Karlovac, September 10th – This year’s editions of the Youth Film Festival and the Four River Film Festival, organized by the Croatian Film Association and Cinema Club Karlovac, were closed with the screening of the award-winning film The Staffroom by Sonja Tarokić last night and today’s awards ceremony.
The Grand Prix of the festival was awarded to the film Ficciones by InOut Distribution film club from Spain, while the Ukrainian-English film War in Ukraine by the Greater Brighton Metropolitan College won the Audience Award, as well as the Yellow Flag, which is awarded to the film that most successfully and convincingly condemns violence with its topic.
The best films were decided on by an expert jury composed of Norwegian filmmaker Martha Otte, long-time director of the Tromsø International Film Festival (TIFF), renowned Croatian actor Frano Mašković and film director Dario Lonjak, who started his film career at festivals like these and whose film Savages opened this year’s editions of the festivals.
The jury declared these are the best films of the 27th Youth Film Festival: in the category of animated film, Televised by Photo Video Cinema Club from Zaprešić, in the category of documentary Dissident by UNIMEDIA from Zagreb, in the category of fiction film Till Tomorrow by Blank_film incubator from Zagreb, while in the category of freestyle film, Let the Sunshine In by Eva Magdić Govedarica from Zagreb was declared the best. The best films of the 15th Four River Film Festival are: Ari from the 6 Bab Sharq Animation School from Egypt in the category of animated film, Dissident by UNIMEDIA from Zagreb in the category of documentary film, Paper Talk from École Internationale de Création Audiovisuelle et de Réalisation from France in the fiction film category and Lenz from the All American High School Film Festival from the USA in the best freestyle film category.
The youth jury, which included film lovers from Karlovac, Italy and Austria this year, awarded the following works: the award for best actor went to Ehsan Majooni (Savior) from Iran, best actress went to Josephine Grosbøl (Capo Crimini) from Denmark, best director to Ivan Mihaljević (Dissident) from Zagreb, best screenwriter to Yeseo Han(If You Swallow a Star) from South Korea, best cinematographer to Eva Magdić Govedarica (Let the Sunshine In) from Zagreb and best editor to Aref Namvar (Lenz) from the USA.
The last official evening screening of this year’s festivals was that of the aforementioned film The Staffroom directed by Sonja Tarokić, crowned with an enviable number of awards in the past year – we should mention the special recognition of the main jury of the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival, the Big Golden Arena for Best Film and four Golden Arenas from Pula Film Festival, as well as the Octavian award for the best feature film of 2022. The evening program also included the feature film debut Savages by Dario Lonjak, who began his film career in Karlovac and was also a member of the expert jury this year, the series The Outsiders by director Jelena Gavrilovićand creator Bruno Mustić, and a successful debut film by a Croatian actress Nina Violić, called Kick and Scream.
As many as 1,364 films were submitted to this year’s Youth Film Festival and Four River Film Festival, of which 63 best films were included in the competition program. The number of submitted films confirms the importance and credibility of these events among young filmmakers around the world.
The Karlovac audience watched the award ceremony live at Zorin dom City Theatre, and anyone who wants to can watch the recording of the ceremony HERE. The films from the competition programs of both festivals will be available to watch online until Monday, September 12th, 2022.
You can find all the information about the festivals and their programs at www.frff.com.hr.
