NEWS & UPDATES

2023 Durban International Film Festival set for July, with online and in-person presentations
The 44th Durban International Film Festival (DIFF) is set to take place over ten days at the University of KwaZulu-Natal from 20 July.- More than 3 000 films from 137 countries have entered this year's edition for an online and in-person presentation.
- This year's programme "will showcase the works of filmmakers who place their imaginations, voices, creativity and lenses at the centre of creating films that inspire, confront, challenge and provoke audiences".
The 44th Durban International Film Festival (DIFF) is set to take place over ten days at the University of KwaZulu-Natal from 20 July, with more than 3 000 films from 137 countries which entered this year's edition for an online and in-person presentation.DIFF, the oldest film festival in South Africa that debuted in 1979, will use both online and in-person presentations for film lovers in South Africa.
Live screenings will take place at the CineCentre in the Suncoast complex, with other venues to be announced closer to the start of the festival. DIFF manager Andrea Voges has returned this year after working at the Joburg Film Festival, Red Sea International Film Festival, Realness Institute, Ucuru Media, National Arts Council of South Africa and the National Film and Video Foundation of South Africa (NFVF) as a project coordinator. She last worked with the film festival between 2010 and 2014.This year's programme "will showcase the works of filmmakers who place their imaginations, voices, creativity and lenses at the centre of creating films that inspire, confront, challenge and provoke audiences"."The programming team will look out for innovative storytelling that will connect storytellers with audiences," Voges said in a statement.The film shorts programming team comprises the founder of Alfreda's Cinema, Melissa Lyde (US); curator, filmmaker and historian Greta Morton (Australia); filmmaker, visual artist, and film festival programmer Yanyu Dong (China) and curator, cultural programmer and producer Mitchell Harper (South Africa).The documentary programmers are film director and curator Ygor Gama (Argentina/Brazil); line producer and programme coordinator Egar Ntanyi (Nigeria), and film director, producer and director of photography Inadelso Cossa (Mozambique).Writer and director Indranil Banerjee (India); curator, producer, director and broadcaster Andrea Cals (Brazil); festival programmer and distributor Safa Morad (Egypt) and film critic, programmer and journalist Tara Karajicoa (Serbia) will make up the programming team for the features category.The 44th Durban International Film Festival from 20 to 30 July will be followed by the 11th kykNET Silwerskerm Film Festival in Camps Bay in Cape Town from 23 to 26 August.
Live screenings will take place at the CineCentre in the Suncoast complex, with other venues to be announced closer to the start of the festival.