This year, TIFF is one of the founding partners of SMART7, an initiative aimed at promoting innovation in European cinema and enhancing the audience experience.
SMART7 is a network of European film festivals dedicated to the development of the cultural industry and the festival field. It aims to provide a meeting space for works by new European filmmakers within an itinerant international competition. The initiative is the result of collaboration between seven film festivals with a similar vision for the future of the industry.
Alongside TIFF, the project's founders include film festivals from Poland, Lithuania, Portugal, Spain, Greece, and Iceland. These include New Horizons International Film Festival (Poland), IndieLisboa International Film Festival (Portugal), Thessaloniki International Film Festival (Greece), Madrid International Film Festival (Spain), Reykjavik International Film Festival (Iceland), and Vilnius International Film Festival Kino Pavasaris (Lithuania).
Built on diversity, inclusion, and a strong commitment to sustainability, the initiative also launches the SMART7 Competition, a joint itinerant program of the festivals, consisting of seven innovative films, one proposed by each organization. Dedicated to emerging directors, the section offers a prize of 5000 EUR to support young creators, with an international jury composed of young people from participating countries.
Among the films proposed this year, we find the surrealist drama "Mammalia" (Romania/Poland/Germany, 2023), questioning important concepts such as identity and masculinity. Inspired by real events and filmed with non-professional actors, the series continues with "Bread and Salt" (Poland, 2022), tackling the sharp issue of violence, and "Don't Forget to Blink" (Lithuania, 2022), a delicate psychological drama examining love, selfishness, anxiety, loyalty, and jealousy in different human relationships.
The competition continues with "Tobacco Barns" (Spain, 2022), which uses the conventions of fantasy to build a story about childhood and coming of age in southern Spain. A nostalgic and inventive journey that takes us through Lisbon, broken hearts, existential crises, and tragic heroes, "Índia" (Portugal, 2022) is a true love letter to cinema and its physical or imaginary spaces. Another experimental film, "Mannvirki" (Iceland, 2023), explores the relationship between humans and nature, creating a space imbued with textures, soundscapes, and complex structures. The selection concludes on a comedic note with "Black Market" (Greece, 2022), a mockumentary, a story about xenophobia packaged in a bittersweet comedy about the absurdity of everyday life.
The SMART7 initiative expects to accelerate the professionalization of the industry and improve the distribution of European films by nurturing and educating a new generation of cinephiles.