Festival internazionale Segni della Notte - Urbino |
International Festival Signs of the Night - Urbino |
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6° Festival internazionale Segni della Notte - Urbino - November 28th - December 4th, 2022
20th International Festival Signs of the Night - Italy
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Amartei Armar |
France, Ghana / 2022 / 0:15:00 |
Set in a small Ghanaian town at the edge of a large landfill site that spills into the ocean, the sons of a fisherman, Sowah and Okai, struggle to cope with loss of their eldest brother who drowned during a fishing expedition. Haunted by his demise, Okai believes their brother is still out there…
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JURY DECLARATION
The Main Award goes to "Tsutsué" for the great ability, eminently cinematographic, to draw poetry from harsh reality, and universal meanings from a dramatically particular story, with a gaze that is both lucid and intensely involved. Also, it is commended for a very effective choice of location and performers.
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SIGNS AWARD
The Signs Award honours films, which treat an important subject in an original and convincing way
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Get Ready, Off to the Feast
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Lamara Sogomonian |
Russia / 2021 / 0:20:08 |
Having arrived at a small clinic in Northern Caucasus to mentor the local physicians, Maya, a gynecologist from Moscow, encounters atrocious operations of female genital mutilation conducted behind her back.
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JURY DECLARATION
The Sign Award goes to "Get Ready, Off to the Feast" for the ambivalent portrayal of a delicate subject in an attractive directing craftsmanship. The refined imagery is both ambient and critical in its simplicity, while the poetry radiates from the sounds, creating permanent traces in time.
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NIGHT AWARD
The Night Award honours films, which are able to balance ambiguity and complexity characterized by enigmatic mysteriousnes
and subtleness, which keeps mind and consideration moving
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Mirko Rucnov |
Ghana / 2021 / 0:15:00 |
Kwame, an artist who explores the revolutionary past of Ghana and the legacy of the Non- Alignment Movement that defined his father’s generation undertakes a dangerous journey leaving the unsettling question for those who stay behind.
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JURY DECLARATION
The Night Award goes to "Farewell to the Wind" for a professionally produced personal, contemplative and meditative journey into Ghana's past. The compelling study of national and family history remains enigmatic and thought-provoking throughout.
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JURY AWARD FOR THE CAPTIVATING STORYLINE
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Snjeguljica |
Lana Baric |
Croatia / 2021 / 0:14:40 |
Željka is a 40-year-old woman, living a quiet life in an isolated village. An unexpected visit will take her back to the past, shaking up her daily routine.
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JURY DECLARATION
The Jury Award goes to "Snow White" for initially using the element of surprise of a character on their own. The performances of all the actors advances the film with great anticipation, while the beautiful fixed shots are well framed and set out the dark ending. Moreover, the dialogue is intelligent and serves the silences with unspoken monologues.
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Yi Ling Wu Liu Mi |
Edwin Ho |
Singapore, USA / 2020 / 0:17:00 |
Ling needs a kidney. She leaves Malaysia and crosses the 1056 metres long causeway at the border to Singapore to see her younger brother who now lives there to seek this desperate favour. Will her last hope eventually save her?
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JURY DECLARATION
"1056 Meters" is awarded Special Mention in the Main Award for the power of transforming nostalgia into a visual representation. It is further enhanced by an impeccable performance and intelligent editing.
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Jan-David Bolt |
Switzerland / 2021 / 0:07:00 |
Ling needs a kidney. She leaves Malaysia and crosses the 1056 metres long Oscar's late. In the surrounding skyscrapers hands are shaken and contracts are signed. That's the last thing he needs right now. Where do these damned snails come from?
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JURY DECLARATION
"Phlegm" is awarded a Special Mention in the Main Award for its comical and surreal portrayal of the circumstantial angst of being late. The simple premise and approach belie the high production values, underlining that such films need not be complicated.
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MENTION FOR THE SIGNS AWARD
The Signs Award honours films, which treat an important subject in an original and convincing way
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Joël Jent, Ali Al-Fatlawi |
Switzerland / 2021 / 0:23:44 |
Rolf, a hemiplegic, spends his days dozing on a sofa bed in his dusty apartment. On TV, he learns of a deadly pandemic sweeping around the globe. While the world around him falls apart, he bears witness to it on his screen with relish. When his nurse fails to visit him, Rolf realizes that his survival is anything but certain.
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JURY DECLARATION
"Eating the silence" gets a Mention in the Sign Award for the peculiarity of the subject and the storytelling technique. The good composition that aids in the curation of the story makes for a great and inescapable end.
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DIRECTOR STATEMENT
Our film focuses on the three topics disability, vulnerability and loneliness in an urban context. It was our aim to highlight the difficult lives of mainly elderly people in cities who are mostly affected by these topics. We wanted to tell the story from the point of view of our main character Rolf, who lives on his own as a hemiplegic, carefully preserving his pride. Since he is deprived of oral language, we chose to draw his inner apocalypse as a reflection of the outer dystopia by using images as the primary narrative source. It was our wish to create awareness with this film by reminding us that we all need to be more attentive to one another and that solidarity as a value must be defended and fought for every single day.
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MENTION FOR THE SIGNS AWARD
The Signs Award honours films, which treat an important subject in an original and convincing way
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Annelies Kruk |
Netherlands / 2021 / 00:15:17 |
Ariana (12) loves to dance with her hairy friend, Mikey her dog. Sadly, she has a ticking bomb inside of her: two kidneys that are not working. If the kidneys won’t get better, she needs to get a dialysis where a tube will be placed in her stomach. For Ariana, this sounds like a terrible idea because that means that she won’t be able to dance anymore. Because there is not much time left, she decides to look for a donor herself by posting an online video. Despite her determination, it’s not an easy task because she much more prefers to direct the camera to the fun stuff in her life. Her dog Mikey for example or to show how good she is at dancing. But how should you make a video about something that you’re actually so scared of?
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JURY DECLARATION
"Free As a Bird" wins a Sign Award Mention for its portrayal of 12-year-old Ariana, living with two problem kidneys that need urgent attention. Her bravery, defiance, lovingness, and sense of fun while waiting for a donor are both exemplary to others and truly heart-warming.
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MENTION FOR THE NIGHT AWARD
The Night Award honours films, which are able to balance ambiguity and complexity characterized by enigmatic mysteriousnes
and subtleness, which keeps mind and consideration moving
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Axel Cheb Terrab |
Czech Republic / 2021 / 0:19:30 |
After crossing the line and eating from the forbidden fruit, Gringa feels that she is being monitored by someone else. Soon she will encounter herself with the happiness, love, hate and violence that exists in the small utopic island she lives in, portraying a character she is not, and under the gaze of someone else.
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JURY DECLARATION
"Declamation" is awarded a Mention in the Night Award Section for the ability to experiment in an authentic way with the audio-visual language, creating a composition of details, sounds, noises, off-screen voices, lights and shadows, which reveal themselves subliminally.
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DIRECTOR STATEMENT
I would like to thank you all for this mention which really menas a lot to me and to Declamation, a short film which I carry in my heart for all the world that was created and the way in which we made the film, just a couple of friends on a trip to the mountains with a tripod and a camera. Thank you very much for the mention and I hope we can meet each other in future editions.
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