About festival

It’s the most important initiative promoting independent Cinema in Poland and one of the most important initiatives in the world.

Brought to life in 2006 World’s Independent Cinema Awards GRAND OFF is a cultural event that draws attention on the phenomen of independent cinema and gives it a proper rank, seriousness and prestige. Most interesting independent productions from all over the world are subjected to preselection and typed by the professional Nomination Committee for awards in eleven categories: screenplay, director, picture, editing, scenography, actress, actor, best plot, documentary, animation and best polish movie. Nominated films are evaluated by an international jury formed by more than 80 film experts, theorists, directors, operators, editors, and actors from more than 30 countries. Awards in the form of statuettes are given during the festivals Gala that is taking place on the 3th December 2022 this year. Earlier, during the festival, in one of the Warsaw’s cinemas there’s a dedicated to viewers variated, interesting program.

In 2021 4183 films were submitted from 120 countries.

On every festival we welcome and reward special guests. Until today honorary statuettes were given to: Marcel Łoziński, Krzysztof Zanussi, Cezary Harasimowicz, Allan Starski, Jiri Menzel, Agnieszka Holland, Janusz Gajos, Lech Majewski, Jerzy Hoffman, Daniel Olbrychski, Wojciech Pszoniak, Janusz Majewski, Emilia Krakowska, Wojciech Wójcik, Piotr Fronczewski, Andrzej Seweryn, Andriej Zwiagincew, Ewa Wiśniewska and Witold Kon.