7th Wiz-Art Lviv International Short Film Festival has announced this year’s winning films

7th Wiz-Art Lviv International Short Film Festival announced this year’s winning films. Grand Prix of the festival went to the film Killing Auntie (photo) directed by Polish filmmaker Mateusz Glowacki — it’s a 30-minute long black comedy with elements of absurd telling a story about a student who once decided to get rid of his own aunt. An animated story of an ordinary chewing gum’s life, The Gum, directedby Olha Makarchuk, took the award for the best Ukrainian short film.

The awards ceremony was held on July 27, the day of closing Wiz-Art 2014 in the Lviv Palace of Arts. The winners were announced by the Jury (photo) — Norwegian filmmaker Gunhild Enger, Ukrainian filmmaker Kateryna Gornostai and the director of the Short Waves Festival Szymon Stemplewski. Beside the Grand Prix and the award for the best Ukrainian short, awards were also given for the Best Director, Best Script and Best Cinematography. Four directors of the winning films sent their video greetings which were shown at the festival’s closing ceremony. 

“I'm very happy that Killing Auntie won at the Wiz-Art Festival, — said the director Mateusz Glowacki. — This is the first festival outside Poland where the film won, and probably the last one. I am very happy that it happened in Ukraine”. While awarding the film, the Jury emphasized that Killing Aunty “performs a perfect balance between an unrealistic story and the convincing way of telling it and has very good directing, editing and comic timing”. 

Best Ukrainian short award was given to an 8-minute long animation by Olha Makarchuk The Gum. The Jury had to admit that being a gum for 8 minutes seems to be more interesting than being a person. 

The award in Best Script nomination went to a British film Counterpart (photo) directed by Adrian Sitaru. This film presents an unusual way of describing a well-known problem in sexual relationship with humour and realism. 

Ilker Çatak, the director of Where We Are, was pronounced the best director in the competition. His film is a classic story with a firm direction that leads us to a delicate point where the ego of a mother becomes less important than the love for her daughter. “It’s my first director’s prize, to be honest, — said Ilker Çatak, — And I’m really honoured”.

An experimental film Harvest (photo), directed by the artist-duo Chaja Hertog & Nir Nadler from the Netherlands, got the Best Cinematography award. The film about spreading protests in an olive grove presents a visually funny and absurd way of describing horrors of terror. “The film metaphorically comments the recent events around the globe, and it totally makes sense to us that it was screened in Ukraine at this time” — said Chaja Hertog. 

Two films were also honoured with Special mention prizes, first of them being Simon Ellis’s film Stew and Punch, a simple story about the power of balance in male and female relationships, done with an impressive camera work and complex character direction. The second Special mention is Pride, the short directed by Pavel Vesnakov. It is an example of a film that mirrors one problem through another, which makes both of them easier to live with.