The MAFF, the Moscow Asian Film Festival, has been launched to support independent filmmakers throughout Asia to display their unique ideas, to tell the stories deep down inside their hearts, and to inspire both audiences and other independent filmmakers.
The Moscow Asian Film Festival features work produced by filmmakers of Asian decent as well as stories about Asian culture and heritage. We will be accepting submissions from asian filmmakers, directors, writers, majority asian crew and/or asian stories.
The festival will primarily support Asian filmmakers to showcase their talents. The event will show short to full length movies and documentaries of Asian cultural, social and historical significance by Asian as well as non-Asian filmmakers. The festival will host filmmakers for a reception and audience engagement. The festival will be a marquee event for the city with support from Big Asia TV-chanel with the goal to promote asian films in Russia.
Festival features live screenings in Global Cinema in Moscow with six 100 – seat theaters with laser DLP projectors and JBL speakers throughout the venue, delivering top notch quality in an intimate screening environment. Filmmakers whose work is accepted into our festival will receive free passes to screenings, invitations to networking events and are eligible for awards consideration.
MAFF is organized and produced by Valery Shanin’s Film Club and Big Asia TV-chanel with generous financial support from private donors.
All best films that were selected for the screening, will be shown on the big screen during the solemn final ceremony on March 14 – 16, 2025 in Moscow, Russia and will be able to struggle for the main prize and the title of the “Best film”. As well as for the prizes in the standalone nominations.
Awards & Prizes
Our jury selects the winners of each category:
Best Feature Film
Best Narrative Short
Best Feature Documentary
Best Short Documentary
Best Feature Animation
Best Animated Short
Best TV Pilot/Web Series Episode
Best Ai-generated film
Best Music Video
Best Director
Best Cinematography
Best Asian Feature Film Screenplay
Best Asian Short Film Screenplay
The winners will receive the Moscow Asian Film Festival Trophy.
Our team
Festival President Valery Shanin
Valery Shanin — journalist, writer and filmmaker, producer of TV programs, author of series “Around the world” on the Big Asiia TV chanel, founder of “Valery Shanin’s film club”, president of international film festivals.
Director Vadim Nikishin
Vadim Nikishin is a graduate of the St. Petersburg State University of Cinema and Television, a specialist in audio-visual systems for cinema and television, great experience of business development in the CIS countries, director of Nivada Film.
Head of Programming Slava Krasko
Slava was born in St. Petersburg, Russia, made a career as a financier and when he was 35 years old left the business to go on a round-the-world trip. He described his impressions of the trip in the book “The Year of Spring”. In 2014, Slava traveled by motorcycle across South America on the route of Ernesto Che Guevara and shot a documentary about it. Since 2017 he has been studying at the Higher Courses of Scriptwriters and Directors in Moscow.
Film Festival Development Manager Alina Fedulova
A graduate of the Faculty of Journalism at Saint Petersburg State University (SPbGU) with a specialization in “International Journalism”. At the film festival, she coordinates participants and develops partnerships. As a digital nomad, she combines traveling the world with organizing various international film festivals.