AVANCA, one of the reference film festivals and one of the oldest in Portugal.
Award-winning films almost always reach the commercial circuit and are widely shown throughout the country.

Short films are automatically considered for the SOPHIA Awards of the Portuguese Academy of Cinema.

The IFFS (International Federation of Film Societies) annually awards a prize. AVANCA is one of the few festivals that make up the restricted list of film festivals recognized by this historic world organization.

AVANCA is a festival where films are screened in rooms on the quality cinema circuit of EUROPA CINEMAS.
The directors of the awarded films are normally guests of the festival.
The films selected at AVANCA are invited to integrate the selection of several other international film festivals, in a system partly managed by the AVANCA Festival itself.
With around 100 films on display, bringing together the largest number of WORLD PREMIERS among festivals in Portugal, Iberia and Lusophony, each year filmmakers and guests from more than 40 countries participate in person at the festival.
A festival that manages the AVANCA FILM FUND whose films already produced have received hundreds of awards all over the world.
15,000 to 20,000 spectators attend AVANCA each year.
AVANCA, a meeting point for films and filmmakers from all over the world.

1 – Prizes
The festival will award the best work of each category: Cinema (feature film), Cinema (short feature), Television, Video, VR and trailer. The jury will also deliver prizes to the best Animation, best Actor/Actress, and best Cinematography Direction, among others.
In the Cinema category (feature film), since only a maximum of 4 films are selected, all works will automatically receive a special mention.

The international jury is composed of cinema professionals invited by the organization.
The selected films may be objects of acquisition proposals for the Portuguese market (cinema, television, video, VOD).

2 – World Premiere Prize
Films that have their world premieres in the AVANCA 2023, regardless of the submitted category, are also candidates for the World Premiere Special Prize. Candidates must refer to the entry form if the film is a world premiere.

3 – Filmmaker Prize
Filmmakers under the age of 30 and over 60 will be candidates for the Junior Filmmaker Award and the Senior Filmmaker Award, respectively.

Regulations
AVANCA 2024
28th International Meeting of Cinema, Television, Video and Multimedia

19, 24 to 28 July
Deadline: April 28th, 2024

1 - Objective
The objective is to trace a global perspective of the contemporary features in cinema, television, video and multimedia.

2 - Conditions of Admission
Works admitted for selection must join the following conditions:
- Be produced after January 1st, 2022;
- Unreleased in Portugal;
- Not available on the web.

Registrations in the following categories are admitted:
CINEMA: short and feature films in fiction and animation;
TELEVISION: documentaries;
Tv SERIES: fiction and documentaries. In this case, the submitter must send only a single episode.
VIDEO: experimental videos less than 20 minutes long;
VR FILMS: films in virtual reality 360°, narrative or experimental, but with no interactivity.
TRAILER IN MOTION – video clips and trailers* - all trailers sent with the submitted films will be considered for this competition.
* trailers up to 3 minutes

3 - Submission
Works must be registered until April 28th, 2024, by completing the online registration form available on www.avanca.com

The payment can be done by Paypal (avancafilmfestival@gmail.com) and the receipt must be sent to the same email so that we can validate your submission.

Entry Fee: 24€ (euros)
• Special price until 8th january 2024: 20 euros.
All submission fees are non-refundable.

FREE ENTRY FEE FOR:
- Portuguese films or from countries with Portuguese as an official language, exclusively received with link and password.
- Trailers and videoclips

The Avanca Film Festival DOES NOT PAY SCREENING FEES. By submitting your project, you acknowledge that Avanca2024 will not pay to present your work.
Entries previously screened in other festivals or are publicly available on the web (e.g. Youtube, Vimeo) will not be considered.
All foreign films must be submitted with English subtitles.

4 - Selection for competition
The organization committee carries out the selection of the submitted works and informs the applicants of selected works. The selection results will be available in www.avanca.com
The film submission at the AVANCA may also involve the selection for AVANCA's Film Festivals Partners.
AVANCA reserves the right to use images from the films selected for marketing purposes.

5 – Prizes
The festival will award the best work of each category: Cinema (feature film), Cinema (short feature), Television, Video, TV series, VR and trailer/video clip. The jury will also deliver prizes to the best Animation, best Actor/Actress and Best Cinematography Direction, among others.
In the Cinema category (feature film), since only a maximum of 4 films are selected, all works will automatically receive a special mention.
The international jury is composed by cinema professionals invited by the organization.
The selected films may be object of acquisition proposals for the Portuguese market.

6 – World Premiere Prize
Films that have their world premieres in the AVANCA regardless the submitted category are also candidates for the World Premiere Special Prize. Candidates must refer to the entry form if the film is a world premiere.

7 – Filmmaker Prize
Filmmakers under the age of 30 and over 60 will be candidates for the <30 Filmmaker Award and the Senior Filmmaker Award, respectively.

8 - Transport and Insurance of Works
The organization will inform the candidates of selected works and will give out instructions for the shipment of final copies.

9 – Others
Copies of selected films will form part of the Festival's Media Library, and the organization undertakes not to use them for commercial purposes. The selected films may be part of non-commercial exhibitions/extensions within the scope of the Festival's promotion.

The festival's languages are Portuguese and English.
By submitting your film(s) to the Festival, you fully agree to all TERMS AND CONDITIONS described above.
Any doubts or questions that may be raised will be clarified or resolved by the Organizing Committee.

The selected works may be objects of non-commercial exhibitions for the festival's promotion.
Festival languages are Portuguese and English.
The Festival reserves the right to make any necessary changes in regulations or scheduling.
By submitting your film/s or screenplay to the Festival you agree to all TERMS AND CONDITIONS above in full.
Any doubts or questions will be clarified or solved by the Organization Committee.

Overall Rating
Quality
Value
Communication
Hospitality
Networking
  • Yvonne Kerekgyarto

    The festival team refuse to communicate with the authors. They didn't even told us when do we have our screening. Negative experience. Anyway I hope others will enjoy AVANCA...

    August 2023
    Logo
    Response from festival:

    Surprised by his words, we reviewed the previous communication. We find your repeated emails in the SPAM folder. In any case, we had answered the essentials in a previous email and your film was shown on the big screen with the necessary quality and attention.
    The festival program is always published on our website and it's a shame you didn't come here because we are always pleased to offer a stay to the authors of the films we select. It has always been a space for meetings and new starting points.
    However, please accept our apologies.

  • Mohammad Mohammadian

    I would like to thank the whole festival team. I congratulate the festival team. It's a great festival.

    September 2022
  • Vasco Otero

    Avanca Cinema Festival has an home welcoming vibe, very familiar and easy going staff and very interesting artistic choices and movie premieres.

    The firts time that i came was more than twenty years ago for Radio University of Coimbra and now the festival has already twenty six editions, it´s an amazing and mature event.

    It was a great honour for me to present in world premiere my feature movie "Epopeia Gandareza" in the 2022 edition.

    Congratulations for the excelent organization! Keep going

    August 2022
  • FR : AVANCA film festival est un événement assez unique en son genre. La première chose à souligner c'est que c'est un vrai festival de cinéma indépendant focalisé sur un cinéma pointu et exigent ; tous les films soumis sont vus avec attention, un vrai travail de recherche est mené dans le but est de trouver les "pépites" de la production mondiale. Ce qui en fait également un festival très singulier, c'est qu'il porte son attention et son programme sur différents aspects (en temps normal plutôt éloignés les uns des autres). Tout d'abord la recherche universitaire : un impressionnant panel de doctorants, professeurs, chercheurs universitaires participe tous les ans. Ensuite, une attention particulière portée à la formation à travers les workshop ; la transmission aux plus jeunes toujours en point de mire. Les productions cinématographiques, côtoient les productions télé, la vidéo, le multimédia... Pour sa 26eme édition, en 2022, on peut dire que le festival est bien rodé mais quel travail colossal !!! On ne peut oublier d'ajouter que l'accueil et le cadre sont fabuleux. Ici on est entre passionnés de cinéma, on fait du travail sérieux , mais dans la décontraction et loin du snobisme affiché par d'autres "événements" ; on se sent en famille. Cumprimentos a todos e até breve AVANCA.
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    ENGL : AVANCA film festival is a rather unique event. The first thing to emphasize is that it is a true independent film festival focused on demanding and cutting-edge cinema; all films submitted are viewed with care, a real research work is carried out in order to find the "nuggets" of the world production. What also makes it a very unique festival is that it focuses its attention and its programme on different aspects (normally rather distant from each other). First of all, university research: an impressive panel of doctoral students, professors and university researchers participate every year. Secondly, particular attention is paid to training through workshops, with transmission to the young always in focus. Cinematographic productions, alongside television productions, video, multimedia... For its 26th edition, in 2022, we can say that the festival is well established but what a colossal task !!! We cannot forget to add that the welcome and the setting are fabulous. Here we are among film lovers, we do serious work, but in a relaxed way and far from the snobbery displayed by other "events"; we feel like a family. Cumprimentos a todos e até breve AVANCA.

    August 2022
  • Seems like a cool festival with lots of events, though I was not able to attend due to the covid situation at the time. I would have loved to see some photos of the VR screenings where my film was featured though I didn't hear back about that from the organizers. Hope more attention can be paid to VR screenings at the festival in the future and regardless i'm grateful for the festival to have selected my work!

    October 2021