Less than a month remains until the start of the 34th Message to Man International Film Festival, which kicks off on October 18 in St. Petersburg.
The Festival’s competitions form its central axis, and the selection team is now ready to unveil the much-anticipated lineup of the competition programmes.
In 2024, the International and National Competitions, as well as the In Silico Experimental Film Competition will feature 78 works from 30 countries, chosen from 2,300 submissions received from 93 countries.
For full details on the competition programmers and comprehensive descriptions of the films, visit the festival website.
The Festival is held with the support of the Ministry of Culture of the Russian Federation, the Presidential Fund for Cultural Initiatives, and the Committee for Culture of St. Petersburg.
INTERNATIONAL COMPETITION
Message to Man’s International Competition traditionally features films from various genres and formats, including full-length documentaries and shorts of all types: documentary, live-action, and animation. Unlike most festivals, the Festival’s Grand Prix, as well as any other prize, can be awarded to any film in the International Competition, regardless of its runtime or format.
“Message to Man’s International Competition is traditionally diverse, even in terms of its participants. Among them are very young filmmakers, but the selection team is particularly proud that world-renowned filmmakers participate in this year’s competition, such as British experimentalist Ben Rivers, Japanese animator Koji Yamamura, and Russian documentary legend Alexei Khanyutin. All of them, both newcomers and seasoned masters, compete on equal footing, just as all genres and formats, regardless of runtime, are treated equally in the International Competition. The competition’s composition might appear eclectic, heterogeneous, even mosaic. It resembles a patchwork quilt, sewn together from the finest lace and coarse canvas, thick leather and delicate silk, cutting-edge nylon and familiar chintz. This multifaceted approach reflects the diverse perspective that contemporary cinema offers on the world. It is this variability that is cinema’s fundamental strength, as it reaches the heart, mind, and soul of viewers in different ways, allowing each individual to find meaning in the intricate, ever-changing patterns. The festival’s goal is to invite everyone on this journey, to ease the preparation, and to make borders more transparent. To overcome isolation and mutual alienation — issues so sharply felt and endured today — which is the only way to understand the message that the wider world shouts out to man through the language of cinema,” says Vasily Stepanov, Chairman of the Selection Committee.
Full-length documentary films:
- Bogancloch, 2024, Ben Rivers (UK, Germany, Iceland)
- The Burden, 2023, Elvis Sabin Ngaibino (Central African Republic, France, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Italy)
- Still With Us, 2024, Alexei Khanyutin (Russia)
- Obscure Night — Goodbye Here, Anywhere, 2023, Sylvain George (France, Switzerland)
- Fire Fire Fire, 2024, Pauline Jeanbourquin (Switzerland)
- Flathead, 2024, Jaydon Martin (Australia)
- Under A Blue Sun, 2024, Daniel Mann (France, Israel)
- Theatre of Violence, 2023, Lukasz Konopa, Emil Langballe (Denmark, Germany)
- Apple Cider Vinegar, 2024, Sophie Benoot (Belgium, Netherlands)
Short documentary films:
- Great People, 2024, Artem Senkovsky, Ksenia Gaun (Russia)
- Exit Through the Cuckoo ’s Nest, 2024, Nikola Ilic (Switzerland)
- Lacuna, 2023, Carlo Nasisse, Shirley Yumeng He (USA)
- The Stag, 2023, Chu An (Taiwan)
- In Praise of Darkness, 2024, Adrián Balseca (Ecuador)
- POV Memory, 2023, Igor Smola (Azerbaijan, Singapore)
- At That Very Moment, 2023, Rita Pauls, Federico Luis (Argentina, Germany)
Live-action short films:
- Full Night, 2023, Manon Coubia (France)
- Spring 23, 2024, Wang Zhiyi (France)
- The Birthday Party, 2023, Francesco Sossai (Germany, France, Italy)
- Wildmen of the Greater Toronto Area, 2023, Solmund MacPherson (Canada)
- The Lost Memories of Trees, 2023, Antonio La Camera (Italy, Spain)
- Nothing Happens After That, 2024, Ibrahim Omar (Sudan)
- The Film Might Be White, 2023, Sebastian Johansson Micci (Sweden)
- The Red Color of the Second Planet, 2023, Azer Guliyev (Azerbaijan)
- Shimmering Bodies, 2023, Inês Teixeira (Portugal)
- Panadrilo, 2024, Marcela Heilbron (Panama)
- To Exist Under Permanent Suspicion, 2024, Valentin Noujaïm (France)
- Intrusion, 2023, Gunnur Martinsdóttir Schlüter (Iceland)
- A Bird Flew, 2024, Leinad Pájaro de la Hoz (Colombia, Cuba)
- You Land, 2023, Debora Maité Bottino (Scotland, UK)
- The Damp Ground, 2024, Maxim Kuzhba (Russia)
Animated short films:
- De Imperio, 2023, Alessandro Novelli (Portugal, Spain)
- Design Bio Toilet, 2024, Mariola Brillowska (Germany)
- Circle, 2024, Joung Yumi (South Korea)
- Father’s Letters, 2023, Alexey Evstigneev (France, Russia)
- The Sword of The Sun, 2023, Le Gentil Garçon (France)
- Extremely Short, 2024, Koji Yamamura (Japan, USA)
- A Supermarket in California, 2024, Anastasia Vereykina (Russia)
- Tako Tsubo, 2024, Eva Pedraza, Fanny Sorgo (Austria, Germany)
- The Three Sisters, 2024, Timur Kognov (Cyprus)
- Whisperer, 2023, Mladen Djukic (Bosnia and Herzegovina)
NATIONAL COMPETITION
The National Competition of Message to Man includes both full-length and short films, which compete on a parity basis.
“This year, more films than usual have been selected for the National Competition. It’s as if documentarians, particularly the younger ones (who, as always, make up the majority in the competition), are eager to capture the ’here and now’ while the trail is still fresh, aiming to grasp the inner lives of ordinary people during these turbulent times. The filmmakers peer into issues that often go quietly unnoticed by society and the government but are essential to an individual’s private life. Modern cinematic language, with its vast possibilities—both experimental and traditional—enables us to explore these subtle matters: feelings, sensations, pain, anxiety, the pursuit of happiness, and the quest for understanding, without stripping away the delicate essence of the individual through rigid artistic form,” says Alena Solntseva, curator of the National Competition.
Films:
- #underfoot, 2024, Alexey Fedorchenko (Russia)
- Wandering Pain, 2024, Zhenya Gorda (Russia)
- There Is Still More to Come, 2024, Masha Godovannaya (Russia, Mexico)
- Hydroelectric Joy, 2024, Alexander Markov (France)
- Dif-friend, 2024, Nastya Ivanova (Russia)
- Wife to be, 2024, Inna Omelchenko (Russia)
- Teeny-Tiny, 2024, Evgenia Dudnikova (Russia)
- Without News, 2024, Denis Shabaev (Russia)
- Hi Papa!, 2024, Alexandra Kretsan (Russia, Kazakhstan)
- To Lay the Head, 2024, Shamil Yagafarov (Russia)
- Against The Wind, 2024, Tatyana Soboleva (Russia)
- Farewell, My Sea, 2024, Sergey Kan (Russia)
- La Ville en Rose, 2024, Vladimir Popov (Russia)
- Catching Snowflakes on Her Tongue + Cute Little Drunk, 2024, Liza Savvina (Russia)
- Text for a Film Pitch, 2024, Dasha Likhaya (Russia)
- The Wind Has No Tail, 2024, Ivan Vlasov, Nikita Stashkevich (Russia)
IN SILICO EXPERIMENTAL SHORT FILM COMPETITION
For the 14th time, the Message to Man IFF features a competition of short experimental films In Silico.
“The essence of the 2024 experimental competition is perhaps best captured by the title of the film by Israeli participant Maya Zak: Decryption. All the films in this programme are, in one way or another, engaged in this ’decoding of reality,’ as Vertov once described. As always, the largest thematic segment of the competition focuses on memory and its preservation through media, exploring the effort to decrypt subjective human experience as captured in amateur and professional footage, photographs, television commercials, and intricate computer renderings,” says Mikhail Zheleznikov, programmer of the In Silico Experimental Film Competition.
Films:
- 二〇二〇, 2023, Max Hattler (Hong Kong)
- Bezuna, 2023, Saif Alsaegh (USA)
- Interpret It Well, 2022, Frank Heath (USA)
- Being Is Negative, 2023, Sun Xun (China)
- The View from the Plane, 2024, Daniele Grosso (Italy)
- Au-Delà, 2023, Patrick Bokanovsky (France)
- All My Scars Vanish in the Wind, 2022, Angélica Restrepo, Carlos Velandia (Colombia)
- Pigeons, 2024, Anosh Aibara (India)
- Decryption, 2023, Maya Zak (Israel)
- Dear Ma’, 2024, Olivier Grancher-Martel (Canada)
- Meat Grinder 2, 2024, Nikita Spiridonov (Russia)
- No Horses on Mars, 2024, Bea de Visser (Netherlands)
- NYC RGB, 2023, Viktoria Schmid (USA, Austria)
- Surface Séance, 2024, Michael Heindl (Austria)
- The Many Interrupted Dreams of Mr. Hemmady, 2024, Amit Dutta (India)
- Synchronicity, 2022, Yann Chapotel (France )
- Three Secret Clues of Longing, 2023, Zhenia Kazankina (Switzerland)
- Phantasia, 2023, Jorge Moneo Quintana (Spain)
- Sensitive Content, 2023, Narges Kalhor (Germany)
- Exotic Words Drifted, 2023, Sandro Aguilar (Portugal)
