This year, nine features will compete at the Durban International Film Festival. They are, Aïcha by Mehdi Barsaoui (Tunisia, France, Italy, Saudi Arabia, Qatar), Don’t Let’s Go to the Dogs Tonight by Embeth Davidtz (South Africa), Dreams by Michel Franco (Mexico, United States), Lurker by Alex Russell (USA, Italy), My Friend An Delie by Dong Zijian (China), On Falling by Laura Carreira (United Kingdom, Portugal), Promised Sky by Erige Sehiri (France, Tunisia, Qatar), The Courageous by Jasmin Gordon (Switzerland), The Things You Kill by Alireza Khatami (France, Poland, Canada, Turkey)
The features jury panel this year includes filmmakers in the industry who have received several awards. Melissa Parry has worked as a freelance editor in the film industry since 2005. She was nominated for the Rolex Mentor and Protégé Arts Initiative (2012) and has won multiple international awards for her work on the wildlife films Birth of a Pride (2019) and Okavango: River of Dreams (2020). She became an International Partner member of the American Cinema Editors (ACE) in 2022 and participated as a panellist in the ACE EditFest Global 2022 panel, Editing for the World. She is joined by fellow award-winning South African producer, writer, director, and showrunner, Rethabile Ramaphakela, celebrated for her contributions to film and television. She is the co-owner and creative director of Burnt Onion Productions, a company she founded with her siblings in 2008. She has directed Netflix’s Seriously Single (2020), wrote and directed the global hit Disaster Holiday, which ranked in Netflix’s Global Top 10, and created and produced the acclaimed Netflix Original series, How to Ruin Christmas, and its spinoff, How to Ruin Love. Her storytelling prowess has earned her multiple South African Film and Television Awards, and she has served as a Jury member for the prestigious International Emmy Awards. Themba Sibeko is another South African member of the jury with vast international experience. In his career spanning three decades, he has scripted content development and physical film and television production with more than one hundred credits, within South Africa and internationally. In 2002, he was appointed the CEO of the Gauteng Film Commission and brokered the investment in the Oscar-nominated film Hotel Rwanda. He also facilitated the South African investment into CNBC Africa and established bilateral relationships with the Brazilian Film Industry in 2004. The final member of the features jury is Ikenna Ezenyirioha. Hailing from Nigeria, he is the Artistic Director of the Africa International Film Festival (AFRIFF). He has spearheaded major projects on the continent, including the Africa Movie Academy Awards (AMAA), the Africa Film Academy Charity Benefit, the Africa Design Expo, and the ION International Film Festival. In 2010, he played a pivotal role in the establishment and structuring of AFRIFF. This esteemed panel will be responsible for selecting the recipients of the Best Feature, Best South African Feature and the Best Edit awards presented by the South African Guild of Editors.
The Documentary Jury will decide on the winners of the Best Documentary and the Best South African Documentary. All the documentaries screened will be eligible for consideration. The documentary jury members, Ayanda Halimana, Diana Keam and Fibby Kiora have extensive experience in the industry and are well placed to assess the submissions. Ayanda, a veteran with sixteen years of experience, rose from an intern in SABC’s Drama Department intern to Head of Story, SABC 1. Thereafter, she joined Mzansi Magic as a Commissioning Editor. As a freelancer, she has worked as the Head Writer for more than twelve episodic dramas, including Makoti (2019’s top series). Her film credits include Happiness Ever After, and her short film Sent won multiple awards in 2024. She is joined by Diana Keam, who has worked on award-winning documentaries, commercials, feature films and many short films and has filmed in over ten African countries, Peru and Lebanon. For the last decade, she has co-owned a boutique Production company based in Cape Town, Silver Bullet Films. The third member of this panel is Fibby Kiora, the Founder and CEO of Mucii Pictures and Co-Founder of Manyatta Screenings. She regularly participates in film festival juries globally, curates for film festivals with attention to content from the African continent and is an Associate Producer for the Sembene Across Africa film-screening program.
The three members of the Short Film Jury, Thabang Moleya, Gabe Gabriels and Tanya Rossouw have a difficult task ahead of them as they select the Best Short Film and the Best South African Short Film from a diverse and exciting programme. Thabang has directed over 13 prime time dramas, including Interrogation Room, Jozi-H, The Lab, and Jacob’s Cross, to name a few. He received an iEmmy nomination for Best Foreign Series for Sokhulu and Partners, and his debut feature film Happiness is a Four-Letter Word (2016) was the highest performing SA film at the local box office. Gabe Gabriels is a writer, director, and actor who has been commissioned by production companies in Canada, the US, India and South Africa. As a director, Gabe collaborated with his father, Ian Gabriel, on the father-son road trip screenplay Runs in the Family. Tanya brings her twenty-three years of service at Ster Kinekor Theatres to the panel, and her skill as a content scheduler is bound to catch the best and brightest films on the programme.
The student jury comprising Ibee Ndaw, Lauren Fletcher and Sharon Gumede will evaluate student films from a global array of tertiary institutions. A graduate of the University of Paris 3-Sorbonne Nouvelle with an MA in Film Studies, Ibee has coordinated the second Pan-African edition of the Mobile Film Festival. Her keen eye has stood her in good stead as she serves as a reader for South African production companies, Big World Cinema and STEPS, and at the Durban FilmMart for the pitching projects. As the Audiovisual Project Manager at the French Institute of South Africa (IFAS), Lauren Fletcher fosters collaboration between the French and South African audiovisual industries, developing cross-continental projects in film, series, animation, video games, podcasts, and digital arts to support artistic exchange and industry growth. Assisting them with the selection of the Best Student Film and the Best South African Student Film is a strong supporter of the local film industry, Sharon Gumede, Senior Manager at the Durban Film Office. They are tasked with selecting the Best Student Film and the Best South African Student Film.
All the panellists bring their many years of expertise and passion for film to the adjudication process. Awards are often opportunities for the translation of symbolic into economic capital and have increased in relevance in the film industry over the years. Dr Marijke de Valck, an associate professor in film and media studies at Utrecht University, has concluded in her research that “festival prizes, in particular prestigious ones, will remain powerful instruments of cultural legitimization for some time to come.” There’s little doubt that the winners of the awards presented at the Durban International Film Festival will not feel the same. Make sure you attend the festival, and you can be your own judge of which of the films in the incredible programme deserve the coveted awards.