A film like a slice of poetry and a sip of mythmaking. A lonely bull waits tirelessly under a blazing sun. Meanwhile, man plunges deep into the darkest depths of his personality in an attempt to defeat death. Bull and man are destined to meet under the same sun.

Italian director Francesco Montagner graduated in documentary directing from FAMU in Prague and his work combines the imagery of Czech film tradition with the lace-like quality of Italian narration. The director has said that this short film is an anthem to life and death and the eternal struggle between them, as described in Jorge Luis Borges’ story The House of Asterion, which depicts the struggle between man and the bull so intrinsic to Spanish culture.

Jury statement: European filmmaking has always been very diverse, boundary-breaking, and border crossing – just like the continent and its people. This film breaks the rules of what we might perceive cinema today as being and yet, at the same time, possesses a timeless quality through its beautiful imagery, innovative editing, and use of the film material itself. Traditional craft is both admired and put into question. Primal desires are met with the demise of another being. An ancient myth becomes a very modern discourse on virility and its fragility. The Short film candidate for the European Film Awards is Astérion by Francesco Montagner.

Jury statement: Taking us back to the roots of cinema through its masterful editing and creative use of sound, this essay on life and death creates its very own mesmerising world. We were impressed by the film’s physicality in both its treatment of the main themes and the literal haptic sensation it manages to create. We can feel the softness of fur, the tender and yet gruesome relationship between man and animal, the weight of responsibility. For questioning traditional values, the bravery it shows in its formal choices, and for its skilled use of cinematic means, the winner of the International Short Film Competition is Astérion by Francesco Montagner.