“Meetings in Siberia” international film festival
Siberia and Novosibirsk are usually associated with severe cold, strong people and bears strolling along the streets. But in fact, Novosibirsk is a big cultural and industrial center, the largest transport hub in Siberia, the third largest city in Russia. It is here where on the cross roads of cultural and scientific breakthroughs the festival of documentary films came into being. It was so named as “Meetings in Siberia”.
“Meetings in Siberia” is an independent international documentary film festival with its great history. The main goals of the festival are “to open the borders” for Siberians to the world through presenting high-quality documentaries; bringing together famous mature and emerging filmmakers, giving them the opportunity to exchange ideas, to discuss the current hot topics and be open to the Siberian audience. Each year it has been the highly visible and greatly anticipated event in Novosibirsk.
The festival was held for the first time in 1996 by the non-profit organization “Meetings in Siberia” in Novosibirsk. Since then, more than 200 films have been shown to Novosibirsk viewers and guests of the region. More than 50 filmmakers from Europe, America, and Asia have met here, presented their works and become friends here in the middle of Siberia. The festival has hosted many celebrities -directors and filmmakers- Alan Heim, Academy Award Winner (USA); Victor Kossakovski, Venice prize winner , Heino Deckert – one of the successful European documentary and feature producer (Germany) ; maestro Jos Stelling ( Netherlands) ; Aleksey Fedorchenko – Venice prize-winner from Russia ; Steve Worker (England) with his famous “Young at heart” , directors – Nati Barats ( Israel), Boris Mitich (Serbia), Jeanne Bertould (Switzerland), and many others are among them .
Novosibirsk is proud of being the home city of Andrey Zvyagintsev , Academy Award Winner film director.
The festival takes place in September every year. Film screenings and meetings with film directors are held in Novosibirsk and the Novosibirsk region. Seminars, master classes, discussions, and photo exhibitions are used to be organized at the festival.
Films Selection is made by the Organizing Committee. There is no award-winning competition for the films, but according to the festival tradition three symbolic prizes are to be presented for the best films.
This year the 24th “Meetings in Siberia” festival will take place on November 29 – December 5, 2021.