The South African Independent Film Festival aims to support both emerging and experienced filmmakers, by creating a breeding place for their work to be reviewed and judged and providing access to a larger audience through media artistic events.

This will be our first year for the festival showing films from around the world. Our filmmakers will share their best works in the most dynamic city in the world. Our film screenings will take place once a year.

Where both filmmakers and film enthusiasts gather to discover new forms of expressiveness and to exchange thoughts and ideas.

The film competition taking place in May 2018, which will feature the winners of each category . The SAIFF will announce the Official Selection, the Nominees for every award one month before the festival.

Our jury formed of film professionals will review all submitted films from an independent point of view, seeking creativity, vision, innovative ideas, powerful messages and attention to details, with the aim of discovering projects with the potential to define the direction of contemporary cinema.

Sean Cameron Michael

Known for his breakout role in “Black Sails” as Richard Guthrie and now recently in the series “Shooter” with Ryan Phillippe.

Ryan Kruger

Ryan Kruger has directed over 75 music videos and is one of the leading music video directors in the country. He’s won numerous awards over the years (both locally and internationally) including a SAMA (South African Music Award) MTV awards.

Brandon Auret

Best known internationally for starring in all of Neil Blomkamp films
such as “District 9” “Chappie” and “Elysium”. And know starring in the new TV series “Blood Drive” as Ribbone.

Ross Learmonth

The Lead singer of South Africa’s biggest rock band “PRIME CIRCLE” they have been going now for over 11 years and still raking in the awards as SA’s best rock band.

Joe Vaz

South African born actor Joe Vaz has established himself as a locally and internationally recognized actor in both film and television. Best known for his role in “Dredd” and “Death Race2” and “10,000 BC.

STEVE WALL actor/singer known for VIKINGS and the lead singer and songwriter in legendary Irish band The Walls and The Stunning.

Roy Zetisky works as a dp and director also teaches in AFDA film school in South Africa.

SAIFF promotes films from around the world with 13 awards.

Awards & Prizes

Awards

BEST SHORT FILM

AUDIENCE AWARD

BEST DIRECTOR
Award Certificate

BEST SCREENWRITER
Award Certificate

BEST ACTOR
Award Certificate

BEST ACTRESS
Award Certificate

BEST EDITOR
Award Certificate

BEST CINEMATOGRAPHER
Award Certificate

BEST ORIGINAL SCORE
Award Certificate

BEST DOCUMENTARY
Award Certificate

BEST EXPERIMENTAL
Award Certificate

BEST ANIMATION
Award Certificate

BEST MUSIC VIDEO
Award Certificate

BEST VIRTUAL REALITY EXPERIENCE
Award Certificate

Rules & Terms

Rules & Terms
- Submissions -

You are entitled to any amount of entries for the festival

- Films -

We accept Short Films, Music Videos , Documentaries
Short films submitted to SAIFF should be under 20 minutes, with a minimum length of 1 minute. Music Videos should not be longer than 10 minutes. There are no restrictions on how old your movie is or when it was made.

All films must come with English subtitles if not in english (with an exception for music videos and movies where English is the main language spoken). Any genre and format is accepted.

- Disclaimer and Rights -

By entering or submitting to South African independent film festival , the participant acknowledges understanding and agreeing to all festival Rules, Terms, Conditions and Guidelines associated with the Festival.

The filmmaker/institution that is submitting the film must own the rights to do so and is responsible for the content they are providing. By submitting, the filmmaker allows SAIFF to create a page for their film without infringing copyright of any kind of form.
If your film won't get an Official Selection, the entry fee won't be refunded.
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- The Process -

Winning films will be highlighted and promoted within the platform. Also, being selected for our Screening Event doesn’t prevent you from submitting your film to other festivals as well.

- Rules & Process -

All genres and formats are considered to be eligible for a nomination or to win one or more of these categories.

Great quality is a standard. Films with a poor production standard (lack of sound quality, absence of subtitles/captions for non-English films, video resolution less than 720p HD) will not be accepted.

The winners of each category will get our official printable Award Certificate.

The ‘Best Picture’ Winner will be awarded with our SAIFF Trophy and will get automatically selected for the Official Screening Event that will take place in December 2017.

The Best Film will consist in 3 Nominations, while the ’Individual’ awards will have at least 3 nominations per category.

The AUDIENCE AWARD will be decided entirely by the public during the Screening Event. The film with the highest amount of votes will be announced at the end of the event, after all the votes will have been counted.
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We WILL NOT publish your film on our platform, so we do not require the film to be embedded on our online website, if your film will be accepted in the Official Selection/Competition.

- Announcements -

SAIFF will announce the Official Selection, the Nominees one month before the event date.
4 Reviews
Overall Rating
Quality
Value
Communication
Hospitality
Networking
  • Peter Regan

    My short "Once Upon a Planet" screened here. Although I could not personally attend, I will say that the communication was great. I was able to confer with the festival directors, they responded to my tweets, promoted my films online, all that jazz. Hope I can submit again and hopefully attend next year with another film!

    June 2018
    Helpful
  • Christopher Harvey

    Fantastic! Looking forward to being a part of future endeavours with the festival. A special thanks to Ryan Kruger, James C. Williamson and Ruaan Van Rooyen. My short Tears In The Rain was well received by the local crowd.

    June 2018
    Helpful
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    Response from festival:

    Great piece of work Christopher, much Respect!

  • Bean Shmog

    Awesome festival! A successful first year! ooking forward to see how it grows. Will definitely be entering my next project.

    June 2018
    Helpful
  • Michael Rodrigues

    It was a good experience to have my short film part of the SA Indie Film Fest in it's first year. The standard of short films was really high and I'm looking forward to seeing how the festival grows.

    May 2018
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