SEOUL, October 06 (AJP) - Filmmakers from 125 countries sent 8,067 films made with artificial intelligence to Kazakhstan's first AI film festival, which closed Saturday in Astana as the government pushes to turn the capital into a center for technology and the creative industries.
Organizers said the entry count made the Astana AI Film Festival the largest international competition for AI-generated films in the world. Only 25 films reached the final round, and the winners shared $1 million in prize money.
The $450,000 Grand Prix went to Latvian filmmaker Nikolay Shestak for The First Honest Day, entered in the main competition under the theme "The Future Worth Living In."
The three-day festival, held Oct. 1 to 3, was part of AI & Digital Bridge 2026, a technology forum at the center of a month of AI events Kazakhstan staged during what it declared its Year of Digitalization and Artificial Intelligence. Finalists' films were screened free to the public at a cinema in the capital.
President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev opened the festival on Oct. 2, calling it "a unique, unparalleled project" in which educated, innovative and creative people show their talents, according to a readout from Akorda, the presidential office.
President Tokayev said AI gives young people and small creative teams a way to compete with large studios and makes it easier to break into the film industry. He added that hosting the event in Astana was no accident, pointing out that the average age of Kazakhstan's population is 33.
India's SITARA took second place and $200,000. Spain's Looking For Perseida finished third, winning $100,000.
Five more films won $50,000 each in category awards for character, directing, visual language, story and concept.
Kazakhstan's Myrzakhan Zhumakhan took Best Character for It Was Just a Joke, a comedy in which a dog and its owner's brother fall out over a prank that plays out on the scale of a blockbuster. Zhumakhan said his own love of pranks and humor inspired the story.
An international jury chose the winners. Its members included Audrey Azoulay, who led UNESCO, the United Nations' cultural and scientific agency, from 2017 to 2025, and Balaji Srinivasan, a technology investor and former chief technology officer of the cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase.
The festival carried a total fund of $2 million, half of it for prizes. The other $1 million was set aside to back promising AI teams and film production in Kazakhstan, with selected teams eligible to join Astana Hub, the state-backed technology park for startups in the capital.
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