verena Wagner // Germany // 2020 // 21:28 min - German Competition 2

1st prize
Postproduction worth 5.000,- €
D-Facto Motion

Jury Statement
It is a symphony of labour. Loaded with a languorous, sensual, almost erotic energy. One night, one shift, men of diverse nations, tattooed, muscular, almost bear-like, in fact. Their appearance and manners stand in stark contrast to that which their hands and mouths create. A graceful, delicate product. Very gradually, the viewer deduces the true nature of the world in which the director has immersed herself. The artistic craft of glassblowing. Without dialogue, observing calmly, the film takes us along on a night of hard physical work performed by seasoned veterans. The rhythmic editing, the trust the men have in one another and in their work, the sound of the breaking glass, the glow of the ovens heating up – all of these practically add up to to a glassblower's opera.
Der übers Meer kam Jonas Riemer // Austria, Germany // 2020 // 09:31 min - German Competition 3

2nd prize
Equipment rental worth 2.500,- €
25p cine support

Jury Statement
The red recording light morphs into the taillight of the car of a man who we look down on from above, as we accompany him and let his voice sink into our consciousness. This film manages to snuggle up against our hearts in such a subtle and clever way – until the part with the blue poster, that is, where it goes in for the kill and leaves us viewers shuddering, asking questions and itching for a discussion.
This film unmasks an AFD supporter instead of pasting a label on him, forcing us to look closely and listen, which is way more painful when it comes down to it. In the end, we viewers – like the filmmaker himself – drift away slowly from the protagonist on our chairs in this sludge of fear.
Bambirak Zamarin Wahdat // Germany, United States // 2020 // 13:29 min - German Competition 3

Audience Award
1000,- €
& Nomination to the touring program from the
European Short Film Audience Award
Doom Cruise Simon Steinhorst / Hannah Stragholz // Germany // 2020 // 16:00 min - German Competiton 3

FBW-Sonderpreis zur Förderung des besonderen Kurzfilms / Kinderkurzfilms
FBW Special Award for the Promotion of Special Short Film / Children's Short Film
FBW - Deutsche Film- und Medienbewertung

Jury Statement
We are invited on a journey to the end of society as we know it. The children try to make sense of the end, while the adults, including the ship’s captain, are none the wiser. As the inevitable approaches, the passengers enjoy themselves and wait. Infused with the spirit of our times, this apocalyptic but colourful film opens up an abstract space to reflect on our delicate existence.

Special Mention

Hurenkind & Schusterjunge / Widow & Orphan
Niklas Pollmann // Austria, Germany, England // 2021 // 14:30 min - German Competition 1

Jury Statement
With trembling images and quivering voices, the two interwoven and yet so distant biographies of "Hurenkind & Schusterjunge" slowly unfold. In the typography, it is punctuation errors that disturb the reader's rhythm. Each imperfect on its own page. Waiting for the next to find its counterpart. Poetically and at the same time naturalistically, Niklas Pollmann tells of two rejected people who speak into the resonanceless space of their telephones. Longing for connection, acceptance and understanding for their own so contradictory selves. And at the end there is this note. A small sign that maybe we are not so alone as we sometimes seem? The Special Mention in the German Competition goes to "Hurenkind & Schusterjunge" by Niklas Pollmann, Austria, Germany, England, 2021.

Green Film Competition

Migrants Hugo Caby / Zoé Devise / Antoine Dupriez / Lucas Lermytte // France // 2020 // 08:17 min

Best environmental film
2.000,- €
Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung e.V.

Eject_XXIV - The Long Night Of Weird Shorts

Boulettes Patrick Gauthier // Canada // 2019 // 06:00 min

Audience award for the weirdest & most wonderful film
1000,- €
Frey Steuerberatung

Online Award

Proteste! Sophie Le Hire // France, Senegal // 2019 // 06:40 min

Eyes Wide Open Online Award
2.000,- €
Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung e.V.