Salgado’s film “Shame” received the Grand Prix of the Moscow Film Festival

The 46th International Film Festival has ended in Moscow. Grand Prix Winner became Mexican director Miguel Salgado with the film “Shame”, shot last year. This drama tells the story of two teenagers who are captured by bandits. One of them dies, the second manages to escape, but he struggles with himself, unable to tell his friend’s relatives about his death.

Best Short Film Jury recognized the film “Partners” by Spanish director José Maria Flores. The best documentary film was “The Rook” by Iranian Sam Kalantari. The best Russian film is Yulia Trofimova’s film “Liar”. The jury’s special prize went to the film “Nirvana” directed by Asif Islam from Bangladesh.

The Moscow International Film Festival is one of the oldest film festivals in the world. It was first held in 1935 and became regular in 1959. For a long time, the MIFF was included in the list of the most prestigious festivals, along with Cannes, Venice and Berlin.

After the outbreak of war in Ukraine, many Western directors and film companies refused to participate in the Moscow festival. The organizers of the event this year relied on the “global South”, as part of the festival passed round table “Prospects for co-production and genre preferences of the BRICS countries.”

In 2022, a scandal erupted around the festival when the famous film director Vitaly Mansky said that at the MIFF allegedly “at least 85% of the budget is stolen.” The president of the festival, film director Nikita Mikhalkov, filed a statement with the police against Mansky for libel. The Ministry of Internal Affairs put Mansky on the wanted list.