Locarno unveils its award winners, jam-packed with independent European films
- The festival unveils its winners. Once again, as tradition would have it, independent cinema is (multi) awarded
Although Philippine Mulas Sa Kung Ano Ang Noon (From What Is Before) by Lav Diaz won the Golden Leopard, European cinema has nonetheless brought home three important awards in Locarno Film Festival's international competition. The decision to award the festival’s most important prize to Lav Diaz’s new film (which lasts 338 minutes) shows how Locarno has lost none of its clout in its support of independent cinema, demanding almost to the point of intransigence. «In Mulas Sa Kung Ano Ang Noon time and space don’t exist. We’re faced with a constant beginning despite the length of the movie. A true cinema experience», is how jury members describe the Golden Leopard winner.
This year Portugal wins another important award in the International competition. Pedro Costa and his movie Horse Money [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile], a film that’s similar to the Golden Leopard winner because of its radical and intense narration, win the Leopard for best direction. Awards for best (male and female) acting, in the international competition again, went to two European actors: French Ariane Labed, who won the award for best actress thanks to her role as a skipper struggling with her difficult private life, in Fidelio, l'odissée d'Alice [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Lucie Borleteau
film profile] by Lucie Borleteau; and to Russian Artem Bystov who offers us an uncommonly strong character, a hero of modern times suffocated by an extremely hostile reality (The Fool [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Yury Bykov
film profile] by Yury Bykov).
Even the Cineasti del presente competition (a genuine space for discovery dedicated to first and second films from young up-and-coming directors) had two nice surprises. Young French filmmaker, Damien Manivel, was awarded, with his first feature film Un jeune poète [+see also:
trailer
film profile], the jury Special mention. While the Italian-Canadian movie The Creation of Meaning by Simone Rapisa Casanova took home the prestigious Award for best up-and-coming director.
In the Pardo di domani competition (a platform for upcoming talents dedicated to short and medium-length films) the movie Abandoned Goods from English Pia Borg and Edward Lawrence won the most important award: the Pardino d’oro for best short film international-Award SRG SSR. Another nice surprise was Shipwreck from Dutch Morgan Knibbe which took home two prizes: the Pardino d’argento SRG SSR for the International competition and the Locarno Nomination to the European Film Awards. As for the National competition the biggest award, the Pardino d’oro for best Swiss short film was won by Italian-Swiss director Sarah Arnold and her movie Totems.
The two important awards UBS Public Prize and Variety Piazza Grande Award also went to Europeans; to Swiss Schweizer Helden [+see also:
trailer
film profile] by Peter Luisi and to Marie Heurtin [+see also:
trailer
film profile] by Jean-Pierre Améris respectively. A French movie, I, Kamikaze [+see also:
trailer
film profile], by Sawada Masa, won the Special mention in the First films section.
(Translated from Italian)
Did you enjoy reading this article? Please subscribe to our newsletter to receive more stories like this directly in your inbox.
