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Sleepwalkers, the sub-festival of the Black Nights Film Festival in Tallinn, gave out awards in four competitive programmes, of which the Grand Prix was given to Nora Särak, a student of Tallinn University Baltic Film, Media, Arts and Communication School.

Her black-and-white documentary, released this year, is called “To Light”. Before winning the Canon Grand Prix, it already won the National competition programme, sponsored by Overall. Her film was about an old woman who finds her place in the world has been displaced as time has passed her by.

In the festival’s International Competition, the winner was Supporting Film [Voor Film] (Dir. Douwe Dijkstra, The Netherlands, 2015). The playful documentary examines the nature of film going and asks just exactly why we love the cinema so much. The film’s acceptance speech was an equally playful affair as director Douwe Dijkstra sent a ‘Thank You’ that deconstructed the entire genre of ‘Thank You’ videos.

A special mention went to the film Hunger [Faim] (Dir. Tommaso Donati, France, 2014)

Over in the festival’s Student Competition – sponsored by PS4 - the main prize went to Last Base (Dir. Aslak Danbolt, Norway/UK, 2014) a powerful and visually stunning story of man doing one last base jump before he becomes a father. The film is a product of the UKs renowned National Film and Television School.

In the student category, two special mentions were given: If Mama Ain’t Happy, Nobody’s Happy (Dir. Mea De Jong, The Netherlands, 2015) from the Netherlands Film Academy and Sparrows and Snorkels [Von Faltbooten und Heringen] (Dir. Elena Brotschi, Switzerland, 2015) from the Zurich University of Arts.

In the festival’s Baltic Sea competition – sponsored by SONY – the prize went to Small Talk (Dir. Even Hafnor, Norway, 2015). This deadpan comedy drama – channelling the likes of Roy Andersson – sees a return to glory for Hafnor at Sleepwalkers as the director previously won at Sleepwalkers with his debut short Money Back Please.

“It’s brilliant that we had such a successful year and such great winners as well. We’re glad that audiences turned out to support us and we look forward to growing even more next year,” said the programme director Laurence Boyce.

The jury for the International and Student Competitions was made up of Ilona Bicevska (Filmmaker, Latvia), Dato Janelidze (Filmmaker, Georgia) and Ivan Pavljutškov (Filmmaker / Winner of 2014 Sleepwalkers Grand Prix, Estonia)

The winner of the Grand Prix was announced at the Closing Ceremony of the Black Nights Film Festival on Friday 27^th November.

International Film Festival Sleepwalkers had one of its most successful years in living memory with large numbers of people turning out for competition screenings, a Georgian retrospective and many other diverse screenings. One particular highlight was the festivals’ Night Cinema, an all-night extravaganza of cinema that attracted a turn away crowd many of whom stayed until the event’s finish at 7.30am the next morning.

The dates for next year’s edition of Sleepwalkers will be announced at over the coming months