A six-day showcase of the art of short film, featuring international guests, local productions, and contemporary narratives : from Wednesday the 3rd to Monday the 8th, Sant'Antioco will host " Passaggi d'Autore – Intrecci mediterranei ," the Mediterranean Short Film Festival, now in its twenty-first year. Organized by the "Immagini" Film Club, the festival is under the artistic direction of Dolores Calabrò and Bosnian director Ado Hasanovic. The screenings, already acclaimed at the most prestigious festivals, some of which are previews, will be held in the City Council Chamber in Piazza Efisio Piria. The screenings are divided into eight thematic sections , along with masterclasses, meetings, and activities for schools .
The inauguration on Wednesday
After the inaugural greetings at 5pm, the " Mediterranean Weaves " will start the dances, the s central section of the event dedicated to productions from countries on the shores of the Mediterranean Wednesday's screening will be the first of three afternoon screenings, followed by Friday the 5th and Sunday the 7th—plus a morning screening on Saturday the 6th—for a total of twenty-two short films. Stories of identity, rights, struggles, and even normality, family, and introspection, which will be told tomorrow evening through seven works: " Domenica sera " by Matteo Tortone, winner of the 2025 David di Donatello for best short film, " De sucre " by Spain's Clàudia Cedó, " A passing day " by Syrian Rasha Shahin, " Bratiska " by Gregorio Mattiocco, the animated " Les bottles de la nuit " by French director Pierre-Luc Granjon, " Border " by Roni Bahat, and " Mua besoj më shpëtoj portreti " by Kosovar Alban Muja. Of the aforementioned, Mattiocco will be present, while Granjon and Cedó will participate remotely .
"Intrecci mediterranei" is not just an exhibition, but for the past three years has also been a competitive space : in fact, a jury of university students will follow the " Criticize the Short Film " workshop in parallel with the festival, and led by the director and critic Francesco Crispino they will view and evaluate the competing works, to award the Young Jury Prize on Monday 8th.
The first day will end at 9:30 pm with a space dedicated to the Sarajevo Film Festival , which has been among the leading film festivals in the Balkans since 1995 and has collaborated with Passaggi d'Autore since 2018. This year, the Bosnian festival will bring four titles selected by Asja Krsmanovic (connected remotely) : " Tarik " by Serbian Adem Tutić, " Sve zbog jednog bika " by Emir Solaković, " Winter in march " by Armenian Natalia Myrzoyan, and " Rahlo " by Croatian Jozo Schmuch.
Thursday's day
Thursday the 4th will kick off in the morning with " Cortoambiente ," a section dedicated to educating and raising awareness of environmental issues among younger generations . In collaboration with the Avezzano Film and Environment Festival , at 10 a.m., the short film " Until the End of the World, " directed by Francesco De Augustinis, will be screened exclusively for high school students in Sant'Antioco. The film investigates the irregularities of intensive fish farming. The director himself will be livestreaming to discuss the topic with Franco Sardi (regional coordinator of the Touring Club Italiano), moderated by Paolo Santamaria of the Avezzano Festival.
Starting at 5:30 p.m., the annual focus on the cinematography of a Mediterranean nation will take place, an honor that this year goes to Lebanon : a land currently experiencing serious crises and illegally invaded, but which still culturally resists, thanks in part to cinema. Its ambassador for the evening will be producer, artistic director, and university professor Nicolas Khabbaz , who will bring with him some of the main short films produced in Lebanon over the last two years: " Ship of Fools " by Alia Haju, " Crow Man " by Yohann Abdelnour, " Ebb & Flow " by Nay Tabbara, " All this Death " by Fady Syriani, " FIZR " by Rani Nasr. And " What if the bomb fell here tonight? " by Samyr Siriani , the latter present remotely .
At 9:30 pm, the Lebanese focus will conclude with the feature film " A Sad and Beautiful World ," the debut film by director Cyril Aris – also via video link – and a tale of the country's internal divisions, told through the love story of Nino and Yasmina, which already won the Audience Award at the 2025 Venice Film Festival.
Friday's program
The morning of Friday the 5th will see the opening of " Intrinas ", a space dedicated to short films produced on the island . A competition is also in sight here, with high school students forming a Youth Jury , coordinated by critic Enrico Azzano , who will award the best short film on the afternoon of Saturday the 6th. At 10 am there will be a screening reserved for the very young, while at 9:30 pm the rest of the public will also be able to attend the screenings: the titles in competition are " Io non dimentico " by Antonello Pisano Murgia, " Su cane est su miu " by Salvatore Mereu, " Oplà " by Giulia Camba, " Childhood and Youth of Gramsci " by Paolo Zucca, Alessandra Atzori and Milena Tipaldo, " The Last Ingredient " by Lorenzo Cioglia, " Dear Brother " by Simone Paderi, " Vida e morti de unu maragotti " by Stefano Cau and " It Doesn't Exist " by Joe Juanne Piras. With the exception of Pisano Murgia, Zucca and Tipaldo, all the directors mentioned will be present at the screening.
At 4:30 pm, " Cinema and Territory " will take center stage, with a screening of the documentary " Furriadroxus ," produced twenty years ago by Michele Mossa and Michele Trentini. With Mossa in attendance , the documentary will retrace the daily lives of the last inhabitants of the furriadroxus, the rural settlements in the Malfatano area at the center of Ovidio Marras's true story, recently featured on the big screen in Riccardo Milani's "La vita va così."
At 6 pm the second tranche of "Mediterranean Intrecci" will take place, with a lineup of five shorts: " Sous les ruines " by the French Nadhir Bouslama, " Marcello " by Maurizio Lombardi, " The Wedding Of The Pir's " by the Turkish Yalçın Çiftçi , the Palestinian-Scottish production " The Flowers Stand Silently, Witnessing " by Theo Panagopoulos and " Lo sguardo basso delle bambine " by Astrid Ardenti who will be present in the room , while Çiftçi, Panagopoulos and Lombardi will intervene remotely .
Saturday's appointments
Saturday 6th will see the penultimate round of "Mediterranean Intrecci" at 11am, with the works " L'mina " by the Moroccan Randa Maroufi, " Kushta Mayn - My Constantinople " by Nicolò Folin, " Arguments in favor of love " by the Portuguese Gabriel Abrantes and " Common pear " by Slovenian Gregor Božić, present via video link .
The awards ceremony, held at 4:00 PM by the Young Jury, made up of high school students and supported by Azzano, will announce the winning short film for the "Intrinas" section. Half an hour later, the masterclass will be held by Iosonouncane (aka Jacopo Incani), acclaimed musician and composer of the soundtracks for "My Father's Diaries," "Berlinguer: The Great Ambition," and "Ukrainian Opera," a documentary by Francesca Mannocchi (who will be present in the room) that will be screened that evening at 9:30 PM, winner of the Cecilia Mangini Award at the David di Donatello Awards . Composer Emanuele Contis will also be teaching the masterclass, which can be booked until tomorrow.
From 6.30 pm onwards, the in-depth analysis of the music video will begin, featuring the screenwriter, photographer and director Ambrogio Lo Giudice , known for his collaborations with artists of the calibre of Dalla, Vasco, Litfiba and Jovanotti, in a dialogue with the media theorist and scholar of audiovisual experimentation Bruno Di Marino .
Sunday's day
Sunday the 7th will begin with the excursion "On the Path of Sant'Antioco Martire," a guided walk lasting approximately two hours from Maladroxia to the Canai Tower, which can be visited for the occasion, followed by a tasting lunch. Organized by Touring Club Sardegna and Amici del cammino di Santu Jacu, reservations are required until Wednesday the 3rd.
The other screenings will be held in the afternoon, beginning at 4:30 PM with " The Trials ," a documentary by Sardinian director and cinematographer Marta Massa , who will be present. This Italian, Hungarian, Belgian, and Portuguese production recounts the judicial persecution suffered by non-binary activist Maja T., held in solitary confinement in a Budapest prison and on trial for the controversial charge of attacking neo-Nazi militants, a situation similar to that experienced by MEP Ilaria Salis.
At 6 pm, the last series of short films from "Mediterranean Intrecci" will be shown: the work between Palestine, Greece and France " I'm glad you're dead now " by Tawfeek Barhom, " We " by the Greek-Albanian Neritan Zinxhiria, " Furia " by the Spanish Fran Moreno Blanco and Santi Pujol Amat, the work between Egypt, Germany and France " My brother, my brother " by Abdelrahman and Saad Dnewar, the production between Palestine, Jordan, the United Kingdom and France " Coyotes " by Said Zagha, and " A dog meows, a cat barks ". by Alessandro Prato, present at the screening , while Zinxhiria will be in video connection.
Another international partnership for Sunday evening, with the Festival du court métrage de Clermont-Ferrand , the second-largest film festival in France (after Cannes) and the largest international short film festival. Co-founder Roger Gonin has selected six titles, presenting them one by one: " A bear remembers " by Zhang & Knight, " Beurk! " by Loïc Espuche, " Généalogie de la violence " by Mohamed Bourouissa, " Mort d'un acteur " by Ambroise Rateau, " Ni Dieu ni pére " by Paul Kermarec, and " Unspoken " by Australian Damian Walshe-Howling.
Monday's closing
Monday 8th will open with a local production, " My Last Exorcism " by Antiochian filmmakers Pierpaolo Fai and Davide Eustacchi at 11:30 am, a localized and subversive parody of horror and demonic possession.
At 4:30 pm, the award ceremony for the best short film of "Intrecci mediterranei " will take place, presented by the Youth Jury composed of university students participating in the workshop curated by Crispino.
The festival officially closes at 6 pm with " Nino ," the debut feature by French director Pauline Loquès (who will be present remotely ) . The film stars Théodore Pellerin as a young man diagnosed with throat cancer on his twenty-ninth birthday. The film was acclaimed by Critics' Week at the Cannes Film Festival , earning Pellerin the Best New Actor Award.
The twenty-first edition of the festival was supported by the Municipality of Sant'Antioco, the Region, and the Fondazione Sardegna, with the patronage of the Regional Presidency and the Italian Touring Club, the partnership of the Sarajevo Film Festival, the Festival du court métrage de Clermont-Ferrand, the Avezzano Film and Environment Festival, as well as the "Nur" and "Cammino di Santu Jacu" associations, CoopMed, the Italian Federation of Film Clubs, and the Sardinia Film Commission.