2025 Winners
Best Documentary
Forty Days Road
Director: Ali Ziani
In Forty Days Road, two colleagues (Ali and Ian) set out on a captivating journey across Egypt to trace the long route of camels traveling from Sudan to a market near Cairo. Along the way, they uncover the tough conditions of transport and join the camels on a 24-hour journey from the Sudanese border to one of the biggest Egyptian camel market near Cairo.
Country: (Germany/Morocco)
Best Fiction
Ben's Birthday
Director: Robert Decani
Ben is nine years old today. Thus, his father lets him choose three sweets on a trip to the supermarket. His innocence is clouded when he observes his father being accosted by a stranger at the supermarket checkout shortly afterwards. Little Ben doesn't understand much from a distance, but his father's ethnicity seems to play a role. Ben doesn't know exactly what has happened, but for the first time he realizes that something has.
Country: Germany
Best Animation
Boudoir Doll
Directors: Dandan Luo
A beautiful lady indulges in the creation of puppets. She often felt that there were hands following her and spying on her in the dark. She did not resist, and she thought she could always coexist with them. Until one night, the hands put ropes on the sleeping heroine, and she became a living puppet. When she woke up, she had entered the world of the magic hand, where a stage play was being staged. In the play, a lady gradually became trapped in a single and repetitive life from freedom and happiness. Outside the stage, the heroine was trapped by countless ropes and was forced to watch this dark and hopeless play. The fire of desire to escape burned blazingly in the hearts of the two people inside and outside the theater. Taking advantage of the night again, they took all possible actions to fight for their own freedom.
Country: China
Audience Choice Award
Som Doma
Director: Luca-Els Mauritz and Lukas Mutschler
"If my Lusatia is no longer Sorbian, then I'll riot!" - is the maxim of two young Sorbians, Mira and Luka. In Som Doma, Mira and Luka are accompanied as they produce a short film, which seeks to address queer topics in their supposedly conservative Sorbian community. Between the dying Sorbian language and queer-hostile voices in their environment, Mira and Luka search for their place in their own home.
Country: Germany
