Category: BEST ACTRESS & ACTORS AWARD – 2025 ARFF BERLIN

(Winner)

Original Film Title: Sin

Director’s Name: Gui Merlino, Juliana Lourenção

Writer’s Name: Juliana Lourenção

Producer: Gui Merlino

Country of Origin: Brazil

Country of Filming: Brazil

Language: Portuguese

Runtime:15 minutes 52 seconds

Film Description:

SIN is a film about a woman who frees herself from an abusive relationship driven by her survival instinct. A slice of a life. A single day. An impulse. A decision that forever diverts his trajectory.
A drama that concludes as an atmospheric horror story, with tragicomic features that ironize the levity with which violence against women is treated. Beyond reality, here fiction will allow us the pleasure of creating a world that subverts the standard acceptable by society with a surprising ending.

Pecado is an independent film, being shot in guerrilla warfare, without public funding, driven by the passion of many people for making cinema.

(Honorable Mention)

Original Film Title: The Bet

Director’s Name: Andrei Cristian Bortica

Writer’s Name: Andrei Cristian Bortica

Producer: Andrei Cristian Bortica

Country of Origin: Romania

Country of Filming: Romania

Language: Romanian

Runtime: 14 minutes 37 seconds

Film Description:

Ovidiu, after losing his HoReCa job during the pandemic, turns to online gambling to make ends meet. His partner, Alexia, an overworked paramedic, tries to support him, but the strain grows as Ovidiu’s gambling spirals out of control. He loses their savings and money borrowed from friends, pushing the couple into financial ruin.
As Ovidiu starts selling possessions to cover his losses, their relationship slowly crumbles.

(Finalist)

Original Film Title: The Christmas Hitlist

Director’s Name: Jonathan Andrew Nettleton

Writer’s Name: Jonathan Andrew Nettleton

Producer: Timothy Nettleton, Hannah Brooks, Jonathan Devoe, Ruben Vidal, Simon Rimmer, Michelle Auda

Country of Origin: United States

Country of Filming: United States

Language: English

Runtime: 16 minutes 35 seconds

Film Description:

When Christmas runs over budget, Santa gets orders from the North Pole’s Godfather to cut costs—by cutting down believers. What follows is a twisted holiday bloodbath filled with elves, ornaments, and offbeat murders in this cheerfully deranged dark comedy.

(Finalist)

Original Film Title: Seconds in Eternity

Director’s Name: Christian Schu

Writer’s Name: Christian Schu, Marina Welsch

Producer: White Eyebrow Group, MarWel Productions, Marina Welsch, Christian Schu, Karin Kehler

Country of Origin: Estonia, Germany

Country of Filming: Germany, Thailand

Language: English, German

Runtime: 42 minutes 14 seconds

Film Description:

An elegant woman in her later years feels the relentless march of time as she mourns her lost youth and missed chances. Alone in a dimly lit room, her life seems to fade with each cigarette she smokes. She observes a vibrant young woman, envying her youth and vitality. Through her introspections, we explore her deep desires and regrets. The narrative, rich with poetry and flashbacks, takes a dramatic turn with a potential murder, leading to a surprising twist. Despite its dark beginnings as a Film Noir, the film transforms into a celebration of life, ending on a hopeful, life-affirming note.

(Envision Award Winner)

Original Film Title: TOMMASA

Director’s Name: Julie Casamonti

Writer’s Name: Julie Casamonti

Producer: Julie Casamonti

Country of Origin: France

Country of Filming: United States

Language: English

Runtime: 10 minutes

Film Description:

TOMMASA is an experimental short film about lust, pain and obsession. Image driven and with little dialogue, individual audience members will have very contrasting interpretations of the story it tells. The film follows Tommasa’s character in a non-chronological timeline seeping in and out of her imagination. An unreliable narrator, possibly bias realities and messy entangled lovers.

(Honorable Mention)

Original Film Title: Bluebells

Director’s Name: Marc Gaudet

Writer’s Name: Lynn Whyte

Producer: Marc Gaudet, Petar Gatsby, Lynn Whyte

Country of Origin: Canada

Country of Filming: Canada

Language: English

Runtime: 12 minutes 16 seconds

Film Description: