Independent Juries

Note: the jury members' films are presented in the "Programmi speciali" section.

Go to the film selection

Ecumenical Prize

Jury members:
Sanne E. Grunnet Denmark
Daria Lepori Switzerland
Ieva Pitruka Latvia
Konstantin Terzis Greece
Joachim Valentin Germany
Christian Wessely Austria 

Since 1973 the Ecumenical Jury has awarded its prize to film directors who have been the most successful with their artistic talent in sensitising the viewer  to religious, people-related, and social values. It looks at the visions of the creative film directors with a feel for justice, peace, and respect as well as for spiritual dimensions. The award included prize money of 20,00 CHF provided by the Reformed Church and Catholic Church of Switzerland, and is committed for the film’s distribution in Switzerland.


FIPRESCI Prize

Jury members:
Pascal Blum Switzerland
Leo Soesanto France
Günter Jekubzik Germany
Yael Shuv Israel
Neil Young UK

To promote cinema as an art form and encourage new and young cinema, the International Federation of Film Critics awards the International Critics’ Prize (FIPRESCI Prize) to a film presented in competition.


CICAE Prix Art & Essai
(Confédération Internationale des Cinémas d’Art & d’Essai)

Jury members:
Katarzyna Boratyn Poland
Éva Demeter Hungary
Erdmann Lange Germany

ART CINEMA AWARD - Bringing festival films to arthouse cinema audiences.
The CICAE is the first international association of its kind: founded in 1955, it today represents 3,000 screens in 30 countries in Europe, Latin America USA and Africa. Its mission is to promote quality motion pictures on wide screens, to defend the ‘’right for cultural diversity’’.
And this is also the difficult task of major festivals such as Locarno, but one that they successfully achieve. The ART CINEMA AWARD is awarded by an international jury of independent cinema programmers, critics and distributors. The ART CINEMA AWARD helps towards distribution in arthouse cinemas systematically informing the 2,000 CICAE member cinemas, as an incentive for distribution companies to market the films discovered and in order to promote their circulation. Working on a country-by-country basis, local CICAE networks help distributors successfully market award-winning films, through recommendations for all cinemas, trade-only screenings to the exhibitors members and the delivery of information to audiences.

Junior Jury Awards

Jury members:

The jury will be selected during the Festival from participants in the Cinema e Gioventù intitiative

The Junior Jury awards the following Prizes (offered by the Cantonal Department for Education, Culture and Sport) to the best directors in the official International Competition: 1st prize 6,000 CHF, 2nd prize 4,000 CHF, 3rd prize 2,000 CHF.
Moreover, the Junior Jury will award a special prize of 3,000 CHF, offered by the Cantonal Department for territory, to the film with the best interpretation of the concept «environment is quality of life.»


FICC/IFFS Prize
(International Federation of Film Societies)

Jury members:
Alice Bourrely Switzerland
Juan Manuel Garcia Ferrer - Catalunya Spain
Twele Holger Germany

DonQuijote Prize of the FICC/IFFS. Founded in 1947 during the Cannes Film Festival, FICC/IFFS is the international umbrella organisation of film societies and non-profit cinemas. One of the aims of FICC/IFFS is to discover outstanding films and to promote them internationally. In order to achieve this, FICC/IFFS promotes all the awarded films trough its members around the world. All films awarded by FICC juries, which are present at many prestigious festivals, are listed in the catalogue of FICC’s. In addition to this, a selection of awarded films is presented in June at the annual International Festival of Film Societies in Italy.


SRG SSR / Semaine de la critique 2011 Prize

Jury members:
Hans Hodel Switzerland
Isabelle Regnier France
Stas Tyrkin Russia

The SRG SSR / Semaine de la critique Prize is CHF 8,000 allocated to the director and producer of the winning film.