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Brussels Independent Film Festival Crowns Eight Winners with Chocolate Prizes At The 2023 Atomium Film Awards
Brussels, 14 February 2023 - This past weekend marked the closing of yet another successful edition of the Brussels Independent Film Festival. Over the course of 8 days, the festival screened more than 60 feature and short films from 25 countries in the heart of Brussels, at Cinema Galeries and Cinema RITCS. In an added effort to celebrate and connect the Brussels film scene, the festival also partnered up with two of the capital's cultural fixtures this year. The Brussels Independent Film Festival is an official partner for the exhibition 'Beatriz Santiago Muñoz: Oriana' (which is running at Argos until 7 May), and supported several screenings at Cinematek as part of a 'tribute to the masters of independent cinema'. Festival director Kris De Meester looks back at this year's run with satisfaction: “Every year the Brussels Independent Film Festival proves to be truly a fest for cinema lovers. I've met so many talented people who presented challenging gems of all sorts. And the audience loved it, what an amazing turnout.”
“I was also very happy to see a representative of the Eurogroup for Animals turn up to collect the award for best animated film," De Meester continues, "taking the opportunity to share their message with our audience. In fact, we were pleased to welcome a number of special guests this year, filmmakers, actors and crew members of the official selection. A warm thank you to Tomas Smulkis, Paul Pirritano, Kate Voet, Jannes Callens, Stefan Gota, Isidor Ilic, Luna Brusselaers, Louise Bailly, Yohan Guignard, Michael Abay, Michael William West and his crew, Agnese Marcon, Fiona Chen, and Misha Van der Werf.”
To crown the 2023 edition, the Atomium Film Awards took place at Cinema Galeries on Saturday 11 February. Eight films were awarded with edible medallion awards, made out of Belgian chocolate by 'Gault & Millau Finest Chocolatier' Wim Vyverman. The jury panel chose the following films as this year's winners:
Best Narrative Feature Film:
A Perfect Day For Caribou (USA) by Jeff Rutherford
Best Narrative Short Film:
The Tears Of Things (Belgium) by Kate Voet
Best Documentary Feature Film:
Chaylla (France) by Clara Teper and Paul Pirritano
Best Documentary Short Film:
The Mechanics Of Fluids (France) by Gala Hernández López
Best Animated Film:
World's Best Animal Welfare (Sweden) by Robin Jonsson
Best Experimental Film:
The Dream Machine (France) by Michael William West
Best Music Video:
Secant (USA) by Timothy David Orme
Best Belgian Film:
Dor (Longing) (Belgium) by Jannes Callens
Congratulations to all!
Last but not least, the Brussels Independent Film Festival wishes to say a special thank you to Cinema Galeries, Cinema RITCS, Cinematek, Argos centre for audiovisual arts, Wim Vyverman, The Bigger Screen, Tree Plan, and Whush, for their contributions in creating this wonderful event.
Official selection 2023
Best Narrative Feature Film: A Perfect Day For Caribou (USA) by Jeff Rutherford
Best Narrative Short Film: The Tears Of Things (Belgium) by Kate Voet
Best Documentary Feature Film: Chaylla (France) by Clara Teper and Paul Pirritano
Best Documentary Short Film: The Mechanics Of Fluids (France) by Gala Hernández López
Best Experimental Film: The Dream Machine (France) by Michael William West
Best Music Video: Secant (USA) by Timothy David Orme
Best Animated Film: World's Best Animal Welfare (Sweden) by Robin Jonsson
Best Belgian Film: Dor (Longing) (Belgium) by Jannes Callens
Dragon (USA) by Dane Cree, Lisa Poppe
Vegetative (France) by Hannah Papacek Harper
Pocket Call (Germany) by Paul Spengemann
A fairy tale (France) by Zoé Arene
Hospes (USA) by Stephanie J Williams
People We Know Are Confused (Lithuania) by Tomas Smulkis
plum tree gorilla ladder (USA) by Maya Gurantz
Beef (USA) by Brendon Kingsbury, Sean Webley
Chicago (Portugal) by João Pombeiro
Mulika (Dem Rep Congo) by Maisha Maene
Letter to my mother (Iran) by Amina Maher
Blind Body (Australia) by Allison Chhorn
The Prisoner (Poland) by Łukasz Gierańczyk, Filip Drzewiecki
Random Patrol (France) by Yohan Guignard
Cygnus (Canada) by Brandon Poole
Contrapunctus (Belgium) by Luna Brusselaers
Upsodown (Australia) by Nathan Ceddia
Laboratory NO.2 (Kurdistan) by Edris Abdi, Aware Omer
Thousand Staring Eyes (Mexico) by Nicolas Gutierrez Wenhammar
Before We Collide (UK) by Guy Gooch, Gregor Petrikovic
No New Wave (Singapore) by Ziwei Yao
One Day Back Home (China) by Ruijing Chen
Idol (Australia) by Alex Wu
Flock众 (UK) by Fiona Chen
To Do (UK) by Saul Pankhurst
Blk (USA) by Na Forest Lim
La Adelita (USA) by Oksana Mirzoyan
The Emergence of The Soviet Beat (UK) by Johannes Magnus Aule
Ousmane (Canada) by Jorge Camarotti
Window (Sweden) by Sara Kadefors
Losing It (Austria) by Sascha Vernik
I Love You Don't Leave Me (USA) by Alex Leombruno
Before the Earthquake (Sweden) by Gustav Hugo Olsson
Red Giant (Belgium) by Anne Verbeure
Iqaluit (USA) by Ted Schneider
Safe as Houses (Ireland) by Mia Mullarkey
Where do we go from here (Italy) by Antonello Schioppa
Freewheelin' (Norway) by Finn Walther
Before We Collide (UK) by Guy Gooch, Gregor Petrikovic
Satan 2 (France) by Maxime Borowski
Atmospheric Marginalia (USA) by Adam E. Stone
A Colônia Luxemburguesa (Luxembourg) by Dominique Santana
Klette (Belgium) by Michael Abay
Daron, Daron Colbert (USA) by Kevin Edward Steen
Solus (Belgium) by Frederic Siroul
Heat Wave Hallucination (USA) by Jil Guyon
The time of a dance (Belgium) by Misha Idriss Van der Werf
Safely Feel The Real World (China) by Jody Xiong
Kungfu Water (China) by Jody Xiong
Ute (Poland) by Maciej Pisarek
The Boy Who Couldn't Feel Pain (Germany) by Eugen Merher
The Extra's Journey (Taiwan) by Hsin-Yu WU
Time Capsule (USA) by Lauren Loesberg
Circle (USA) by Phillip Kaminiak
Consensual (USA) by Jeff Hilliard, Joey Danger