Short Scene is a half-year intensive workshop that combines screenwriting theory and practise, idea development, and script production for a short film. This year’s Short Scene is the eighth in a row, however, enriched and updated since 2022. What’s more, for the first time in its existence, it is being supported by the Directors Guild of Slovenia in collaboration with the Slovenian Film Centre and in partnership with Kraken, the Society for Short Film Promotion. Find out more at dsr.si.

Short Scene’s guest mentor, Christian Gamst Miller-Harris, will talk about how to view a script and the process of writing it as useful tools. He will address questions such as how screenwriters approach projects, which subjects are compelling enough to warrant a film, where to find inspiration, and how to build a structure. He will reveal his own writing processes and tools, which others may find useful when things go well or when you hit a block. 

In her talk, Tara Najd Ahmadi will discuss her research and practise in relation to the festival’s theme of the year, resistance. In her presentation, she describes what it means to create works that are informed by collective struggles, fragmented formats, and incomplete narratives and highlights the process of creating a dialectical connection with history as an active form of resistance.

Tara Najd Ahmadi is a non-fiction filmmaker and scholar.

Borjana Gaković will focus on curatorial cinema work as an aesthetic, media, and cultural practise in light of resistant theories of cinema, which understand cinema as a place of public, socio-political, and discursive debate. Whether it is a thematic film series, an experimental film programme, or a retrospective, curatorial work for the arthouse cinema, as well as certain festival sections, is situated at the intersection of theory and practise. This includes research and archival work as well as conceptual and organisational activities.

Borjana Gaković is a film and media scholar, curator, and author.

What are the circumstances surrounding the creation and publication of a short film review? What is the current state of short film reflection in film criticism workshops, and how is the learning process going? The associates of three film criticism workshops, Muanis Sinanović (mentor of Ostrenje pogleda), Vitja Dominkuš Dreu (mentor of Do zadnje besede), and Leonardo Goi Moro (mentor of The END) will share their experiences with the practice and pedagogy of short film criticism in a world that traditionally offers more opportunity and space to feature films.

We cannot promise you bearable temperatures or world salvation, but we can warm you up prior to the exam period and enjoy a sho(r)t or two.

Reserve your evenings for critical viewing of shorts and listening to guest filmmakers that might just answers some of your questions. Additionally, guided by mentors, you will sharpen your thoughts into shorter writings that are going to be published on the festival website e-kino.si, with a selected few also making it into the KINO! film magazine. 

The film-criticism workshop will be headed by Žiga Brdnik, a regular writer for KINO! and Ekran, a film critic and curator.

A workshop for all high school or faculty students who want to think critically about films and experiment with new media. What we offer is not a traditional critique writing workshop, but rather a review of a selected film in whichever format, be it stories, reels, videoblogs, etc. Guided by mentors Natalija Majsova, a film critic, and Luka Marčetić, a director, screenwriter, and new media content creator (known for TV series V dvoje (2015 to present) and the films Pr' Hostar (2016) and Pr' Hostar 2‰ (2022)), participants will learn not only the elements of film criticism, but also the specifics of the various contemporary media as the frames of our views and platforms for critical expression.

The best film reviews will be presented at a special event of the October Film School in Slovenian Cinematheque, held this year under the name We are watching a film and the film is watching us.

Held in cooperation with Ekran and financially supported by the Slovenian Film Centre.

A new and critical look at European short film: six international short film festivals have joined forces to form the European Network for Film Discourse (The END). Officially established in March 2023, the new alliance, which is closely linked to the successful online magazine Talking Shorts, will receive EU funding for the next two years via the "Creative Europe – MEDIA" programme.

The network consists of Filmfest Dresden, Vienna Shorts, Lago Film Fest, Kortfilmfestival Leuven, FeKK Ljubljana Short Film Festival, and Vilnius International Short Film Festival. Its main purpose is to promote critical film discourse by and for a younger generation and to familiarise new audiences with a flourishing European film landscape, including cooperative workshops, mentoring programmes, and various community activities.

The fact that the network has given itself the tongue-in-cheek acronym "The END" is for good reason. "Both European cinema and film criticism like to be declared dead," says network coordinator Anne Gaschütz from Dresden with a smile, adding that the new platform aims to actively counter this. "When 'The End' appears in classic cinema, it also usually marks the beginning of the discussion about the film. We thought that was a nice analogy."

The participants of the workshop will travel to festivals and hone their writing skills under the guidance of several film professionals. Principal among them is Leonardo Goi Moro, a journalist and film critic. He is a staff writer and columnist at MUBI and also contributes to a handful of other outlets, including The Film Stage, Senses of Cinema, Reverse Shot, and Film Comment. Parallel to his writings and festival globetrotting, he runs the Berlinale Talents Press, a platform for emerging critics. Video essayist Jessica McGoff and film curator Jurij Meden will also participate as mentors at the workshop.

With the assistance of their mentors, Olga Michalik, Miha Možina and Tomaž Pavkovič, the participants will pay close attention to the action at the festival and learn to film and edit various forms of documentary (such as an interview, commentary, festival video, and documentation). They will further learn the secrets of groupwork and documentary journalism, as well as see the festival's mechanisms, and meet the team and guests.