15th Akbank Short Film Festival

Akbank Short Film Festival was held for the first time in 2004. It has developed further over the years into one of the leading arts and culture events in Istanbul with an increasingly diverse programme. The festival aims to encourage short film production, to deliver the films to audiences, to support new filmmakers, to champion short film internationally, to provide a debate platform for short film within a festival culture and to establish a festival for cinema-lovers to enjoy.

In addition to the national and international short film competitions, the festival includes various workshops, interviews and master classes and thus acts as an experience-sharing platform between cinema professionals and festivalgoers. Akbank Short Festival, which takes place in Akbank Sanat every year for ten days, is free of charge for all the events. The festival is composed of “Festival Shorts,” “World Shorts,” “Short to Feature,” “Experiences,” “Documentary Film,” “Perspective,” “Special Screening” and “Forum” sections. Films that have competed at world’s leading film festivals such as Cannes, Berlin, Venice are presented to audiences every year. The “Forum” section, which was opened for the first time in 2017, aims to support short films from the scriptwriting stage, organizes trainings for project development and a short film screenplay contest for production support.

So far the festival has featured valuable artists such as Abbas Kiarostami, Reha Erdem, Jessica Woodworth, Yeşim Ustaoğlu, Jafar Panahi, Ahmet Uluçay, Tayfun Pirselimoğlu, Coşkun Aral, Barış Pirhasan with master classes and film screenings.

Every year, with "Akbank Short Film Festival in Universities" event, the festival reaches various cities of Turkey other than Istanbul. The award winning films are screened to the students of universities in Turkey.

18 March - 28 March 2019

Akbank Sanat

Festival Booklet

15th Akbank Short Film Festival Selection

Short Film Fifteen

Private video of Maria goes viral during a volleyball class in a school in Lima.

Short Film Guilt

Diego is humiliated and punished by his father after telling him what happened.

Short Film Los Bastardos

Three teenagers spend a day in an apartment that doesn’t belong to them. They pretend to live the life of the owners, until fear and jealousy break in.

Short Film Mini Miss

Filmed entirely from the perspective of a 4-year-old, five young girls compete to be crowned Mini Miss Baby Brazil.

Short Film Our Song to War

Crocodile-men, a mystic river, some kids that like fishing and a war that ends share the same Colombian land; Bojaya.

Short Film San Miguel

In order to heal her grieving mother, Ana, a devout 9-year-old girl, pushes her faith to its limit in hopes of divine intervention.

Short Film Ad Infinitum

At the center of a barren and mysterious universe stands a shed. From within, the Leader oversees his subordinates, but they cannot look inside.

Short Film Frog Hunters

Dealing with the frog hunting profession that is being passed on from generation to generation by Romani people in Edirne, the documentary film blends the cultural structure and aesthetics of the Romani neighborhood and examines the details of frog hunting profession through the intimate relationship between fathers and sons.

Short Film My Sister

Elif is 10 years old, her sister Ayşe is 13. It’s a sticky summer in 1980’s Istanbul. When she has an accident, Ayşe spends the summer lying down.

Short Film Rotten

Mehmet and Sibel start to argue because of the bad smell coming from the apartment’s bathroom.

Conversation Where Does The Job of Casting Director Begin and How Long Does It Last?

Many potential actors are trying to get in touch with casting directors. Directors also work with casting directors in order to find the right actors.

Short Film AGift

Isfi can wear her comfortable pants among her guy friends but has to wear hijab to be accepted at Nita’s house.