Leiden Shorts is an annual short film festival held in the city of Leiden, The Netherlands. Leiden Shorts (previously known as Leiden International Short Film Experience) was founded in 2009 as a cineclub and has grown to become one of the Netherlands' largest international short film festivals.[1][2]
Founded in 2009, LISFE (Leiden International Short Film Experience) was created by 5 cinema-loving expats. While they were studying at Leiden University, the first and oldest university in the Netherlands, they felt that short film was grossly underrepresented as an art form and sought to create a space where short film could truly be appreciated as a medium.
From their love of short film, a cineclub was born. Held in sporadic locations, it was an open space for cinephiles of all genres. Above all, this cineclub shone a new and open spotlight on short films.
Today, what was originally a one-day festival has grown into Leiden Shorts, one of the most prominent short film festivals in the Netherlands. Fourteen editions later, the now 4-day festival has gone from screenings in Leiden’s underground art spaces to collaborations co-hosted by Leiden’s cinemas.
Since 2012, the festival has three categories of awards – General Award, Student Award and Audience Award. In 2020, a National Award was created, and the General Award was renamed International Award. The juries for the National, International, and Student Awards are generally composed of scholars, filmmakers and other film professionals alike. The audience votes during the festival and the results are announced on the last day of the festival. During the festival's retrospective edition in 2023, the Retrospective Audience Award was awarded to three films with the highest audience rating.
Retrospective Audience Award (the three films with the highest audience rating, in alphabetical order): Love, Dad (dir. Diana Cam Van Nguyen), Czech Republic, 2021 | My Uncle Tudor (dir. Olga Lucovnicova), Belgium, Portugal, Hungary and Moldova, 2021 | Sisters (dir. Katarina Rešek Kukla), Slovenia, 2021