09/01/2014 - Awards also go to legendary film critic Jaan Ruus and Sorrentino’s The Great Beauty

Tangerines by Zaza Urushadze

Estonian/Georgian co-production Tangerines [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile] (Mandariinid, Dir. Zaza Urushadze) walked away with the 2014 Virgin Maali Award for Best Estonian Film at a ceremony held in Tallinn’s Kino Sõprus yesterday. The film follows an Estonian farmer who takes in two wounded soldiers at the height of the Abkhazia war in 1990.  The award, bestowed by the Estonian Film Critics Association, tops off an excellent few months for the film which has also won Audience Awards at numerous festivals (including the Warsaw Film Festival where it also won for Best Director.) Urushadze was on hand to collect the award where he thanked the audience effusively in Russian.

Other awards at the event went to Jaan Ruus who picked up the Best Critic of the Year Award. Perhaps the most famous and venerated of Estonian film critics, Ruus won the award chiefly for his new book, Eesti filmi täheatla, a collection of interviews with numerous legendary Estonian actors.

Estonian distributor Must Käsi picked up Best Distributed Film for their release of Sorrentino’s The Great Beauty [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Paolo Sorrentino
film profile].