European Workshop for Film Criticism #7

The European Network for Film Discourse (The END) and short film magazine Talking Shorts are organising the 7th edition of the European Workshop for Film Criticism: two week-long workshop sessions for aspiring film critics set during film festivals in Vila do Conde, Portugal (Curtas Vila do Conde, July 2025) and Ljubljana, Slovenia (FeKK, August 2025).

The two workshop units will explore short film criticism and festival coverage in a variety of formats, both written and audiovisual. At Vila do Conde, participants will work on the fundamentals of conducting and writing interviews, which they will arrange with some of the filmmakers invited to the festival.

Parallel to that, the participants will be mentored on the art of video essays, and will begin crafting their own, which they will continue to work on and complete at FeKK. Video essays aside, this second workshop unit will move away from interviews to embrace more discursive and essayistic types of coverage, like festival correspondences and dispatches.

Participants will receive 1:1 editorial guidance from the workshop’s tutor and guest mentors throughout the two festivals. A selection of their texts and video essays will be published on Talking Shorts.

The workshops will be held in English. There will be tasks before each workshop and additional editing in between or after the workshop tandem.

Tutor
The tutor of this tandem workshop will be Leonardo Goi. A film critic and editor, he is a staff writer and columnist at MUBI Notebook, an editor at Senses of Cinema, and a regular contributor to The Film Stage, Reverse Shot, Film Comment, and Filmmaker Magazine, among others. Goi also runs the Berlinale Talent Press, as well as the Critics Campus at the Golden Apricot International Film Festival in Yerevan, Armenia.

Application
The workshop is aimed at anyone over 18 who is interested in critical and discursive work about (short) films and can participate in both units of the tandem workshop:

13.07—19.07.2025
Workshop at Curtas Vila do Conde (Portugal)

17.08—24.08.2024
Workshop at FeKK Ljubljana Short Film Festival (Slovenia)

The application is available for European residents who:

• are over the age of 18;
• have a strong interest and motivation to gain insight into journalistic and criticism practices;
• are eager to learn/be mentored by industry professionals;
• are proficient in English (speaking and writing);
• can attend the programme entirely, i.e. participate in both units of the tandem workshop in Vila do Conde and Ljubljana.

The call is NOW CLOSED.
The results will be communicated by April 18, 2025.