Blind Dates wins the Golden Olive Tree at Lecce; Cineuropa Award goes to Macondo
- The 15th edition of the Lecce Festival of European Cinema has bestowed its top prize upon Levan Koguashvili’s Georgian film
A great many films received awards at the closing ceremony of the Lecce Festival of European Cinema, directed by Alberto La Monica. Without a shadow of a doubt, the selection rustled up by Cristina Soldano brought together ten first-rate European films in the charming Puglia city, including Blind Dates [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Levan Koguashvili
film profile] (read the review) by Georgian director Levan Koguashvili, which won the Golden Olive Tree for Best Film.
The jury chaired by Spanish producer and director Lluís Miñarro gave the Best Director Award to Macondo [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Sudabeh Mortezai
film profile] (read the review) by Sudabeh Mortezai, another film revealed at the Berlinale that also left Lecce clutching the Cineuropa Award, one of the festival’s partners.
Also among the prizewinners were Winter Journey by Russian duo Lubov Lvova and Sergey Taramaev (Best Cinematography), My Soul Healed by You [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile] (read the review) by François Dupeyron (Special Jury Prize for French actor Grégory Gadebois) and the German-Turkish-Dutch co-production Lifelong [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile] by Asli Özge (Special Jury Prize for actress Defne Halman, read the review).
The jury at the European competition comprised Lluís Miñarro, Stefan Kitanov (director of the Sofia International Film Festival, as well as a producer and distributor), Jasmina Zbanic (director), Lou Castel (actor) and Licia Eminenti (director and project manager at Eurimages). The Cineuropa jury, consisting of Domenico La Porta and Valerio Caruso, was thrilled to also welcome Guillaume Calop (director of the Festival des Arcs) on board.
The FIPRESCI jury awarded its prize to Norwegian film Letter to the King [+see also:
trailer
interview: Hisham Zaman
film profile] (Hisham Zaman, read the interview), while the Audience Award went to September [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile] (read the review) by Greek director Penny Panayotopoulou.
The complete awards list is available on the festival’s official website.
(Translated from French)
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