04/06/2013 - UK director Fyzal Boulifa's The Curse won the main award in international fiction and documentary competition of the 10th Vienna Independent Shorts film festival

At the tenth edition of Austria’s most important short film festival, the Vienna Independent Shorts (VIS) which took place May 28 – June 2, UK director Fyzal Boulifa’s 14-minute fiction film The Curse won the Vienna Short Film Award for the best fiction or documentary film. The prize includes €4,000 provided by City of Vienna.

Special mentions in the category went to The Day Has Conquered the Night by Jean-Gabriel Périot from France and About Ndugu by David Munoz from Spain. Austria’s Robert Cambrinus won the audience award and €500 sponsored by film magazine ray for I Can’t Cry Much Louder than This.

In the international Animation Avantgarde section, the ASIFA Austria Award for the best Animation or Experimental Film worth €2,000 went to It’s Such a Beautiful Day by US director Don Hertzfeldt. A special mention was given to Voidov by Austria’s Manuel Knapp.

Mihai Grecu  and Thibault Gleize from France won a one month artist residency at Vienna’s Museum Quarter for their experimental film Exland. The audience award in this category went to The Pub by UK’s Joseph Pierce.

The award for Best Female Director, worth €1,000 sponsored by the Elfi Dassanowsky Fund, was given to Karolina Glusiec from Poland for animated film Velocity.

In the national competition, the Vienna Short Film Award for the best Austrian Film worth €2,000 provided by VDFS, went to Hände zum Himmel by Ulrike Putzer und Matthias van Baaren. Lotte Schreiber received a special mention for GHL, while both the Youth Jury and the audience voted for We Fly by Ulrike Kofler.

The best Austrian newcomer award and €1,000 sponsored by  the VAM Collecting Society for Audiovisual Media went to Kurdwin Ayub for Familienurlaub.

The full list of awards can be found here.