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IFF Message to Man > 2026 > International Competition: Short Feature films > City of Owls

City of Owls

Information about the film

Genres: Feature, Short-length

Director: Zhenia Kazankina

Operator: Luda Kuropyatnikova

Screenwriter: Zhenia Kazankina, Sofia Boteva, Andrea Gatopoulos

Cast: Vera Engalycheva, Lera Yacenko

Producer: Clémence Crépin Néel, Igor Courtecuisse, Pavel Karykhalin, Andrea Gatopoulos, Laura Catalano, Leone Balduzzi, Marco Mingolla, Stefano Schiavone

Year: 2026

Country: France-Italy-Germany

Duration: 13 min.

Languages: Russian

Description

Russian premiere

On the last evening before her departure, Vera is putting her small sister to bed. To hide the real reason for her leaving, she tells her a bedtime fairy tale instead. It’s the story of a city swallowed by an eternal night.

About the director:

City of Owls

Zhenia Kazankina

Director, screenwriter, and editor. Born in Moscow in 1996. A graduate of VGIK, she is currently based in Rome. Her work explores themes of adaptation, attachment, and the search for belonging, often through the lens of feminine characters and perspectives. Unfolding in a collective dimension, her stories are rooted in metaphorical concepts and personal experience, and touched with elements of mystery and fable. She has competed twice in the In Silico programme at Message to Man: in 2023 with Empty Rooms, and in 2024 with Three Secret Clues of Longing, which won her the Jury Diploma.

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