CinEast ("Ciné East"), the Central and Eastern European Film Festival in Luxembourg, is an annual non-profit film festival held annually in October at major venues in the city of Luxembourg as well as other towns of the Grand Duchy. The festival is dedicated to presenting current film productions from countries of Central and Eastern Europe. Although focusing on recent fiction films, the festival also presents documentaries, animated works, and short films. The festival runs for 18 days and presents over 100 screenings (50+ features, 30+ short films) with numerous guests, as well as various accompanying events (concerts, exhibitions, culinary), attracting around 10000 festival-goers every year. CinEast includes a fiction feature film competition (films evaluated by an international jury and a separate press jury) as well as audience awards for feature and short films.

The CinEast festival features an Official Competition for fiction feature films. The competition films are evaluated by an International Jury that awards the Grand Prix and Special Jury Prize. A separate Press Jury awards the Critics' Prize. The Young Talents Jury evaluates a selection of films by first or second-time directors and awards the Young Talents Award. The festival audience votes for the Audience Award from all recent feature films presented during the festival. The audience also decides on the winners of the Audience Award for the Best Short Film in three categories - fiction, animation and documentary. There are no cash prizes, the winners of the main awards receive original trophies.

Regulations

1. The Central and Eastern European Film Festival "CinEast" is organised by the association CinEast asbl, registered in RCS Luxembourg.

2. The 17th edition of CinEast will take place from 3 to 20 October 2024.

Selection

1. The films eligible for the selection should meet the following criteria:

1.1. films made by directors from the following countries: Albania, Belarus, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Estonia, Georgia, Hungary, Kosovo, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldova, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Poland, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia and Ukraine. Exceptionally, other films having a strong connection to the mentioned countries can be considered;

1.2. completed in 2024 and 2023;

1.3. with English and/or French subtitles (or in English/French);

1.4. both full-length and short films (fiction, animated and documentary) can be submitted.

2. Only the entrants whose films were selected will be notified, as we are not able to inform individual applicants about the rejection nor its reason.

Official Competition

1. Only feature films (with running time >60 minutes) will be considered for the official competition.

2. The International Jury appointed by the Festival's organisers will award the Grand Prix to the chosen film. It may also award The Special Jury Prize.

3. The Press Jury appointed by the Festival's organisers will award the Critics' Prize.

4. An Audience Award for Best Feature will be awarded on the basis of the votes by the audience. All features (fiction and documentary) completed in 2024 and 2023 presented in any festival section are eligible for the Audience Award.

5. The repetition of the awarded films will take place during the last day of the festival.

Short Films Competition (Audience Awards)

1. Audience awards will be awarded in each of the three short films categories - short fiction, documentary and animation. The audience present at the short film screenings will decide on the winners of: the Audience Award for Best Short Fiction Film; the Audience Award for Best Short Animated Film; and the Audience Award for Best Short Documentary Film.

2. The films should not be longer than 40 minutes.

Submission

1. Films may be submitted electronically via FilmFreeway only.

2. The submission deadline is 30 June 2024.

3. There is no entry fee.

4. The person submitting the film gives permission to screen the film during the Festival and during other events promoting the Festival arranged by the organiser.

5. The Festival reserves the right to invite a film that was not submitted to the Festival.

Film copies

1. The film copies (selected films) should be made available to the Festival by September 15th at the latest.

2. The prints with films in the official competition have to remain at the Festival's disposal until the closing of the festival, to ensure the repetition of the winning film on the last day of the festival.

3. All the prints will be returned within two weeks following the closing of the Festival.

4. If not agreed otherwise, the cost of the outbound shipment of the print can be covered by the Festival only if the print is not travelling along a chain of festivals. If that is the case, the Festival only covers the cost of the inbound shipment (to Luxembourg).

Submitting a film to the CinEast Film Festival is equivalent to the acceptance of the conditions set out in the above Regulations.

Overall Rating
Quality
Value
Communication
Hospitality
Networking
  • I really appreciate the program and the audiences who awarded me the Audience Award for the Best Short Doc for "The Silence of The Banana Trees"

    October 2023
  • CinEat - whataAn amazing festival, with great communiction & quality of eastern European films. The Team at CinEast is a pleasure to have contact with. We always look forward to subit films from Warsaw Film School. Warmest Regards, Veronica

    November 2021