22/08/2013 - Per Fly’s Waltz with Monica – a biopic of legendary Swedish singer-actress Monica Zetterlund – won the Nordic Prize at Haugesund’s Norwegian International Film Festival

“This film will make audiences smile, laugh and cry – it is a real ray of sunshine,” said the jury when awarding Norwegian director Gunhild Westhagen Magnor’s documentary The Optimists [+see also:
trailer
interview: Ingunn Knudsen
film profile] (photo) the Ray of Sunshine award at the 41^st Norwegian International Film Festival in Haugesund, which ends today (August 22).

Written, directed and photographed by Magnor, the film – which concluded the festival’s main programme – portrays  a volleyball club in Hamar, instigated 40 years ago, still with training sessions every Monday for its members – for ladies between the ages of 66 and 98.

The players were given a star reception on stage at Haugesund’s Rica Maritim Hall; produced by Hilde Skofteland and Ingunn H Knudsen for Skofteland Film, The Optimists will be released in Norway on September 27 by Norsk Filmdistribusjon.

Local distributor Arthaus collected two prizes for festival films from its current line-up: the Norwegian critics’ prize for Tunisian director Abdellatif Kechiche’s Cannes winner, Blue Is the Warmest Colour [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Abdellatif Kechiche
film profile], and the Audience Award for Belgian director Felix van Groeningen’s The Broken Circle Breakdown [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Felix van Groeningen
interview: Felix Van Groeningen
interview: Felix Van Groeningen
film profile].

Danish director Per Fly’s biopic of legendary Swedish singer-actress Monica Zetterlund, Waltz with Monica, which opened the Nordic Focus in Haugesund, left with the Nordic Film Prize Haugesund. Scripted by Peter Birro, starring Swedish-Icelandic singer, songwriter and pianist Edda Magnason in her first film role, follows Zetterlund from the time she quits her job as a telephone operator till she reigns over the clubs in Stockholm and New York.