Why make a short film? Majority of filmmakers do not have the budget of major film studios. So can a film be made with a low budget or no budget at all? Of course you can. Many filmmakers have launched their careers making a low budget film. It costs nothing to be creative, you just have to let your creativity flow, take your time and once you have a script that you like, just start shooting.

 

The idea of starting the Malta International Television Short Film Festival is to screen short films on television. I believe that filmmakers of short films deserve an increase in the promotion, appreciation and international recognition of their works and in this respect we will be making the submissions available on demand on the Internet.

 

Judging of the films will be done by a panel of jurors and a guest judge. There will also be voting by SMS, Tele-voting and through the festival website. All non‑English language films will be sub-titled in English and since the judging will be in Maltese, all the dialogue is going to be sub-titled in English. This will ensure larger audience appreciation of the films that will be screened during the thirteen‑programme series which will starting in April 2009 on Malta’s national television station, Public Broadcasting Services Ltd.  A panel of foreign judges are being invited for the final programme of the series to award the Foreign Jury Award for the Best Film category of the festival.

 

The launching of the new short film festival is meant to complement other well established film festivals in Malta. One of the rules of this festival is that film entries in the festival cannot exceed ten minutes in duration. The committee is hoping that seeing these great films on television will enable the festivals to become more interesting and that it will deservedly increase the appreciation of short films from local and international film and video producers.

 

 

Tony Parnis
Festival Director / Producer