Glorious Revolution wins third prize at La Cinef 2022

Glorious Revolution, the Grad Film from London Film School alumnus, Masha Novikova was awarded joint third prize at La Cinef.

The film was selected from over 1,500 short films submitted from film schools all over the world to the Festival de Cannes competition. Glorious Revolution was the only UK film to be awarded at La Cinef and takes home the €7,500 third place prize.  

Shot entirely in Ukraine last year, the film was informed by Masha’s own experiences of the Revolution of Dignity. Glorious Revolution is set in 2014 and depicts a mother’s loss, as her son is killed while protesting in Independence Square. Her attempts to bury him as a hero clashes with the corruption in the bureaucratic system, testing her view of Ukraine. 

Pablo Garrido Carreras was DP, and the screenplay was co-written by Matthew McHaffie, and co-produced by Paisley Valentine Walsh who also fulfilled the role of Assistant Director alongside Anastasia Savinova, with Ka Ki Wong and Alex Grigoras working on poster design and as Colourist – all LFS alumni. 

Glorious Revolution and other the awarded films will be screened at the Cinéma du Panthéon in Paris on 31st May. Italy’s Valerio Ferrara was named the winner with A Conspiracy Man (Il Barbiere Complottista) and Li Jihae’s Somewhere receiving second place. Third prize was shared with Humans Are Dumber When Crammed Up Together (Les Humains sont cons quand ils s’empilent) by Laurène Fernandez. 

The winning films were selected by the short films and La Cinef jury, presided over by Egyptian film director Yousry Nasrallah and including Monia Chokri, Laura Wandel, actor and director Félix Moati and French journalist Jean-Claude Raspiengeas. Previously known as Cinéfondation, La Cinef was originally created in 1998 in a bid to discover new young international cinematographic talent.  

Masha  was born and raised in in Kiev, and travelled and studied at London Film School, graduating in 2021, with an MA in Filmmaking. She is an Erwin and Gisela von Steiner Foundation grant recipient, an Oskar-Karl-Forster scholarship holder, and was selected for Ildikó Enyedi’s directing workshop with her upcoming short film, Maria’s Lovers.  

Masha joins several other LFS alumni to have been part of the Cinéfondation competition. In 2016 Hamid Ahmadi’s graduation film  In The Hills won 2nd prize, and in 2018  Zhannat Alshanova’s grad film, End of Season was selected. Several more LFS alumni have taken part in the prestigious Festival de Cannes Cinéfondation Residence including Duccio Chiarini, Barney Elliott, Babak Jalali, Rafael Kapelinski, Orkhan Aghazadeh, and Rafael Mendoza. In 2020 Amanda Nell Eu  was chosen to attend the  Cannes Cinéfondation L’Atelier  with her project  Tiger Stripes.