On july 17th, Maksim posted that he’d been notified by TopShot International Film Festival about the Best Comedy & Best Short Film award as early as the 13th of November 2023, and that he had just waited for the best opportunity to share the great news. The work had also been selected for Best Original Score, Best Costume Design and Best TV Show, at festivals such as Art Giraffe (Nice, France) and Winter Leopard (Stockholm). The composer is Goran Trajkoski.
The short film is in fact an episode of the anthology series “Macedonian Folk Tales”, produced by Alfa Television in Skopje. While Maksim was directing the series as his full time job, he was also working on his Master’s, which required a practical work along the paper. Hence the episode was conjured and developed for a much longer period than the other episodes that were produced on a rapid basis.
Maksim had adopted a lot of screenplays for the series, however for this work he fully takes the credit as an author. Which wouldn’t be the first, as he’s known to delve into all areas of production when working on his projects.
A noteworthy example is “Tell me we’re for real”, Maksim’s student film from 2021 that had only in 2023 been awarded three times for Best Student film, and once for Best Romantic Short.
A movie he wrote, produced, directed and edited.
(Maksim holding a prologue speech for “Tell me we’re for real” on Asterfest Film Festival 2023)
Maksim’s filmmaking passion is evident even before entering film school. In the 2015 national vocational highschools competition of Macedonia “MASSUM”, Maksim was awarded first place for his 11min. short: “The Defect Patriots”. Apart from this, Maksim had been creating various internet videos since the age of nine.
Maksim is currently utilizing his skills at Alfa TV in the control room, as well as helping out on various projects when needed, some of the more prominent are the recently finished “Tommorrow Morning” (currently in post), and “Clear Water” (2022), contributing as a production coordinator and second assistant director.
Maksim’s hope for his next uptaking is producing his next short film (25min.), that would serve as his official Directorial debut, since his previous works don’t qualify as such, as they were without a budget or financing.
