TIFF film festival announces winners

TIRANA, Nov. 4 – Seven lucky Gods, a movie directed by UK’s Jamil Dehlavi and starring Albanian writer Nik Xhelilaj has been announced the best film in the Tirana International Film Festival. The movie starring Nik Xhelilaj, famous for his “The Albanian” movie in 2010 which made him one of Europe’s Shooting Stars in the 2011 Berlin film festival is about an illegal immigrant from Albania who infiltrates the lives of a group of Londoners with devastating consequences.
The best director award went to Greece’s Thanos Anastopoulos for The Daughter feature film. Damn Girl, directed by Denmark’s Pelle Folmer was announced the best short film while the Executioner’s Tear earned the best short documentary award. “Me the Sea and …” was announced the best Albanian documentary.
Prime Minister Edi Rama awarded the Best Editing prize to Frederic Labonde for his Humus experimental film. Meanwhile, Tirana Mayor Lulzim Basha handed over the Audience award to Kosovo director Bekim Guri for his Silence movie.
Hundreds of feature and short film, documentaries and animated movies from all the world competed in this year’s edition of the Tirana International Film Festival held from October 23 to 31 in Tirana at the Millennium cinema.
Along with the Durres International Film Festival, TIFF is the biggest movie festival in Albania. The first and only international cinema festival of its kind in Albania, TIFF was established in 2003 showcasing movies competing in four categories including feature films, short-films, the Digiart, TV short film competition, and the Albanian short-film competition.
All the daily programs of the TIFF festival combine features and short films of all formats and genres – fiction, documentary, animation and experimental. On its daily agenda, TIFF also dedicates time to classes and seminars with professionals in the motion picture industry geared for Albanian film students and emerging filmmakers.