Festival Internacional de Cine de la Universidad Central (8)

Festival start: 22 October 2025      Festival end: 28 October 2025

The Central University International Film Festival (FICUC) and the Central University film program are once again present to invite students, alumni and the public to the eighth edition of FICUC.

“Finding a possible cinema” will be the vision of the festival during this new edition of the festival. Under this slogan, the festival seeks new visions of cinema, ones that are open to exploration, both aesthetically and thematically, and to that of its production models or schemes. This year the festival seeks to generate encounters with a new national cinema, which moves away from traditional models and proposes an alternative, creative and recursive production.

The eighth edition of FICUC opens the call to all types of national and international short films made during undergraduate, graduate, master's, etc. academic periods. Also, short films made outside of academic periods, but certified by the university of these participants, i.e., creation labs, workshops, etc.

The competition will be divided into four categories: national, international, school and national feature films. Each category will consist of a winning film and an honorable mention, which will be awarded by the juries of each category.

The competing works in the categories of: national short film competition and national feature film competition, will also be competing for the “Jury Award”. This prize will be awarded by a select group of students from different university undergraduate programs, in order to generate an encounter between two apparently disconnected worlds.

Each short film selected from both the national short film and feature film competitions will be participating in the Best Director Award. This will be chosen by a group of directors and/or film critics previously selected.

Each winner of the above mentioned categories (National, International, School and National Feature Films) will receive a statuette of the festival, in addition to a prize previously agreed with our direct sponsors. In past editions, sponsors have awarded prizes such as: 5 million rental kits, 5.1 mixing, loan of sound equipment, a selection of films for the school category, etc.

The winner of the national feature film competition will receive an economic bonus, in addition to the statuette for best national feature film.

We are looking for films that have been made within the framework of an academic activity or exercise (classes, workshops, degree projects, etc.) that want to be part of our exhibition and competition spaces. We accept films completed from 2024 to 2025.

In this eighth edition we will have 4 competition sections:

• National Competition (Colombia): In the National Competition, the curatorial criteria are: Short films made by university students of Colombian nationality and completed in the last two years, which reflect the author's personal searches, encouraging the exploration of narratives close to their context and expanding experimentation and innovation to their production models. Exploration is not limited to one genre or format; Any type of short film, whether fiction, experimental, animation or documentary, will be accepted and evaluated as a cinematographic work.

Short films of any genre and format will be accepted, made by Colombian university students or by those who belong to a school, faculty or department of visual arts, cinema and/or communication in Colombia. The minimum duration of the short films must be 3 minutes, and the completion date must be between 2024 and 2025.


• National Feature Film Competition (Colombia): In the National Feature Film Competition, the curatorial criteria are as follows: feature films made by students and/or filmmakers of Colombian nationality. The goal is to showcase perspectives that reflect the inquiries and explorations of contemporary independent cinema, emphasizing an interest in production through alternative approaches to traditional methods. Additionally, the competition seeks projects with narrative concerns, both formal and aesthetic, where films are not centered on a specific topic but are driven by impulses rooted in the cinematic language itself. Exploration is not limited to any one genre or format; any type of feature film, whether fiction, experimental, animation, or documentary, will be accepted and evaluated as a cinematic work.

The minimum duration of feature films must be 70 minutes, and they must have been completed between 2022 and 2025.


• National School Short Film Competition (Colombia): The selection criteria for the National School Short Film Competition are: Short films made by students from Colombian schools, completed in the last two years, that demonstrate an interest in audiovisual experimentation and the creation of films using homemade materials. The objective is to bring the public closer to the innovative proposals of new young filmmakers with basic training. Exploration is not limited to one genre or format; Any type of short film, whether fiction, experimental, animation or documentary, will be accepted and evaluated as a cinematographic work.

Short films of any genre and format will be accepted, made by students from Colombian schools, with a minimum duration of 3 minutes. The completion date of the short films must be between 2024 and 2025.

• International Competition: In International Competition, the curatorial criteria are: short films made by students of foreign nationality (non-Colombian) and completed in the last two years, belonging to schools, university courses, postgraduate, technical, master's degrees, etc. The objective is to find international panoramas that recognize the searches and questions of contemporary independent cinema, where interest in production is explored through alternative forms to traditional ones. In addition, projects with both formal and aesthetic narrative concerns are sought, in which the films do not focus on a specific theme, but rather on impulses that come from cinematographic language. Exploration is not limited to one genre or format; Any type of short film, whether fiction, experimental, animation or documentary, will be accepted and evaluated as a cinematographic work.

Short films of any genre and format, made by university students of foreign nationality, will be accepted. The minimum duration of the short films must be 3 minutes, and their completion date must be between 2024 and 2025.


Note: The curatorial team may determine that a work be placed in a different category if it so considers.

Participant profile:

Participation will be open to university students and graduates of audiovisual programs, plastic arts, social communication and/or similar. All works that wish to participate, carried out within the framework of a university activity or exercise, may participate, provided that the author, director, producer and/or editor (which may be the same person) have been linked to a university institution at the time of creation and up to a maximum of two (2) years after graduation.

Participation requirements for all categories:

1. Theme: To increase the chances of being in this year's official selection, the works can refer (in one way or another) to this year's main theme “Finding a possible cinema” (Read the festival description).

2. Format: The works, if selected, must be delivered in the best possible quality (greater than 1080p up to a maximum of 4k) and on the dates that will be established for that.

3. Only completed works will be received from January 2024.

4. For the selected films, a letter from the university or institution will be requested that endorses the work, along with the screening copy of the film, the director's photographs, poster, graphic piece and/or still from the film and a signature of the authorization for the projection and dissemination of promotional pieces in the programming and promotion of the festival.

5. If the work is not spoken in Spanish, the filmmakers will have to send the short film with the proper subtitles in the Spanish language; if the subtitles are not sent, the short film will be disqualified.

6. The selected films will be requested to have subtitles in C.C (Closed Captions), since it is important that people with diverse abilities can enjoy the entire festival programming.