Five international short films from Greece, Brazil, New Zealand, the UK and Kazakhstan have won the Golden Knight Malta International Short Film Festival 2022. These include an animated film, a documentary and an experimental movie, besides fictional works.

This year marks the 60th edition of the festival, which has grown from strength to strength since its launch in 1962. Organised by the Malta Cine Circle, it started out with a handful of participants, mainly from the UK, but today attracts over 300 participants from all over Europe, the US, Australia, South America, the Far East and, more recently, from Turkey, Iran and Israel, among other countries.

Maltese productions have regularly participated in the festival and in recent years also placed among the winners.

“Having now reached its 60th edition, the Golden Knight is one of the longest-running festivals of its kind worldwide,” Vincent Lungaro-Mifsud, chairman of the Malta Cine Circle, said.

“Over the years, the Golden Knight has built up a high reputation and today is one of the most prestigious and highly regarded international short film festivals. This is truly a matter of pride for the Malta Cine Circle as well as for Malta’s film industry.”

This year’s competing films were judged by a panel made up of Carmel Bonello (chairman), award-winning film-maker Rebecca Cremona, film producer and director Joshua Cassar Gaspar, film-maker and special effects expert Paul Parker and Paul Camilleri, lecturer in media and interactive media.

Among the winners is the Greek animated film A Night at the Cemetery, directed by Stelios Polychronakis, which is about a widow who is unexpectedly forced to spend a night among tombstones when visiting her husband’s grave.

The experimental New Zealand film June, directed by Dwayne Cameron, is a tale about the fragility of life, the primal forces that drive and control humanity and the mystery of hope and new beginnings.

The Brazilian entry Searching Heleny, directed by Esther Vital, is a documentary using puppetry to tell the story of philosopher and theatre director Heleny Guariba, who disappeared in 1971 under the Brazilian dictatorship.

The British drama Revelations, directed by David Allain, is a film about family, grief and acceptance, in which a young man remembers a few key moments that defined the relationship with his estranged mother during the latter’s funeral.

The other fictional film The Rat, directed by Zhantemir Baimukhamedov of Kazakhstan, follows a convict who is released from prison but has nowhere to go.

These films will be screened and awarded with a Golden Knight trophy during a prize-giving ceremony that will be held tomorrow.

Another five short films will receive a ‘highly commended certificate’: Page’s Edge (animation), Two Knights (UK), I’ll Be Frank (Ireland), Awama (Tunisia) and Like You (Spain).

The screening of the winning films and the presentation of awards will be held tomorrow at the Malta Experience theatre, in Valletta, at 7pm. Entrance is free. For reservations, e-mail: bookings @goldenknightmalta.org or call 9946 0866.