About the awards

CICAE Art Cinema Awards: Why?

In most countries, the film market is dominated by super-productions that tend to format audience’s tastes. The vast majority of innovative films, first works and films from less recognised countries or faraway continents do not get distributed. Festivals are thus the only venue for a large number of films. The CICAE Art Cinema Award addresses this very issue. This award is given at major European festivals by an international jury of art cinema programmers and aims at bringing high-quality films to the art cinemas. The juries’ aim is also to encourage young directors as well as productions coming out of less-recognized countries.

The CICAE Art Cinema Award helps the films towards distribution, by systematically informing the 2,000 CICAE member cinemas and the numerous contacts in its network. Working on a country-by-country basis, local CICAE networks help distributors to successfully market award-winning films through recommendations for all cinemas, trade-only screenings for exhibitor members, networking of film copies, and the delivery of information to audiences.

Are you a CICAE member? Apply here to participate as a CICAE jury member for the next festivals!