FICVI awards 10 prizes to the best short films and closes nine days full of emerging cinema

The International Short Film Festival of Vila-seca has announced tonight the winners of its ninth edition in a gala that has distributed 10 awards and has said goodbye to nine days of authentic cultural explosion, full of emerging cinema in short format, in the emblematic noucentista building of the Celler de Vila-seca.

Alex Lora’s ‘La Gran Obra’ won the national award for Best Fiction Short Film at the International Short Film Festival of Vila-seca (FICVI) for the originality of its script, its attention to detail, its meticulous production and its ability to appeal to the audience’s prejudices.

The other big winners of the night, in the national category, were ‘Tesoro’, which received the award for Best Animation for creating an ingenious and amusing tale that proposes a very well explained idea, and ‘Ei, Temi’, which was distinguished as Best Documentary for embracing a stage of life with great sensitivity, humour and charisma.

On an international level, the jury of the official section awarded the French fiction short film ‘The mysterious adventures of Claude Conseil’, for its originality in form, the soundscape, for posing a current problem from another place, and the mixture between ornithology and the world of trapping, and recognised the Polish animation ‘There are people in the forest’ by Szymon Ruczynkiel for going further and becoming a slap in the face of reality with a perfect combination of simplicity, art and crudeness.

The Do Catalonia prize went to ‘Els buits’ by Sofia Esteve, Isa Luengo and Marina Freixa, for its skilful use of audiovisual language to reconstruct events so that they do not fall into oblivion. The documentary, which has already received several awards and nominations, is an exercise in historical memory in which Mariona Roca reflects with her daughter and filmmaker, Marina Freixa, on her time in a Francoist correctional facility, and recomposes a distorted account of the repression.

The Do Catalonia award went to ‘Els Buits’ by Sofia Esteve, Isa Luengo and Marina Freixa, for its skilful use of audiovisual language to reconstruct events so that they do not fall into oblivion. The documentary, which has already received several awards and nominations, is an exercise in historical memory in which Mariona Roca reflects with her daughter and filmmaker, Marina Freixa, on her time in a Francoist correctional facility, and recomposes a distorted account of the repression.

There is also recognition for those who have taken on the challenge of the IN SITU competition to make short films of a maximum of 3 minutes about a person or group of people from the municipality. In this category, the first prize went to ‘Retrato de un Vampiro’ by Arian Araujo and the second prize to ‘Ezequiel’ by Nil corral.

The Young Jury decided in favour of ‘El armario Viviente’, by Martí Madaula Ardilla, and the desired prize of the audience, who voted at the end of each of the sessions, went to the short film ‘Dol i fa sol’, by Maria Besora and Pep Garrido.

The closing gala of the ninth edition of the FICVI brought to a close an intense programme with more than 50 short films screened; a dozen talks; more than 40 national and international guests such as filmmakers, programmers and artists; more than 2.500 people from the audience; wine pairings; film creation in the town, a networking space and family workshops that have made Vila-seca a meeting point for industry professionals and film-lovers of all ages.

The event, hosted by journalist Samanta Villar, was presided over by the Mayor of Vila-seca, Pere Segura, and was attended by the President of the Tarragona Provincial Council, Noemí Llauradó, and the President of the Municipal Tourist Board, Lluïsa Clavé.

The artistic director, Alba Bresolí, took advantage of her speech to give a very positive assessment of these nine days of exciting and unforgettable experiences and explained that the festival ‘is not just a film event, but a platform for connecting different realities and people’. In this sense, the director affirmed that the FICVI ‘is a window to discover new emerging cinema that is close to our reality, but also to discover others that are very different from ours’.

For her part, the presenter, Samanta Villar, wanted to highlight the value of the short film format and emphasise the privilege of having a festival like this one in the region. ‘Short films are often spoken of as if they were the little brothers of films, but those of us who work in audiovisuals know that less is more and that among short films there are gems that have the power to make us live a million lives in a few minutes’, said the journalist.

Finally, the Mayor of Vila-seca, Pere Segura, closed the event with a few words from the Italian filmmaker Alice Rohrwacher, who sees cinema as a large square where everyone has a place, to experience it as a space for meeting and celebration. From this point of view, the mayor explained that the idea has a lot to do with the aims that were set out from the beginning of the festival, and he noted that the event has now reached full consolidation.

Pere Segura also stated that ‘during these autumn days the Celler becomes a welcoming place where we meet to celebrate that new and old ideas, new and old passions, new and old feelings come together to fill our minds and hearts with great stories expressed with the old art of cinema and in this case the short film’. Finally, the mayor thanked the work and dedication of the different juries – the official jury, the young jury and especially the audience that makes the festival possible – and said that from now on the Tourist Board and Parallel 40 are starting to work on the tenth edition of the festival.

It should be remembered that tomorrow, Sunday 17th November, the 11 winning short films of the ninth edition of the Festival Internacional de Vila-seca will be screened in the final session that will take place at 19:00 at the Celler de Vila-seca. As in all previous screenings, access will be free and admission will be free.