CONGRATULATIONS!

The winners and runners-up in Animated and Non-animated Categories were announced from the festival stage and screened before the main features.

Image design by Zeineb Alieva

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Thank you to the jurors!

ZBIGNIEW BANAŚ

Film critic, teacher, translator, radio and television journalist. Banaś reviews films for the Kino monthly magazine in Poland. He is an instructor in International Film at Loyola University in Chicago, teaches film-related classes for the Road Scholar Program, and conducts film discussions at Talk Cinema and the Sinai Congregation. Banas is the co-founder of the Polish Film Festival of America and serves as the Master of Ceremony of the Polish Film Festivals in Chicago and Los Angeles. He is an accredited journalist at over 20 film festivals, including Cannes, Berlin, Toronto, and Sundance and a member of the Chicago Film Critics Association. Mr. Banaś was also a Master of Ceremony at the Austin Polish Film Festival in 2015 and 2016.

SLAWOMIR GRUNBERG

An Emmy Award winning documentary producer, director and cameraman; he has directed and produced over 45 documentary films including: Don't Cry When I'm Gone, Karski & The Lords of Humanity. His credits as director of photography include: Legacy (Academy Award nomination for best documentary feature in 2001), and Sister Rose’s Passion, which won best short doc at Tribeca Film Festival in 2004 and received an Academy Award nomination for best documentary short in 2005.

ANNE S. LEWIS

A filmmaker and a journalist. Her mixed-media short films have screened widely and won awards, including a Jury Award at SXSW. She writes about film and documentary for, among other publications, the Austin Chronicle and  The Wall Street Journal.

CHALE NAFUS

For 25 years enjoyed a career of a full-time professor at the Austin Community College, where he founded the Radio-TV-Film Department. Mr. Nafus is a founding board member of the Austin Film Society since 1985. He took a position of AFS Director of Programming and enjoyed 12 years of programming a wide array of films at various AFS venues and working with many Austin film organizations. Chale has been a wonderful mentor to the APFF for many years and a frequent speaker at the festival.

ŁUKASZ MACIEJEWSKI

Member of the European Film Academy, the International Association of Theater Critics ("AICT") and the International Federation of Film Critics ("Fipresci"). He is a lecturer for the Acting Department at the Film School in Łódź and for the Faculty of Journalism at the SWPS University in Warsaw. Juror, moderator and organizer of several hundred film festivals. Nominated for "Małopolska Man of the Year". Two of his books, “Actresses: Discoveries” and the Polish-English album “Lupa / Maciejewski: The End of the World of Values” became bestsellers.

ROBERT SIMS

Host of the KOOP 91.7 FM radio show Lights Camera Austin, named by The Austin Chronicle as the "Best Sound of Cinema" in 2018. Robert Sims has written for The Austin American-Statesman, Hollywood.com, Miami New Times, The Palm Beach Daily News, Shock Till You Drop, Total Film Magazine, and What's On in London. He currently is a member of the Austin Film Critics Association: http://austinfilmcritics.org/.

JOANNA ZABŁOCKA-SKOREK

Doctor of Arts in Film Studies,film expert, educator, a Polish Film Institute and Center for Citizenship Education certified trainer in film education and an author of a wide range of trainings, lectures, papers and publications regarding film education for school children. The President of Foundation for the Development of Media and Social Competences ‘KinoSzkola’, as well as the program director of the nationwide Interdisciplinary Media and Social Education Program, under the same name: "KinoSzkola"
She was awarded by the Polish Film Institute in young audience education category as well as received a Golden Ticket for outstanding achievements in the field of film culture dissemination.