The festival’s top awards — the Blue Angel for Best Feature Film, Best Direction and for the acting performances — will be presented at the 32nd edition of IFF Art Film Košice (19 – 25 June 2026) on Wednesday, 24 June, at the closing ceremony. This year’s winners were decided by the three-member jury of the International Feature Film Competition: Slovak screenwriter and script editor Barbora Námerová, Hungarian film critic and artistic director of the CineFest Miskolc festival Géza Csákvári, a Golden Globes voting member since 2023, and Icelandic director Hafsteinn Gunnar Sigurðsson. It was Sigurðsson’s debut Á annan veg (2011) that Hollywood picked up for a remake. Its American version, Prince Avalanche (2013) starring Paul Rudd and Emile Hirsch, earned director David Gordon Green the Silver Bear at the Berlinale.
Hungarian film critic Géza Csákvári, member of the European Film Academy and FIPRESCI, and critic for the Népszava daily, enters every film personally. “I look for a personal connection — whether I can step into the film’s world with it, travel with it, dream, mourn, rejoice, fear. I look for fiction,” said Csákvári. He sees the differences between Central European cinema and films from the rest of the world through cultural context. “Eastern Europe has a tinge of depression in our films. In Hungary we have a saying that we are happiest when we cry with depression. That can be our original touch. Our history is different from happier corners of the world, yet we are not in the greatest crisis. A film can be good or bad — that’s the main measure. If it’s good, it can come from any culture, as long as it speaks the universal language of the image,” he added.
On the question whether the story, directing or acting matters most, Csákvári refuses any simplification. “If I were an actor, I’d say that acting makes a film a miracle. A director would say it’s the direction. As a festival programmer and film critic I watch five to six hundred films a year — the story is of course important, but I don’t mind if it isn’t told conservatively. It can be told in images. It’s a mix, and a bit of luck, whether all the pieces come together into something exceptional. Since I studied theatre and dramaturgy, I naturally lean toward story, but it isn’t that simple,” he explained. The work of a film critic is for him a craft equal to the other filmmaking professions. “A critic needs to know what direction is, what a screenwriter does, the cinematographer, the editor, how the music and sound come together. A film director doesn’t have to be an expert in everything, but has to know about everything — and a critic is the same, only looking at the finished product. That’s why I never give films a score: I know most people will just look at the number and read nothing of what stands behind it,” added Csákvári.
For young filmmakers — to whom he occasionally teaches creative writing and the history of modern cinema — Csákvári has a direct message: “There is no such thing as an ‘old film’ or a ‘film that’s too old’. Watch the history of cinema. The great masters, the hidden gems, the cult films. When looking for your own voice, you have to know that someone else has already said it in some way, and you have to find yours. Go to the theatre, read plays. The best screenwriter of today would be William Shakespeare. I have experience with young directors who don’t watch old films, don’t go to the theatre, yet they have ideas. Don’t be arrogant. First you have to learn,” he summed up.
Icelandic director Hafsteinn Gunnar Sigurðsson, the author of Under the Tree (2017), which had its world premiere in the Orizzonti section of the 74th Venice Film Festival and was Iceland’s national submission for the Academy Award in the Best Foreign Language Film category, enters his evaluations with no expectations. “I’m not looking for anything specific. I try to be open and see whether the film catches my heart in some way. Films are very different and work on different levels, so you can’t look for one single thing,” said Sigurðsson. A good film, in his view, has to work on several levels at once. “A good film can’t stand on a great screenplay with weak direction — everything has to come together. But usually it’s the story, the content and the characters that move you and grab you,” he explained.
Bringing together tragedy and comedy — something Sigurðsson often experiments with in his own work — he considers natural. “It’s completely fine to place these two genres next to each other. I love mixing them in my work — comedy works very nicely when there’s also a sad side to it. And the other way around,” he said. An original authorial voice reveals itself to him through the film. “When a film has its own voice, you recognise it. When it does something specific you don’t see in others’ work, you can tell,” he explained. For young directors he has simple advice: “Be stubborn. Don’t give up. Nobody said it would be easy. Keep going,” summed up Hafsteinn Gunnar Sigurðsson.
Slovak screenwriter and script editor Barbora Námerová, author of scripts for both feature and television series formats, approaches films first and foremost as a viewer. “I always watch films as a viewer, not only as a juror. For me it matters whether the film hits me emotionally, whether the story is innovative and original in some way, whether the character works for me. Film is about emotions and about story, but everything else is connected to that: the editing, the cinematography. It’s a very complex work,” said Námerová. Her own screenwriting lens is built on the teaching of the Czechoslovak New Wave. “I grew up on the dramaturgy of Professor Lubor Dohnal, one of the makers of the Czechoslovak New Wave. Thanks to that I follow intensities more than the classical three-act structure. Whether a film surprises me, whether it strikes me — it’s really about emotions,” she explained.
The jury deliberations went smoothly according to Námerová. “It wasn’t difficult in our jury — we had excellent dynamics and our views complemented one another,” she said. From her time in Košice she mainly takes home the conversations with her colleagues. “It’s always interesting for me to meet new filmmakers. In our jury we have a director and a critic, so it was very interesting. And generally, coming to Košice is an impulse for me — there are wonderful cinemas here and great people who make culture happen,” she added. Her message to young screenwriters: “Trust your own voice. Start from yourself. Listen to tutorials and teachers, but in the end it is your film and your script — when creating, trust yourself,” summed up Barbora Námerová.
The closing ceremony of the 32nd IFF Art Film Košice, at which the jury of the International Feature Film Competition will award the Blue Angels for Best Feature Film, Best Direction and the acting performances, takes place today, on Wednesday, 24 June 2026. The IFF Art Film programme continues on Thursday, 25 June 2026 as well.
The 32nd IFF ART FILM is made possible thanks to the support of:
Main organizer: ART FILM FEST s.r.o.
Co-organizers: City of Košice, K13 – Košice Cultural Centres, Visit Košice, ART FILM FEST, n.o.
With the financial support of: Audiovisual Fund
The project was co-financed by the Košice Self-governing Region from the Terra Incognita program
Main partners: CODES Brand House, H2O FUND SICAV, Fors – stav
Automotive partner: AUTO-VALAS
Official hotel: Hotel Yasmin
Main media partners: TV JOJ, Pravda, Eurotelevízia
Sponsors: U. S. Steel Košice, ANTIK Telecom, Kino Úsmev, LOKO TRANS Media, CORE Labs, Technical University of Košice
Technological partners: NOV, ZEBRA, Deutsche Telekom Systems Solutions Slovakia, DELTA OnLine, ARICOMA, Datacomp
Official suppliers: DKC Veritas, PLOOM, DOMOS SLOVAKIA, Reštaurácia Contessa, Natura, Kinley, Budweiser Budvar, Julius Meinl
Official wine: KubBo Select, Ostrožovič
Media partners: JOJ play, JOJ 24, Film Europe Media Company, Rádio KOŠICE, Aktuality.sk, Forbes, Startitup.sk, Korzár, Slovenka, SITA, TASR, Mediaboard, AHOJ TV, See & Go, BigMedia, Kino Sterio, Košice City Guide, Košice V Skratke, MOJAkultura.sk, Česko-Slovenská filmová databáze – ČSFD, Filmsk.sk, diva.sk, koktejl.sk, zenskyweb.sk, Naše Košice
Partners: JOJ Cinema, Jojko, Slovak Film Institute, WITKOWITZ SLOVAKIA, DDDental, CK TUI ReiseCenter Slovensko, Wallonie-Bruxelles International.be, Taper, ECO Technologies, Aupark Shopping Center Košice, Košice Public Transport Company, Košice International Airport, YumEarth, Rent2Eat, CPK Transport, iWish.sk, Kvety Garomi, Hair Factory Košice, Face up! Studio by Michaela Petroci, Panta Rhei, ARTFORUM, LOCAL NOMAD, East Slovak Museum in Košice, MIHYRING
