The Zlin Film Festival, looking back upon its successful 61st edition, is one of those festivals helping ECFA to further establish the ECFA Doc Award. The ECFA Jury’s choice fell on KIDS CUP, a feature length young audience documentary by Line Hatland.
KIDS CUP (Denmark/Finland/Norway 2021) takes you to the world’s biggest soccer tournament for kids, where young players are facing plenty of challenges on and off the pitch. Afnan from Palestine, Yu from China, Fred from Brazil, and many others have been training hard to bring the trophy home.
The ECFA Jury: “Unique stories are connected through a universal topic. Going beyond this theme the film aims for a deeper understanding of each of the characters, who have to deal with the loss of a parent, political instabilities, parental pressure, etc. We follow them closely through emotional and exciting moments. And even though in the world of football winning is the only goal, in real life winning isn’t everything.”
The ECFA Jury were Julia Jarl (Sweden), Nicola Jones (Germany) & Michal Šašek (Czech Republic).
In semi post-pandemic times, the jury was amazed by the way people from Zlin exuberantly celebrated the festival’s return. Nicola Jones: “The involvement of local citizens makes the festival not only an event for cinema lovers but for the entire town. All that engagement and dedication is the proof of a certain pride, in the most positive sense.” You’ll find an interview with the ECFA Jury on the Zlin website.
On the long list of titles awarded in the Zlin Film Festival were SISTERS – THE SUMMER WE FOUND OUR SUPERPOWERS (Arild Østin Ommundsen & Silje Salomonsen, Norway – Golden Slipper for Best Feature Film for Children by the Int’l Expert Jury & Children’s Jury), SUN CHILDREN (Majid Majidi, Iran – Golden Slipper for Best Junior Film), DATING AMBER (David Freyne, Ireland – European Youth Jury) and VALENTINA (Cássio Pereira dos Santos, Brazil – Golden Slipper for Best Youth Film).