An adven­ture in shorts at Cler­mont-Fer­rand Inter­na­tion­al Film Festival

The short film medi­um is often resis­tant to the com­mer­cial trap­pings that fea­ture films gen­er­al­ly become enmeshed with­in. As such, shorts are often a play­ground for exper­i­men­tal­ism, for provo­ca­tion, for young tal­ents to find their voice and estab­lished artists to play with the bound­aries of cin­e­ma. Yet to divorce the medi­um of short film from any kind of com­mer­cial imper­a­tive would also be unfair. Shorts become a prov­ing ground for many a direc­tor who will make a mark on the fea­ture film world in the years to come. And, per­haps more than ever before, the oppor­tu­ni­ties for short films to reach a glob­al audi­ence are much more diverse with estab­lished plat­forms such as MUBI show­cas­ing shorts amongst their fea­ture film offer­ings or new play­ers such as Argo offer­ing ded­i­cat­ed spaces for short content.

Gen­er­al­ly con­sid­ered to be the largest ded­i­cat­ed short film fes­ti­val in the world, the Cler­mont-Fer­rand Inter­na­tion­al Short Film Fes­ti­val embraces many of the con­tra­dic­tions that lie at the heart of the medi­um it cham­pi­ons. Com­mer­cial­ly it boasts impres­sive num­bers: in nor­mal years audi­ence num­ber can be in excess of 150’000 which makes it sec­ond only to Cannes in terms of film fes­ti­val atten­dance in France. The par­al­lel short film mar­ket wel­comes more than 3000 dis­trib­u­tors, buy­ers and fes­ti­vals show­ing that – while the indus­try for shorts is small­er than the fea­ture film world – an indus­try does exist.

But for all its indus­try and com­mer­cial cre­den­tials, there’s a streak of anar­chy that still run through­out the fes­ti­val. Orig­i­nal­ly estab­lished in 1979 as a short film week by the stu­dents of the then Cler­mont-Fer­rand Uni­ver­si­ty, the fes­ti­val runs to this day with no hier­ar­chy (there is no ​‘Fes­ti­val Direc­tor’ and every­one who works for the fes­ti­val is paid the same) and still offers free tick­ets for the home­less and the unem­ployed with huge dis­counts for children.

With­in sight of the dor­mant vol­cano Puy de Dôme, the French city – also known as the home of Miche­lin Tyres – this year once again wel­comed swathes of audi­ences, film­mak­ers and the short film indus­try between the 28^th Jan­u­ary and 5^th Feb­ru­ary. After mov­ing online in 2021, there was a pal­pa­ble sense of relief that the fes­ti­val could take place on-site even with strict health pro­to­cols in place. And whilst the cur­rent sit­u­a­tion meant that both audi­ence and indus­try atten­dance was down on pre­vi­ous years, there was an air of cau­tious opti­mism. With fes­ti­val hang­out L’Univers also prov­ing exceed­ing­ly pop­u­lar (with most peo­ple luck­i­ly out­side) there was some­thing reas­sur­ing­ly wel­com­ing about the fes­ti­val returning.

As always Cler­mont pre­sent­ed a diverse and eclec­tic range of shorts across three com­pe­ti­tions and spe­cial pro­grammes (slight­ly trun­cat­ed this year, though there was a pro­gramme ded­i­cat­ed to Dance films and Spain was the coun­try in focus). With more than 150 films on offer amongst the com­pe­ti­tion titles alone, it can be daunt­ing even for the most ardent of cinephiles. Giv­en that the fes­ti­val has no pre­mière pol­i­cy (anoth­er sign of the more rad­i­cal ideas that run through­out it) the com­pe­ti­tions con­tained a mix­ture of old­er fare that has already gar­nered a rep­u­ta­tion on the cir­cuit and new­er discoveries.

High­lights in the Inter­na­tion­al Com­pe­ti­tion includ­ed ulti­mate Grand Prix win­ner Mate. From direc­tor George-Alex Nagle, the Aus­tralian effort is a fas­ci­nat­ing dra­ma about a no-hop­er who is put in charge of a young school­boy. With­in a real­ist aes­thet­ic, the film takes on issues of mas­culin­i­ty and social class and is often dark­ly com­pelling. Also screen­ing, fresh from win­ning a Short Film Jury award at Sun­dance, was Samir Karahoda’s rather won­der­ful Pa Vend (Dis­placed). Blur­ring the lines between doc­u­men­tary and fic­tion, the film explores ideas of belong­ing, immi­gra­tion and nation­al­i­ty with a sly humour and eye for human­i­ty. More straight doc­u­men­tary was evi­dent in Ghosts of Moria a film from direc­tors Michael Gra­versen and Flo­ri­an Elab­di which sees two refugees from Alep­po scav­enge in the remains of the destroyed Moria refugee camp in Greece. By focus­ing on the friend­ship of the two main pro­tag­o­nists, the film chan­nels the over­whelm­ing tragedy of Syr­ia through their expe­ri­ences and the film is a beau­ti­ful and mov­ing ode to friend­ship and reminder of what many peo­ple have lost.

In the festival’s Lab com­pe­ti­tion, focus­ing on more eso­teric fare, the win­ning film was Le Boug Doug (Meet Doug), Théo Jollet’s amaz­ing­ly bold focus on two small town crim­i­nals. While real­ism is seem­ing­ly the order of the day, the film starts to go down more bold and sur­re­al routes and is an exhil­a­rat­ing piece of work. The same goes for Neon Phan­tom, Leonar­do Martinelli’s Locarno win­ning effort that melds social cri­tique with dance movie.

With many, many films on offer Cler­mont-Fer­rand was a wel­come reminder of the vital­i­ty of the medi­um and the fact that there is still a hun­gry audi­ence for shorts. It also act­ed as a reminder that cin­e­ma can also be an act of togeth­er­ness (albeit one that is cur­rent­ly observ­ing pro­to­cols) and that fes­ti­vals are still an impor­tant nexus point for cel­e­brat­ing cin­e­ma in all its forms.