# Thessaloniki International Film Festival

The Thessaloniki International Film Festival (TIFF) is a film festival held every November in Thessaloniki, Greece. It is organized by the Thessaloniki Film Festival under the auspices of the Greek Ministry of Culture. It features international competition sections, and its program includes tributes to major filmmakers and national cinemas, as well as sidebar events such as masterclasses, exhibitions, live concerts and workshops. In addition to TIFF, the Thessaloniki Film Festival holds the annual Thessaloniki Documentary Festival (TDF) in March.

## Overview

The Thessaloniki International Film Festival focuses on independent cinema and emerging filmmakers from around the world. The festival serves as an essential platform for film professionals from Greece and Southeast Europe. The event attracts an audience of more than 80.000. Hundreds of Greek and foreign guests, including major figures of the international film scene, have attended TIFF.
TIFF is held at the historical “Olympion” theater at the central Thessaloniki Aristotelous Square and, since 1999, at the Thessaloniki port, in four theaters housed at two newly-restored warehouses. The festival hub is Warehouse C, located at the city port; several sidebar events take place at the Thessaloniki Cinema Museum, also part of the Thessaloniki Film Festival Cultural Institution.
TIFF comprises three competition sections: International Competition for the first or second feature film by emerging directors; “Meet the Neighbors” International Competition, for films from the region spanning from Southeast Europe to the Near East; and Virtual Reality (VR) Competition.
Agora is the developmental section of the Thessaloniki Film Festival, reaching out to international film professionals. Agora is one of the most dynamic and constantly growing film markets globally.

## History

The Thessaloniki Film Festival was launched as a national film festival in 1960 under the name “Greek Film Week” with the contribution of “Techni” Macedonian Art Society. The event was renamed “Thessaloniki Greek Film Festival” in 1966 and continued as a national film festival until 1991. During these years, the festival closely followed the trends of the national film production, its program highlighting the emergence of the “New Greek Cinema”, while showcasing the work of world cinema auteurs. After the political changeover that followed the 7-year Greek military regime (1967-1974), the festival was intensely politicized, reflecting the political climate of the day, yet keeping its focus on art-house cinema. The event was subject to the Ministry of Trade by 1981 when it came under the auspices of the Greek Ministry of Culture. Following a new national law on cinema, an artistic director was appointed in 1986.
In 1992, during its 33rd edition, TIFF became an international festival under the artistic direction of film critic Michalis Demopoulos. Film director Theo Angelopoulos was appointed president. Since then, the festival has been committed to international independent cinema and the discovery of promising voices from around the world and from the Balkans. Further to showcasing the domestic film production, the festival presents independent films, premieres and tributes to major Greek and international filmmakers while hosting a large number of sidebar events.

## Notable guests and tributes

Leading filmmakers that have attended TIFF include Abbas Kiarostami, Nagisa Oshima, Nanni Moretti, Bernardo Bertolucci, Manoel de Oliveira, Ken Loach, Agnès Varda, Béla Tarr, Todd Solondz, Nuri Bilge Ceylan, Francis Ford Coppola, Wim Wenders, Alfonso Cuarón, Oliver Stone, Emir Kusturica, Fatih Akin, Werner Herzog, Takeshi Kitano, Michael Winterbottom, Aki Kaurismäki, Jim Jarmusch, Alexander Payne, Louie Psihoyos and John Waters.
Acclaimed actors, actresses and artists who visited TIFF either as guests or as member of the festival juries include Catherine Deneuve, Harvey Keitel, Faye Dunaway, Isabelle Huppert, John Malkovich, Willem Dafoe, Sam Rockwell, Michael Ondaatje and Jean Marc Barr.
TIFF has held the following tributes to acclaimed auteurs, national cinemas and movements:
60th Festival – 2019
Gregory Markopoulos and Robert Beavers
Albert Serra
Joanna Hogg
Dušan Makavejev
59th Festival – 2018
Jaime Rosales
yyyoungcut
Nanouk Leopold
Cristóbal León & Joaquín Cociña
Greek Queer Cinema
Iordanis Ananiadis
Before the Wave Breaks: the Road to New Romanian Cinema
58th Festival – 2017
Ruben Östlund
Ildikó Enyedi
Armand Gatti
Ida Lupino
From Words to Images: Balkan Literature and Cinema
57th Festival – 2016
Philippe Grandrieux
Leonardo Favio
Zeki Demirkubuz
56th Festival – 2015
Arnaud Desplechin
Focus on New Austrian films
Mircea Daneliuc
55th Festival – 2014
Ramin Bahrani
Roy Andersson
Kornél Mundruczó
Želimir Žilnik
54th Festival – 2013
Contemporary Argentine Cinema
Claire Simon
Alain Guiraudie
Balkan Survey 1994-2013
53rd Festival – 2012
Aki Kaurismäki
Andreas Dresen
Bahman Ghobadi
Cristian Mungiu
Theo Angelopoulos
Costas Zapas
Lior Shamriz
52nd Festival – 2011
Ole Christian Madsen
Sara Driver
Paolo Sorentino
Ulrich Seidl
Erden Kıral
Éric Baudelaire
Dror Heller
Constantine Giannaris
51st Festival – 2010
Susanne Bier
Dorota Kędzierzawska
Mohamed Al-Daradji
Werner Schröter
Apichatpong Weerasethakul
Croatian Animation: from the Zagreb School to the Present
Borivoj Dovniković-Bordo
Martin Putz
50th Festival – 2009
Werner Herzog
Jeremy Thomas
Philippines Rising
Pinku eiga: beyond Pink
Goran Paskaljević
Ljubomir Šimunić
49th Festival – 2008
Jean-Pierre & Luc Dardenne
Takeshi Kitano
Manos Zacharias
Oliver Stone
Willem Dafoe
Diablo Cody
Haris Zambarloukos
Gustavo Santaolalla
Richard Jobson
Guillermo Navarro
Division and Unity: Cinema in the Middle East
Ousmane Sembène
Terence Davies
Contemporary Turkish Cinema
Spotlight: Romanian Shorts
Ivan Ladislav Galeta
BB-Χ: Hungarian experimental film and the Béla Balázs Studio
48th Festival – 2007
John Sayles
William Klein
Nikos Nikolaidis
Nikos Kazantzakis
Nikos Kourkoulos
Sotiris Moustakas
Sokratis Kapsaskis
Yorgos Skalenakis
New Spanish Cinema
Nae Caranfil
Lee Chang-dong
Yasmin Ahmad
Mikio Naruse
47th Festival – 2006
Wim Wenders
Stavros Tsiolis
Dimos Theos
Alexis Damianos
Greek Screenwriters Spotlight
Yannis Fafoutis
Maria Plyta
Brazilian Cinema
New Cinema from China: Another View
Nuri Bilge Ceylan
Abderrahmane Sissako
Jim McKay
Jan Švankmajer
46th Festival – 2005
Hou Hsiao-hsien
Patrice Chéreau
Vittorio Storaro
Michael Winterbottom
Yorgos Panousopoulos
Nico Papatakis
Antoinetta Angelidis
Park Chan-wook
Focus on Mexican Cinema
Focus on Danish Cinema
Focus on Irish Cinema
Kutluğ Ataman
Seijun Suzuki
Kim Jee-woon
45th Festival – 2004
Abbas Kiarostami
Victor Erice
Kiyoshi Kurosawa
Katerina Thomadaki & Maria Klonari
Kostas Sfikas
Alexis Damianos
Iakovos Kambanellis
Manos Zacharias
Isabelle Huppert
Movies of Our Time: the Best of the New Argentine cinema
Argentine 2004: Wind of Change Still Blowing
New French Cinema
New Russian Cinema
Hirokazu Kore-eda
Götz Spielmann
Todd Verow
Peter Greenaway
44th Festival – 2003
Wong Kar-wai
Otar Iosseliani
João César Monteiro
Nikos Panayotopoulos
Stars of the Steppe
Michael Snow
Shinya Tsukamoto
43rd Festival – 2002
Μarco Bellocchio
Béla Tarr
Bob Rafelson
Pantelis Voulgaris
Giannis Dalianidis
Asian Vision
Jaime Humberto Hermosillo
Hong Sang-Soo
Shirin Neshat
Aurelio Grimaldi
42ο Festival – 2001
John Boorman
Dinos Dimopoulos
Stavros Tornes
Argentinian Cinema: a Time of Changes
German Cinema 2000
French Cinema 2000
US Independents
3x3: Stanley Kwan, Rakhshān Banietemad, Jan Hřebejk
41st Festival – 2000
Jerzy Skolimowski
Theodoros Angelopoulos
Harvey Keitel
New Russian Cinema: after Perestroika
Dinos Katsouridis
New French Cinema
New Austrian Cinema
Agnès Varda
Paulo Branco
40th Festival – 1999
Pedro Almodóvar
Amos Gitai
Tonino Guerra
Man Ray
Portuguese Cinema: the Portuguese Spring
Vassilis Georgiadis
US Independents
New German Cinema
New French Cinema
Alison Anders
39ο Festival – 1998
Ken Loach
Jean-Daniel Pollet
Akira Kurosawa
Asian Vision
3x3: Marcel Grier, François Ozon, Ventura Pons
US Independents
New French Cinema
38ο Festival – 1997
Claude Chabrol
Arturo Ripstein
Manoel De Oliveira
Irene Papas
Takis Kanellopoulos
Tsai Ming-liang
Aleksandr Sokurov
3x3: Tony Gatlif, Errol Morris, Fridrik Thor Fridriksson
Views of the New French Cinema
37ο Festival – 1996
Bernardo Bertolucci
Grigoris Grigoriou
Lucian Pintilie
3x3: Jan Svěrák, Sergei Bodrov, Carlo Mazzacurati
Peter Greenaway
American Independents
36th Festival – 1995
Krzysztof Kieślowski
Nanni Moretti
Frida Liapa
Michael Cacoyannis
Treasures of Iranian Cinema
Mohsen Makhmalbaf
American Independents
Cine Documenta
Sergei Eisenstein
35th Festival – 1994
Nagisa Oshima
Yorgos Tzavelas
Tonia Marketaki
Russian Cinema
Charles Burnett
Michael Haneke
Rainer Werner Fassbinder
Sergei Parajanov
34th Festival – 1993
David Cronenberg
Hal Hartley
Jules Dassin
Alexis Damianos
Pavlos Zannas

## Festival sections

The Thessaloniki International Film Festival comprises the following sections:
* International Competition section, screening the first or second film by emerging directors from around the world.
* “Meet the Neighbors” International Competition section, screening films from the region spanning from Southeast Europe to the Middle East.
* Virtual Reality (VR) International Competition section.
* “Open Horizons” program, a selection of cutting-edge and avant-garde independent films.
* Greek Film Festival, a showcase of the year’s Greek film production.
* “Balkan Survey”, monitoring contemporary trends of Balkan cinema.
* “Youth screen”, featuring special screenings for schoolchildren and youths.
TIFF’s line-up further includes Out-of-Competition films, special screenings and “Carte Blanche” special programs.

## Agora

TIFF's "Agora" was launched in 2005, establishing a productive and unique form of helping and introducing professionals visiting Thessaloniki from Southeast Europe, the Mediterranean region and the rest of the world to the industry professionals, consultants, tutors, and potential collaborators invited to the festival.
The Agora includes the following activities:
Agora Film Market
The Agora Film Market promotes the majority of the feature films participating in the official sections of the Festival. Additionally, more titles from the countries that the Agora focuses on are presented, even if they are not part of the festival’s main program. In this way, they will have the opportunity to find their way to other international film festivals, sales agents and distributors. The Agora Film Market also includes previous films by the Crossroads participants and a selection of Greek films produced within the last year.
Crossroads Co-Production Forum
Crossroads chooses projects based on the quality of the script, the creative team and the likelihood of their being produced. Crossroads aims to support the producers of feature-length film projects that are linked to Central Europe, the Mediterranean or Balkan countries.
Agora Works in Progress
This industry activity gives the opportunity to selected sales agents, distributors, and festival programmers from all over the world to be the first to discover feature films from the Mediterranean and Balkan countries, in the stage just before completion.
Agora Talks
New directors and producers get the opportunity to learn from renowned film professionals. A day full of discussions where people who wish to establish themselves in the industry can exchange ideas, methods, and approaches about the development of the audiovisual sector.
Thessaloniki Locarno Industry Academy International
Thessaloniki International Film Festival in collaboration with Locarno Film Festival launched in 2016 the Thessaloniki Locarno Industry Academy International in Southeast Europe and the Mediterranean. The Thessaloniki Locarno Industry Academy International is a training program created to help young professionals of the cinema industry –sales agents, distributors, and new media professionals– to extend their experience and networking in the fields of international sales, marketing, distribution and programming.
Meet the Future
A new initiative of the Thessaloniki IFF and the Agora that focuses on the younger generation of Greek filmmakers.

## Awards

The films of the International Competition program are eligible for the Best Full-length Feature Film Award “Theo Angelopoulos” (Golden Alexander, 15.000 euros cash prize), the Special Jury Award (Silver Alexander, 8.000 euros cash prize), the Special Jury Award for Best Director (Bronze Alexander), the Best Actor and Actress Awards, and the Best Artistic Achievement or Screenplay Award. The awards are selected by a five-member international jury.
The Best Full-length Feature Film Award (Golden Alexander, 3.000 euros cash prize) is bestowed on a film competing at the “Meet the Neighbors” competition section, awarded by a three-member international jury.
The Best VR Film award (accompanied by a 3.000 euros cash prize) is awarded to the best film in the VR Competition Section.
Independent juries hand parallel awards, including the “Mermaid Award” for the best LGBTQI-themed film, the Youth Jury Awards, the “Human Values Award” granted by the Hellenic Parliament, the awards of the Greek Film Center, the Hellenic Broadcasting Corporation Award, the “J.F. Costopoulos Foundation Award” for a Greek film holding its premiere at the festival, and the “WIFT GR Award” for the best woman’s contribution and presence in front or behind the camera.
Further awards are handed by the International Film Critics’ Association (FIPRESCI) and the Greek Association of Film Critics.
Audience Awards are presented to films participating both in the international and the Greek program of the festival.

## Award-winning films
### II. Thessaloniki International Film Festival (Golden Alexander, 1992- )

| Year | Film | Director | Country of origin |
| 1992 | Orlando | Sally Potter | United Kingdom |
| 1992 | Dance in the Night | Aleko Tsabadze | Georgia |
| 1993 | From the Snow | Sotiris Goritsas | Greece |
| 1994 | The Days | Wang Xiaoshuai | China |
| 1995 | Postman | He Jianjun | China |
| 1996 | Brothers in Trouble | Udayan Prasad | United Kingdom |
| 1997 | Road to Nhill | Sue Brooks | Australia |
| 1998 | Fishes in August | Yōichirō Takahashi | Japan |
| 1999 | Shower | Zhang Yang | China |
| 2000 | Last Resort | Paweł Pawlikowski | United Kingdom |
| 2001 | Tirana Year Zero | Fatmir Koçi | Albania |
| 2002 | Woman of Water | Hidenori Sugimori | Japan |
| 2002 | Blissfully Yours | Apichatpong Weerasethakul | Thailand |
| 2003 | The Last Train | Aleksei German | Russia |
| 2004 | Bitter Dream | Mohsen Amiryousefi | Iran |
| 2005 | Someone Else's Happiness | Fien Troch | Belgium |
| 2006 | Family Ties | Kim Tae-yong | South Korea |
| 2007 | The Red Awn | Cai Shangjun | China |
| 2008 | Over There | Abdolreza Kahani | Iran |
| 2009 | Ajami | Scandar Copti and Yaron Shani | Israel / Germany |
| 2010 | Periferic | Bogdan George Apetri | Romania |
| 2011 | Twilight Portrait | Angelina Nikonova | Russia |
| 2012 | A Hijacking | Tobias Lindholm | Denmark |
| 2013 | The Golden Cage | Diego Quemada-Díez | Mexico |
| 2014 | Perpetual Sadness | Jorge Perez Solano | Mexico |
| 2015 | Rams | Grímur Hákonarson | Iceland |
| 2016 | Deadly Wheelchairs | Attila Till | Hungary |
| 2017 | Ravens (film) | Jens Assur | Sweden |
| 2018 | Ray & Liz | Richard Billingham | United Kingdom |
| 2019 | Fire Will Come | Oliver Laxe | Spain |
| 2020 | Identifying Features | Fernanda Valadez | Mexico/ Spain |
| 2021 | Softie | Samuel Theis | France |
| 2022 | I Have Electric Dreams | Valentina Maurel | Belgium France Costa Rica |