The Golden Alexander win comes with a 12,000 prize.
Church officials called the film blasphemous, and right-wing groups in Greek also took offense at it.
Stray Bodies also won a Special Mention in the International Amnesty Award competition.
‘My Stolen Planet’Jyoti Film
The top prize in the International Amnesty Award competition went to Maciek Hamelas Oscar-shortlistedIn the Rearview.
The festival described the awards ceremony as unfolding amidst a warm and moving ambiance.
A Special Mention went toTack, directed by Vania Turner.
The Thessaloniki International Documentary Festival awards ceremony.TiDF
Its impact extends far beyond the confines of the screen, inspiring audiences to take action towards positive change.
The challenge is how to bridge this gap.Fresh Memories: The Looktests the reality of connecting different experiences.
It faces the Unspeakable by making us interact closely with those who have witnessed and experienced it.
At this very moment a special bond of empathy between strangers appears.
Firstly, the originality of the theme.
The prize is awarded by a three-member jury.
Does a queer film demand something special of the theater space and its audience?
Does it provoke new ways of being together?
In the Thessaloniki International Documentary Festival 2024 we repeatedly saw queer community in practice.
For example, the festival invited two witnesses to talk about the assaults on Aristotelous square last Saturday.
When they saw what was happening, they immediately responded by opening the restaurant space they were in.
As politicized queer people, they were prepared for a moment like this.
We also saw community in action in the way filmmakers and guests were welcomed.
We saw queers supporting queers, queers feeding queers, queers translating for queers, queers caretaking for queers.
What queer life have we encountered at the Thessaloniki International Documentary Festival 2024?
The kissing figures on the festivals poster are the most obvious visual marker.
Yet it is not an end goal.
We ask whether queer film can do more than simply portray queerness.
How it could not simply represent queer stories, but tell stories in queer ways.
How it could not only represent, but also reflect on and performatively shape, queer community.
Many of the films we watched for the 2024 Mermaid Award show us a way.
Relationships, dreams, dance and music are playfully, buoyantly, central.
Lesviaby Tzeli Hadjidimitriou
Reasoning: The jury would like to offer a special mention to the filmLesviaby Tzeli Hadjidimitriou.
Simultaneously, this film is sexy.
The award was bestowed by Rouli Christopoulou, Corporate Responsibility & Culture Manager of Alpha Bank.
Because without access there is, after all, no freedom.
From this year, this prize is also awarded at the Documentary International Festival.
The award is accompanied by a 3,000-euro cash prize.
AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL AWARD
The Amnesty International Award is given to a film that promotes and supports human rights.
The decision is made by the General Assembly of the members that have attended the Festival.
There, its tortured regulars seek their own redemptive gray, striving to break free from the everyday crucifixion.
WWF HELLAS AWARD
The WWF Hellas Award is bestowed to the best environment-themed movie of the Festival.
Eligible for these awards are Greek films participating in the International Program.
This years jury members are Vilelmini Adamidou, Sofia Agalioti, Maria Koukoutini, and Miltiadis Moraitis.
FISCHER AUDIENCE AWARDS
Five Audience Awards are bestowed to three Greek and two international films.
This years Agora marked a great success, as more than 400 international visitors attended its events.
A profound, comprehensive, multidimensional narrative that surprised us and left us with a lot to think about.
By tending to your homeland, you in turn nurture family, and the right to your home.
The DAE Documentary Association of Europe Award amounts to consultation and free membership.
The Aylon Productions Digital Services Award offers an hour of high quality digital transfer of archival material.
The Aylon Productions Digital Services Award goes to Stephanie Andreou and Adrian Gutierrez for Women Walk Home.
The Beldocs award goes to Nikos Ziogas, Konstantina Stavrianou, Rena Vougioukalou, and Antigoni Papantoni for Lake.
It takes place within the MFI Script2Film program, where the scripts for 35 feature length films are developed.
Unfortunately, we can choose only one.
But all the other projects are strongly encouraged to apply to our program.
The DOK Leipzig Accelerator Award offers two Observer badges and accommodation.
The DOK Leipzig Accelerator Award goes to Masa Neskovic, Maja Medic and Ena Bajraktarevic for Kafka in Belgrade.
The lines that divide generations, people, values, and ideas must fade away.
And every story that narrates this procedure is redemptive and encouraging.
Our warmest wishes for all the projects!
But of course it is not so.
The 18 year-old Kurdish boy Vural reminds us about this.
Therefore the project Exile(s) has the potential to tell an important story about human relations.
