Magical Realist Tale ‘6TM’ and ‘Searching for SmarterChild,’ About One of the Earliest Chatbots, Win Top Industry Awards at Ji.hlava Festival
“6TM” won Ji.hlava’s New Visions Award for the most promising European project, recognising its blend of magical realism, humour and social themes. Set during a hot summer in Brussels’ Cité Modèle housing estate, the film follows three stories about one family and their neighbours, exploring community resilience and whose experiences are represented on screen.
“Searching for SmarterChild”, a US-Canadian film directed by Lindsey Sitz and Zan Gillies, won the award for the most promising US project. It revisits the 2003 chatbot that became a confidant and target of abuse for young internet users, using those exchanges to examine human behaviour and today’s relationship with AI. The European award includes post-production support valued at about €20,000, while the US project receives $7,000; the festival also honoured Danish producer Signe Byrge Sørensen for her contribution to international cinema.
In short
- “6TM” won Ji.hlava’s award for the most promising European project.
- “Searching for SmarterChild” received the US project award.
- The films explore community representation and people’s relationship with AI.
Explained simply
Ji.hlava is a documentary film festival in the Czech Republic that also supports projects still in development or production. Its New Visions awards recognise promising European and US projects, with funding to help bring them to completion.
Cité Modèle is a large housing estate in Brussels, where residents’ lives reflect the city’s varied communities. SmarterChild was a chatbot that users could talk to through online messaging services in the early 2000s, before today’s widely used AI assistants.
The two films take different approaches to questions of community and technology: one centres on a family and its neighbours, while the other looks back at people’s exchanges with a chatbot. Their subjects touch on whose lives are shown in film and how people relate to digital tools.
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