The International Festival of Films on Art (FIFA) has announced the winners of its 42nd edition, which runs online until March 31.
This year, 13 feature-length films and 14 shorts were in the International Competition, and 6 feature-length films and 13 shorts were in a new section: the National Competition. They competed for one of eight prizes awarded by the jury: the Grand Prix, the Jury Prize, the Best Essay Award, the Best Portrait Award, the Best Canadian Feature Film Award, the Best Short Film Award, the Best Canadian Short Film Award and the Best Canadian Work Award.
National competition
Best Canadian short film
ART ROBOTS (Mathieu Fortin) Canada | 2023 | 5 min | No dialogue
“For its great technical mastery and the originality with which it tackles a timely subject, this film has captivated the jury while sparking fascinating exchanges. Visually remarkable, it boldly ventures into a narrative reminiscent of fable or tale to question, with humor, the boundaries of art, subjectivity, and existence. We particularly applaud the way in which the film’s form mirrors its content, thus reflecting upon its own subject matter. Finally, we stand before a work that has the power to reach us, both intellectually and emotionally, through unexpected avenues.”
Available online until March 31.
Best Canadian work
THE GEOGRAPHIES OF DAR (Monique LeBlanc) Canada | 2023 | 1 h 13 min | English | Subtitles : French
“Visually polished, this film is a vibrant tribute to the power of fiction as a gateway to our empathy, our resilience, our consideration for the marginalized and the disenfranchised. You’ll come away from the experience steeped in its light, with a desire to look at and read the world better. A world away from self-righteousness, this film, like its subject, is never complacent. On the contrary, it is a call to the heart, and a reminder that art and literature have a real power to elevate. In this way, it is both poetic and political. A work of depth and sincerity, this portrait is not just of a writer with a singular career path, but of the infinite potential of our humanity.”
Available online until March 31.
International competition – Short films
Best short film
THE GREAT ENDEAVOR (Liam Young) United States, Australia | 2023 | 9 min | No dialogue
“Through a unique creative approach, The Great Endeavor presents striking ideas in an artistic and cinematic style that encourages audiences to think about solutions to climate change.”
Special mention
BIG BANG HENDA (Fernanda Polacow) Portugal, Angola | 2023 | 20 min | Portuguese | Subtitles : English
“Through the language of photography and performance, between reality and fiction, the film succeeds in conveying how deeply the memory of a past of suffering weighs on the new generations, who nevertheless manage to find hope in poetry and art to write a new history.”
Available online until March 31.
International competition – Feature films
Best essai
GHOSTS OF BAGGOTONIA (Alan Gilsenan) Ireland | 2022 | 1 h 25 min | English
“Poetic and ambitious, this film stands out for the beauty of its images, the hypnotic rhythm of its editing and its profound knowledge of a place and a bygone era that still resonates today. For its ability to transport reality into a spectral world and its unique work on the relationship between literature, sound and images.”
Available online until March 31.
Best portrait
AN OWL, A GARDEN AND THE WRITER (Sara Dolatabadi) France, Switzerland, Iran | 2023 | 1 h 23 min | Persian | Subtitles: French
“With patience and delicacy, this intimate film plunges us into the daily life of an artist whose false simplicity masks a courageous life. whose false simplicity masks a courageous and resilient life dedicated to political art in a repressive political context. For the sensitive perspective it offers on a visionary writer and inspirational family man.”
Available online until March 31.
Jury prize
THE ARTIST’S DAUGHTER (Margarita Linton) Israel | 2022 | 1 h | Russian, Hebrew | Subtitles : English
“The result of a courageous and original approach, this film bears witness to a rigorous sense of direction and a singular ability to artistically confront personal issues. For its ability to transform the portrait of an artist in his absence into a moving and pertinent self-portrait of a filmmaker who frees herself from a father figure as admired as he is harmful.”
Available online until March 31.
Grand prize
LA RICERCA (Giuseppe Petruzzellis) Italy | 2023 | 1 h 2 min Italian | Subtitles: English
“At once modest and surprisingly wide-ranging, this film opens as a portrait of a man with a strange passion of a man with a strange passion. Step by step, the anecdotal subtly gives way to a profound on the world, the history of humanity and the very notion of art. For his ability to explore all the facets, both aesthetic and philosophical, of an obsession that is transformed – or not – into an artistic project.”
