Awards return to Edinburgh

by Naman Ramachandran

14/02/2012 - It’s official. Ending months of speculation, Chris Fujiwara, Artistic Director, Edinburgh International Film Festival (EIFF), has announced that this year’s edition of the festival will see the return of major awards.

The awards were absent in 2011 due to cost-cutting measures, leading to trenchant criticism from the industry. 2012 will see the Best International Feature Film by an Emerging Director, Best Performance in a British Feature Film and The Michael Powell Award for Best British Feature honours making a return. The major change in the Powell award is that from this year documentaries will also be eligible in addition to films from the British Gala section.

Eligibility for the awards will be at the Fujiwara’s discretion. Chris Fujiwara said, “I am delighted to re-introduce these awards for the Festival this year and am pleased to give both documentary and fiction films the opportunity to win the awards. I feel very strongly that having noteworthy awards is important for an international film festival. Awards can stimulate creative dialogue and above all help shine the spotlight on emerging talent, which is part of the mission of EIFF.”