English
Moscow’s Patriki Film Festival will be Russia’s first international online film competition
Next year, the Patriki Film Festival will become Russia’s first competitive international online film festival. The chairman of the jury will be American film director, screenwriter, producer, and winner of the Venice Film Festival’s Golden Lion prize, Darren Aronofsky. And one of the festival key partner is START group.The fourth Patriki Film Festival will take place in Moscow in the summer of 2022. The festival will feature premieres of Russian and international films and TV shows. All entries will be available for free online viewing during the entire period of the festival. The event will include several competitive programs, public talks with artists, directors and producers, and charitable as well as official and social events. 'I am excited to be the head of the jury of the 2022 Patriki Film Festival. It has an open call for new filmmakers from all over the world to submit their feature films to compete for the Patriki Film Festival Grand Prix main award. The jury will be watching and will choose a winner this summer. Surprise us with your originality and personal visions. Thank you', commented Darren Aronofsky.
One of the festival’s key partners is START group, whose primary business is a like-named streaming service with its own studio. The SVOD is a leader in creating premium content on the market in the CIS region. Available worldwide for Russian-speaking audiences, START has created a slate of premium Russian original series in recent years, including Gold Diggers, Text, Container, Addicted and The Vampires of Midland. A START representative will be on the festival jury, and several participants will be able to present their films and series to viewers.
The winner of the main award will be selected from a shortlist of seven films. Entries will be accepted starting December 20; films of any length and with a bright artistic expression and original look can be submitted to the competition. Detailed terms and conditions can be found at the official website of the festival.
The founders of the festival, Marina Jigalova and Alexey Bokov, are professionally involved in the film industry and have extensive production experience. The first is a producer of more than a dozen films and TV shows, including The Book of Masters (2009), The Last Warrior (2017), and Happiness Is ... (2015, 2019). For more than 13 years she was all-time managing director for The Walt Disney Company’s Russia office, responsible for the development of all business segments and brands of the company in Georgia, Mongolia, and the CIS countries. Winner of the Golden Eagle film award (2019), chairman of the jury of short films at the 42nd Moscow Film Festival, and a frequent juror at major film festivals and television competitions.
The second has produced more than ten projects, including the feature film Veselchaki (2009) and the documentary Fortress. History of the Russian Crisis which in 2021 received a TEFI in the category ‘Documentary. Digital Media’. Alexey was also executive producer of the Mirror International Film Festival named after A. Andrei Tarkovsky and the Context festival of contemporary choreography. Alexey is head of the START ADS advertising division at START group.
'At the fourth Patriki Film Festival, we want to move away from the existing system and propose a new format, which, in our opinion, is much more in line with modern trends. The main difference between our film festival this time is the new international online format. At the same time, the festival will retain its name, since the Patriarch’s Pond is a symbol of the cultural and emotional spirit of Moscow. We want to expand the space, give more filmmakers from different countries the opportunity to present their works, show new genres and formats, and share our unique artistic vision of the modern world. In addition, we are creating a new digital platform that will enable anyone, from anywhere in the world, to watch any of the films presented at the festival for free. Usually, festival films are restricted to a very small audience, and we want to change this format', said festival co-founder Jigalova.
'The Patriki Film Festival has grown from a local city event to an international festival. The new online format we offer is an opportunity for filmmakers to show the entire world their work, a wonderful chance to be seen and heard from anywhere in the world. In this sense, our choice of Darren Aronofsky as jury chairman is very consistent with the concept of the festival, which opens up wide opportunities for creative expression. Aronofsky is in touch with the zeitgeist of today and certainly has a strong name, thanks to which the contestants have the chance to receive a direct ticket to Hollywood', remarked Bokov.
The general media partner of the festival in 2022 will once again be Independent Media, a Russian media holding company that publishes such international brands as Cosmopolitan, Harper's Bazaar, Esquire, Robb Report, Good Housekeeping and Grazia. Natalya Vesnina, Independent Media’s general director, concluded: 'We have been supporting the Patriki Film Festival for several years now. We are glad that the audience of Independent Media brands, which today has more than 80 million users, will have an excellent opportunity to be among the first to hear about the films premiering at the festival, to study these filmmakers’ works, and to learn about the latest trends in the world of cinema'.