The official programme of the 16th Sofia International Film Festival
will end tonight with the gala screening of Borislav Kolev's
documentary debut Stoichkov.

The
festival presented a total of 260 films from 52 countries from all
over the world. Over 300 international guests came to Sofia, amongst
them were directors, producers, festival directors as well as media and
film experts.

The Award Ceremony took place on the 17th of March in Hall 1 of the National Palace of Culture.

THE INTERNATIONAL JURY

David Mackenzie (UK) – Director
Marc Baschet (France) – Producer
Dragomir Sholev (Bulgaria) – Director  
Vania Shtereva (Bulgaria) – Actress, writer and musician
Jan Cvitkovic (Slovenia) – Director  

awarded

THE GRAND PRIX AWARD for best film in the International Competition to STORIES ONLY EXIST WHEN REMEMBERED (Brazil-Argentina-France) by director JULIA MURAT.

THE JURY SPECIAL AWARD went to MAGIC VALLEY (USA) by director JAFFE ZINN.

THE AWARD FOR BEST DIRECTOR went to KONSTANTIN BOJANOV for his film AVE (Bulgaria-France).

The Jury handed SPECIAL MENTION to the film GENERATION P (Russia-USA) by director VICTOR GINSBURG.

THE JAMESON SHORT FILM AWARD FOR BEST BULGARIAN SHORT FILM went to MORNING (Bulgaria) by director NEDA MORFOVA.

UNESCO AWARD FOR BEST DOCUMENTARY was handed by the international jury
presided by Eldora Traykova (director) and members Ben Hopkins
(screenwriter and director, UK) and Jay Weissberg (film critic, USA) to
the film THIS IS NOT A FILM by Mojtaba Mirtahmasb and Jafar Panahi.

DOMAIN BOYAR AWARD FOR BEST BALKAN FILM handed by Balkan jury
president Jim Stark (producer, USA) and members Ana-Felicia Scutelnicu
(director and writer, Moldova) and Peter Zavrel (expert, Austria),
went to AVE (Bulgaria-France) by director KONSTANTIN BOJANOV.

The Balkan Jury handed two SPECIAL MENTIONS – to the actress of ALPS (Greece) Ariane Labed and the actor of TOLL BOOTH Serkan Ercan.

THE AWARD OF THE BULGARIAN GUILD OF FILM CRITICS for film from the Balkan Competition went to AVE (Bulgaria-France) by KONSTANTIN BOJANOV.

THE KODAK AWARD FOR BEST BULGARIAN FEATURE FILM went to AVE (Bulgaria-France) by director KONSTANTIN BOJANOV and producer DIMITAR GOTCHEV.

The FIPRESCI Jury members Alison Frank (UK), Leslaw Roman Czaplinski
(Poland), Dimitar Kabaivanov (Bulgaria) handed out the FIPRESCI Award
to the film THE ENEMY by DEJAN ZECEVIC.

THE
AIDIENCE AWARD of the 16th Sofia International Film Festival was chosen
among the films in the International Competition and the Balkan
Competition. The award went to PUNK’S NOT DEAD (Macedonia-Serbia) by VLADIMIR BLAZEVSKI.

Bulgarian
Association of Film Producers presented SPECIAL AWARD for contribution
for the promotion of the Bulgarian cinema to the teams of Sofia
International Film Festival and Sofia Meetings.

At the 9th edition of SOFIA MEETINGS the following awards were handed out:

BEST
PITCHING AWARD in the Second Films Programme donated by Synchro Film,
Video & Audio (VIENNA) was given to the producer of the film project
RHINOCEROS by OLEG SENTSOV (director) and OLGA ZHURZHENKO (producer),
Ukraine.

BEST PROJECT AWARD in the Second Films section, donated
by Digimage–LVT Post Production was given to the film project RHINOCEROS
by OLEG SENTSOV (director) and OLGA ZHURZHENKO (producer), Ukraine.

BEST
PROJECT AWARD in the ‘Plus Minus One’ section, donated by LVT Sofia
Post Production was given to the film project PANCHO AND ALICE by STEFAN
VALDOBREV (director) and MINA MILEVA, VESELA KAZAKOVA (producers),
Bulgaria.

Within the framework of the 16th Sofia International
Film Festival the SOFIA AWARD of the Sofia Municipality for contribution
to world cinema was presented to:

NURI BILGE CEYLAN, director (Turkey)
GEORGI STOYANOV, director (Bulgaria)
DANIS TANOVIC, director (Bosnia and Herzegovina)
HUGH HUDSON, director (UK)