SUNNY BUNNY LGBTQIA+ Film Festival

The festival grows out of the Sunny Bunny strand at Molodist, part of the festival since 2001. Molodist (founded in 1970) was the second major international film festival in the world after Berlinale and Teddy to introduce a special award for LGBTQIA+ themed films and launch a dedicated program, which then evolved into Sunny Bunny: a competition of full length fiction films alongside non competition screenings of documentaries, short films, and queer classics. Andriy Khalpakhchi and Anatoliy Yerema founded the LGBTQIA+ program at Molodist. Sunny Bunny has been the leading LGBTQIA+ themed cultural event in Ukraine and the Eastern European region.

Sunny Bunny film festival maintains the tradition of the eponymous programme at Molodist, while expanding into a wider scope of subjects and representing more films and talents. The main program is the international competition dedicated to feature length fiction films. In addition, the festival showcases fiction, documentary, short, and classic films in its non competition section. Selected films compete for the Best Film awards in both the International Competition and the International Short Competition, with 4000 USD in total prize money plus the Sunny Bunny statuette.