SIFFA 2025

A Decade of the Festival

SIFFA 2025 was a double celebration: the festival’s 15th edition and its 10th anniversary, held across London from 20–28 November at Vue Cinema Piccadilly, with the Closing Ceremony and Awards Gala in Mayfair. Ten years on from its founding in 2016, the anniversary edition gathered filmmakers, artists and thinkers from around the world under a single guiding theme: Cinema of Higher Values: Beyond Differences, Towards Dialogue, inspired by the Chilean philosopher Dario Salas Sommer.

The Winners

An international panel across three juries, for the Feature, Documentary and Short Film competitions, selected the year’s award winners.

Feature Films

• Best Feature Film: The Postman (Russia), dir. Andrey Razenkov
• Best Director: Farkhat Sharipov, Evacuation (Kazakhstan)
• Best Actor: Alexander Petrov, The Postman
• Best Actress: Natalia Witmer, Evacuation
• Best Screenplay: Andrey Razenkov & Mikhail Petukhov, The Postman
• Best Cinematography: Chiang Shen Feng, Qingtong and Kuihua (China)
• Best Editing: Badeimon Khashiing, The Elysian Field (India)
• Best Production Design: Dmitriy Mestnikov, Legends of Eternal Snow (Russia)
• Best Original Score: Iman Ahmad, Escape (UK)
• Best Supporting Actress: Sophie Rankin, Escape (UK)
• Best Child Actor: Xueya Feng, Qingtong and Kuihua
• Best Film on Ethnocultural Heritage: Legends of Eternal Snow
• Best Family Feature: Palma 2 (Russia), dir. Vladimir Kondaurov
• Special Jury Prize & Best Ensemble Cast: Swallowtail and Dragonfly (USA), dir. Julia Jay Pierrepont III
• Vera Glagoleva Award (Woman Director), Best International Feature: New Year’s Miracle (Russia), dir. Oksana Stashenko
• Mohy Kandour Award (youth-focused film): Besieged (Mexico), dir. Lucero González Pasarán
• Diplomacy & Humanity Award: NeGogen (Russia), dir. Polina Oldenburg

Documentaries

• Best Documentary: Taymetov: The Forgotten Hero (Uzbekistan), dir. Eldar Yuldashev
• Best Newcomer: Lydia Grigorieva: I Choose to Live (UK), dir. Maria Bregman

Short Films

• Best Short Film: The Interval (Belarus), dir. Kirill Khaletsky
• Best Ensemble Cast & Best Social Impact: The Trap (Russia), dir. Sergey Baryshev
• The Roots Award: The Turtle (Russia), dir. Moris Amiryan
• Best Emotional Impact: Maru and My Friend’s Wedding (Republic of Korea), dir. Hyunbin Lee
• Best Child Newcomers: Nora Rosestolato & Eva Niccolai, Only Daughters (Italy), dir. Noemi Forti

President’s Awards

• Martha Fiennes: Special SIFFA recognition (IRIDA statuette) for an outstanding contribution to world cinema (director of Onegin)
• Aleksey Antropov & the Antropov Foundation: Special SIFFA recognition (IRIDA statuette) for Temptation by Civilization
• Special President’s Diploma, Cultural Bridging: Flying with Fins, dir. Maria Averina (Bulgaria)
• Special President’s Diploma, Outstanding Music: composer Aleksander Aleksandrov, Messengers of Light (dir. Lidia Grigorieva)

Beyond the Competition

The anniversary programme reached well past the screenings. It opened with a masterclass at Raindance Studios led by award-winning investigative filmmaker Richard Belfield; an official press conference at The Castle Cinema in Hackney presented the documentary Temptation by Civilisation; and an industry talk led by filmmaker Joel Van Der Molen explored how independent films find their audience today. A special Victory Day programme, marking the 80th anniversary of the end of the Second World War, screened non-competitive work by contemporary Russian directors.

In a world that is becoming more and more divided, our film festival is breaking down national borders. Films have overcome distances, differences of cultures and beliefs, uniting us.

Closing a Decade

Ten years after its first edition, SIFFA marked its anniversary the way it began, as a meeting place for independent voices from across the world. The winners, the honorary awards and the industry gatherings all returned to the same conviction: that cinema, at its best, is a bridge between cultures.