Ladies and Gentlemen, as always, it’s a huge pleasure to help bring the cinematic circus that is the Edinburgh Short Film Festival to our cinemas each Autumn. But like any circus, the time has come to fold up the big top and pack the trapeze artists and human cannonballs back into their Winnibagos for another year.
It just remains to thank all the wonderfully talented young – and not-so-young people – who’ve worked so hard to bring these wonderful films to Edinburgh Shorts 2016.

And so, I’d like to thank the marvellous Yulia Kovanova, our hard working artistic director, head programmer and the linchpin of our Japanese exchange project.

I’d also like to thank the hugely talented Federica Pugliese our Assistant Director, for everything from starring on Periscope to print design and even being interviewed on Sardinian Television, so many thanks Federica!

Thanks also to the highly knowledgeable. erudite and ideas-packed Press Co-Ordinator, Devin Karambelas, New York’s loss has been very much our gain! Her visa is up in January by the way, but she kinda likes it here and she is single…

Thanks also to our ever cheerful Press co-ordinator Alice Shone for her enthusiastic front of house assistance and creative photography and thanks also to Anna Kumacheva who ran our script pitch competition as efficiently and as expertly as you could wish.

Thank you to our genial and informed Q & A host, Carys Evans – our tip is that Carys is a stick-on to be Mark Kermode’s replacement on BBC Film Review and should also be appearing at Undependence next year, so you’ll see her again soon!

Thanks very much to the charming and highly professional Elsa Vibert who has helped us develop the festival over the last couple of years and who it’s always a pleasure to work with!

Thanks to our young and enthusiastic Event Management and box office and ushering team of Ali Malik, Sanne Huizenga, Nicola Laing and Kadi Alikas, all of whom have coped brilliantly with the very difficult task of dealing with over 650 visitors and guests over the last 12 days and done so with charm, good humour, and a real rapport with the public.

We appreciate the bravery and ingenity of Elsa Boudjema who kindly organised our Garden Cinema along with the charming Daniela Cuevos Guerrera and thanks to Fernando and the Brazilian Pancake Kiosk for letting us use their space! Thanks also to Sink for the fabulous live film scoring at the venue on Friday 28^th October!

Thanks to our reviewers Pete Carson & Benjamin Brown who’ve a real feel for the media and for the lovely still photography from our very talented photographer, Nadia Dermatopoulou.

I’d also like to thank Chris Young and the Raptor Films Team for their professionally produced highlights and interview packages (coming soon!) and also to the team at Summerhall, Amber Cordiner and the ever unflappable Silvua who has brilliantly managed all the technical difficulties we could throw at her! As well as the staff at the Filmhouse and the Cameo!

Many thanks are due to Will Samson and…the legend that is Scoop Barclay for their magnificent efforts to remain entirely alcohol free while acting as master of ceremonies, in their own entertaining and inimitable styles!

We also need to thank Kay Sheridan, Shian Holt and James Mavor at Screen Academy Scotland, Claudia Yusuf at Scottish Film Talent Network and Eddie MacFadden at Scottish Screenwriters for helping us to bring you the screenwriters events last weekend. Thanks to Matthew Martino at the Matthew Martino Benevolent Trust for providing us with some excellent prizes and a funding workshop and thanks also to Eve Korzec and everyone at the Scottish Documentary Institute for bringing us a night of outstanding Scottish documentary.

Thanks to all the visiting film-makers – too many to list – who agreed to talk to us about their films and for giving us the chance to screen them to you this Autumn.

I’d also like to thank Edinburgh’s finest exponents of retro-Americana, Brimstone Blake who provided the live music for the last night party.

And finally, thanks so much to you, the Edinburgh film-going public for turning out in large numbers on these dark, Autumnal evenings.

We’ll be hosting more events through 2017 and obviously, the ESFF will be back next year with another season of the world’s finest short films so for now..

Thank You!