Michael J. Keplinger’s short film IRIS has continued its successful festival run into 2025.
Adding new screenings and awards across Europe and beyond, IRIS most recently won the Silver Medal at the 85th Film Competition between Nations and Congress (UNiCA). The jury highlighted the film’s ability to create tension through silence and visual storytelling:
Michael Gough (UK) said, “I particularly like the fact that a lot of things were still seen by us as if heard or not heard by her. The ambient noises were all very muted. There was a tiny little heartbeat, but it was hardly at the level that [most would use] to show tension. But her tension was almost a silent tension. (…) I thought that was a very neat touch.”
Jacqueline Pante (Italy) added “[The forest] is always something where we got lost. (…) And the author was really good in using these little tiny bits and tricks to increase the horror feeling(…).” Thomas Schauer (Austria) added that the film’s aspect ratio of 4:3 also added to it’s feeling of entrapment.
Michael Gough also highlighted the film’s usage of sign language as particularly clever. “There was no sort of language in that sense at all, but there was language in what the two of them were doing with each other. The actual gestures that she used, as I said, could be understood by anybody (…) which I thought was a very neat little trick for a film that you want to get appreciated in an international circuit.”
Buntingford Shorts and TimeLine
Since its online premiere in October 2024, ending the film’s initial festival run, IRIS has continued to reach audiences worldwide. Alongside its Silver Medal at UNiCA, the film won Best Horror at UK’s Buntingford Shorts Film Festival. Later it won the Intercultural and Integration Award at the TimeLine Film Festival in Italy. It has also screened at Faba Films, and Kalakari Film Fest in India.
These achievements follow a strong 2024 festival run. After premiering at Crossing Europe, IRIS won the Creative Video Award by the Zawinul Foundation, and was named Best Horror 2024 at the Austrian Filmfestival.
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