08/11/2005

Per Fly’s Manslaughter [+see also:
trailer
film profile] has just added Lübeck’s Nordic Film Days’ main award, the NDR Promotion Film Prize -amounting to €12,5000- to its already long list of festival awards. The five-member jury (including actor Axel Milberg and former Head of Locarno Film Festival David Streiff), explained their decision with the following statement: "A theme of great dimension, guilt and conscience is examined with tenacity and closeness to the figures in the film. The concentrated screenplay and outstanding actors draw the viewers into the story with an inescapable gravitational pull, forcing them even to question themselves".

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The 47th Nordic Film Days in Lübeck which took place from November 3-6, is the biggest showcase of Nordic films in Germany and outside the Nordic countries and an essential promotional platform for Nordic cinema as Germany is the biggest market in Europe for Nordic films. The other big winner of the festival was the Finnish entry in the 2006 Oscars nominations race Mother of Mine by Klaus Härö which won two major awards: the Public Award and the Baltic Films Prize. The jury consisting of Zanda Dunina, production consultant from Latvia’s National Film Centre, Aushra Duobiené, commercial director at Lithuania’s Lietuvos Kinas Company and Karlo Funk, Head of International Relations at the Estonian Film Foundation said about the film: "In a subtle and thoughtful way, the film observes the choices a child has to take as a refugee in the middle of war. The film brings together the historical, ethical, individual and artistic dimensions of Nordic culture".

The Children’s Film Prize of the Nordic Film Institutes went to the feature film debut of Estonian director René Vilbre: Mat The Cat produced by Parunid & Von’id, Amrion, Taska Film, and the Church Film Prize (€2,500) to the Finnish film Homesick by Petri Kotwica.