We are proud to be a part of a network of sites that has awarded Julia Loktev’s stunning “My Undesirable Friends: Part I – Last Air in Moscow” with the 2025 IFSN Advocate Award. Other films cited as essential ones of 2025 include “Cutting Through Rocks,” “Familiar Touch,” “The Perfect Neighbor,” “Put Your Soul on Your Hand and Walk,” and “The Voice of Hind Rajab.” Please see the official press release below:

Indie Film Site Network (IFSN) has announced Julia Loktev’s My Undesirable Friends: Part I – Last Air in Moscow as the recipient of the 2025 IFSN Advocate Award. The award was established in 2022 to highlight independent films each year that illuminate a humanitarian issue with a singular artistic vision. The top prize is awarded one million (1M) media impressions across the Indie Film Site Network, which represents The Film Stage, Hammer to Nail, IONCINEMA.com, Next Best Picture, RogerEbert.com, and Slant Magazine. Letterboxd is also contributing to the award.

Finalists for the 2025 IFSN Advocate Award are Sara Khaki and Mohammad Reza Eyni’s ​​Cutting Through Rocks, Sarah Friedland’s Familiar Touch, Geeta Gandbhir’s The Perfect Neighbor, Sepideh Farsi’s Put Your Soul on Your Hand and Walk, and Kaouther Ben Hania’s The Voice of Hind Rajab, which will each be awarded 100K media impressions across IFSN. 

Soviet-born American filmmaker Julia Loktev (The Loneliest Planet, Day Night Day Night) came to Moscow in 2021 to make a film about independent journalists being declared “foreign agents” by Putin’s regime—as it turns out, just four months before Russia started a full-scale war in Ukraine. With her friend Anna Nemzer, a talk show host at TV Rain, Russia’s last remaining independent news channel, Loktev brings us into a community of sharp, warm, and funny young women speaking truth to power as they face increasing threats. Loktev filmed in Moscow during the first week of the full-scale invasion, as the journalists tried to counter Russian propaganda and report the truth on the war, until all independent media were shut down and they were forced to flee the country. Structured in five chapters, feeling like a cross between a Russian novel and a reality show about frighteningly real reality, Loktev’s film is an extraordinary historical record of a country on the verge of fascism and an immersive and intimate inside view of the opposition in an authoritarian society, which becomes all the more globally relevant every day.

“This is such an honor. The way audiences are experiencing this film has changed so much over the past months,” said Julia Loktev. “It’s gone from being a film about journalists fighting an authoritarian regime in a far away place, to hitting very close to home in the U.S. People keep telling me the film has helped them process the current moment, which is also a form of advocacy—a reminder not to ignore the warning signs and, hopefully, an inspiration to keep fighting even when the fight sometimes feel lost.”

“As the vital right of the freedom of press continues to be eroded across the world, Julia Loktev’s My Undesirable Friends: Part I – Last Air in Moscow intimately and exhaustively captures the Putin regime’s calculated dismantling of what should be a universal certainty,” said Jordan Raup, co-founder of IFSN and editor-in-chief and co-founder of The Film Stage. “In presenting the IFSN Advocate Award to Loktev, we also want to commend the courage of the film’s subjects––Anna Nemzer, Ksenia Mironova, Sonya Groysman, Olga Churakova, Irina Dolinina––for steadfastly reporting amidst the threat of immediate danger. We sincerely hope a U.S. distributor comes aboard to introduce this essential documentary to a wider audience.”

My Undesirable Friends: Part I – Last Air in Moscow premiered at the 2024 New York Film Festival, and subsequently played at Berlin International Film Festival, IDFA Best of Fests, Thessaloniki Documentary Festival, Visions du Réel Film Festival, and Karlovy Vary International Film Festival, among others. It received a U.S. qualifying run in August at Film Forum and is currently seeking U.S. distribution.

The IFSN Advocate Award, created by the network as part of its mission to celebrate and support indie film, is selected by a jury of writers and editors from IFSN sites, with each site nominating a finalist and deliberating to award a winner. Previous IFSN Advocate Award winners include Basel Adra, Hamdan Ballal, Yuval Abraham, and Rachel Szor’s No Other Land, D. Smith’s Kokomo City, and Shaunak Sen’s All That Breathes.

About Indie Film Site Network

Indie Film Site Network (IFSN) is a collaboration between well-respected media outlets covering the most essential developments in independent and international cinema. IFSN, which represents The Film Stage, Hammer to Nail, IONCINEMA.com, Next Best Picture, RogerEbert.com, and Slant Magazine, was created with a mission to support film criticism and foster an ever-growing community of indie film lovers. For more information, visit indiefilmsitenetwork.com. For sales and partnership inquiries, contact sales@3rdimpression.com.

At the 2025 Cinema Femme Short Film Festival that took place at the Music Box Theatre earlier this summer, filmmaker and multidisciplinary artist Lauren Melinda was honored as the first recipient of the Chaz Ebert Phenomenal Person in Film Award. The award recognizes filmmakers whose work embodies empathy, compassion, and a commitment to amplifying underrepresented voices, values central both to Cinema Femme and to Chaz Ebert’s philanthropic vision.

During the ceremony, Sonia Evans, Vice President of Development at Ebert Digital LLC and daughter of Chaz Ebert, selected Lauren Melinda for the honor, and shared why she chose Lauren and her film “Before You”:

“I chose Lauren Melinda and her film “Before You” because it invites the viewer into a world where forgiveness, empathy, compassion, and kindness are not only present but essential for survival. These principles are woven throughout the film’s emotional arc and are reflected in Lauren’s own artistic mission. Lauren’s work across film photography and mixed media installation serves as a powerful form of advocacy that speaks not only to personal truth, but to shared humanity. For these reasons, I believe Lauren Melinda is the deeply deserving recipient of the 2025 Chaz Ebert Phenomenal Person in Film Award.”

When asked about Evan’s words, Melinda reflected on how deeply they resonated:

“I so appreciate that’s what she saw from the film. And I think that’s always been my goal—to bring humanity to a conversation that’s so politicized and isn’t really seen in that light. For her to reflect that back was incredibly meaningful to me. In all of my work—my artwork, writing, filmmaking—it’s always been about finding the humanity and the connection we share, and creating an open dialogue.”

Melinda emphasized that her art often delves into subjects many people shy away from discussing. “My husband sometimes asks me, why do you talk about things people aren’t supposed to talk about?” she said with a smile. “But the truth is, so many of us live with silence, shame, or guilt. We don’t need to be alone in that. Sharing our own humanity allows others to bring their stories into the light.”

Her film “Before You,” currently screening at festivals nationwide—including at the Alabama School of Fine Arts—has sparked conversations across audiences in unexpected places.

“What surprised me most was how many red states have been playing my film,” she noted. “I expected it to find its home in blue states, where the conversation is maybe more normalized. But actually, most of the festivals have been in very strict abortion states. It’s been fascinating to see how audiences there have received the film and the idea that love and pain can exist together.”

That duality, Melinda explained, is at the heart of “Before You.” “I talk with my daughter about being able to hold two feelings at once. For me, this film is about holding the immense love I had for my daughter who was born alongside the pain and loss of the one who never came to be. Many of us—women, men, parents—have lived with loss. The film is about shifting expectations and opening space for those emotions to coexist.”

About the Award

The Phenomenal Person in Film Award was inspired in 2019, when Chaz Ebert praised Cinema Femme’s Executive Director, Rebecca Martin Fagerholm, as “a phenomenal woman” during a public event. That moment sparked the creation of an award to recognize filmmakers whose work advances empathy, representation, and inclusion.

This year marks the first time the Cinema Femme Film Festival has presented the award under Ebert’s name. Each recipient is interviewed for Cinema Femme Magazine and invited to meet Chaz Ebert, continuing her mission of mentoring and uplifting new voices. Past honorees of the original Phenomenal Person Award have included Veronica Miles, Katrine Weber, Anna Fredrikke Bjerke, Mazdey Snob, Tiffany Tenille, and Claudia Lee.

Cameron Bailey, the CEO of the Toronto International Film Festival (“TIFF”), announced that at its 50th edition, TIFF will present acclaimed filmmaker Guillermo del Toro with this year’s Ebert Director Award, as part of their TIFF Tribute Awards gala.

Del Toro, the Academy Award-winning director of films like “Pan’s Labyrinth,” “Nightmare Alley,” “Hellboy,” “Crimson Peak,” “The Devil’s Backbone,” and “The Shape of Water,” will be presented with the award (which recognizes filmmakers who have exemplified greatness) at the TIFF Tribute Awards gala, in Toronto, Sunday, September 7th at the Fairmont Royal York Hotel.

The director will also premiere his latest film, “Frankenstein,” at the festival.

Chaz Ebert, Publisher of RogerEbert.com, said: “I am absolutely thrilled that Guillermo Del Toro will receive the Ebert Director Award at TIFF in acknowledgement of his excellence as a filmmaker. In his conversations with Roger, he confirmed that his films often explored the depths of the psyche, both of his own and of our collective fears and desires. His attention to cinematic detail is exemplary.”

Alongside del Toro, other Tribute Award recipients this year include Jodie Foster, who will receive the Share Her Journey Groundbreaker Award for her pioneering work as a female filmmaker; Japanese writer-director Mitsuyo Miyazaki (aka Hikari) will receive the Emerging Talent Award, and South Korean star Lee Byung-hun (“Squid Game, “this year’s upcoming “No Other Choice”) will receive the Special Tribute Award. Brendan Fraser is returning as the Chair of the event.

Previous Ebert Director Award recipients include Martin Scorsese, Ava DuVernay, Agnes Varda, Wim Wenders, Spike Lee, Mike Leigh, Claire Denis, Taika Waititi, Chloé Zhao, Denis Villeneuve, and Sam Mendes.

TIFF will take place September 4th to September 14th, with its opening night film being the documentary “John Candy: I Like Me,” about the late comic actor.

Watch the teaser for the TIFF Tribute Awards below.