Winners of short film competitions Film Fest Gent 2024

In the past few days, the International Short Film Jury, consisting of Nienke Deutz, Isadora Neves Marques and Faraz Fesharaki, saw three selections of International Shorts and a selection of Belgian student shorts.

International Short Film Competition

In the International Short Film Competition, featuring films from 12 different countries, a lot of up-and-coming directorial talent emerged. In the end, the jury chose Goodbye First Love by Shuli Huang as the winner. The film is a melancholic souvenir for the director and his friend who reunited in Frankfurt, almost a decade after their last encounter in Beijing.

The winner of the Award for Best International Short (powered by Nationale Loterij), a prize worth €5.000, thanked the jury in a video message: "It's such a huge recognition and encouragement. It means a lot for this film which is a spontaneous and humble project. My friend and I - just the two of us - shot the film in five hours. We didn't have a script. We didn't have a tripod. We just set the camera on his coffee table. Thank you so much."

The jury had kind words for Goodbye First Love: "Shot with limited resources but a genuine passion for cinema, this film fills the screen with tenderness and emotional depth. There’s nothing superfluous here, as the director allows the framing, pacing, and the quiet spaces between characters to vividly evoke the bittersweet reunion of two former lovers in a foreign land."

In the same competition, the jury decided to award a Special Mention to And How Miserable is the Home of Evil by the Switzerland-based Iranian filmmaker Saleh Kashefi. In his short film, Kashefi uses freely downloadable footage of Iranian Ayatollah Ali Khamenei to create a political fiction about a dictator's last moments before his downfall. The jury praised the film's creative approach: "Saleh Kashefi turns the already existing propaganda footage into its very opposite, making a collective dream come true and possible on the screen."

Competition for Belgian Student Shorts

Each year, there's a lof of buzz around the Competition for Belgian Student Shorts, a competition that has awarded local talents such as Anthony Nti, Kato De Boeck, Adil El Arbi & Bilall Fallah and Lukas Dhont in the past. All students from accredited film schools in Flanders, Wallonia and Brussels were allowed to enter the competition. Out of all submissions, the jury crowned Dreams About Putin by Nastia Korkia & Vlad Fishez as the winner of the Award for Best Belgian Student Short (powered by Amplo) worth €5.000. The hybrid animated documentary shows how you cannot escape Russian President Vladimir Putin, even in your dreams.

The jury about Dreams About Putin: "A precise film with a very unique perspective on a collective trauma - a dream archive of war. Nightmares that catch us while we watch and haunt us afterward. As written in the opening words of the film: 'Beware of the other's dream, because if you are caught in other's dreams, you are done for.' "

The Film Fest Gent audience had the opportunity to vote for their favourite film in the Competition for Belgian Student Shorts. The World is My Idea by Alexander Wolfgang Smadja came out on top, winning the Audience Award for Best Belgian Student Short (powered by THEPACK), worth a post-production budget of €6.500. In this stylized genre mix a high-strung shift leader at a restaurant faces her demonic double.

Award Winners

International Short Film Competition

Award for Best International Short - powered by Nationale Loterij
Goodbye First Love (Shuli Huang)

Special Mention
And How Miserable is the Home of Evil (Saleh Kashefi)

Competition for Belgian Student Shorts

Award for Best Belgian Student Short - powered by Amplo
Dreams About Putin (Nastia Korkia & Vlad Fishez)

Audience Award for Best Belgian Student Short - powered by THEPACK
The World is My Idea (Alexander Wolfgang Smadja)