10/06/2015 - Polish films have proven popular amongst the award winners

The award winners at the festival (© Tomasz Korczyński)

The Krakow Film Festival has come to a close with female Polish documentary makers taking away three prizes in the festival’s international documentary competition.

The Golden Horn for Best Documentary was awarded to Karolina Bielawska, the director of Call Me Marianna [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile]. The film, which had its world premiere at the festival, follows a man who decides to undergo gender reassignment surgery. It was described by the jury as a “sensitive, intense and complex portrayal of a brave approach to life and the steps to a new life in harmony with one's real identity”. The movie also won the Maciej Szumowski Award for remarkable social awareness, the Award for the Best Short and Documentary Films Producer in Poland and the festival’s Audience Award.

The Silver Horn for the Director of the Best Medium-length Documentary Film went to Aleksandra Maciuszek for the film Casa Blanca, which also received the Golden Hobby Horse, the main prize in the festival’s national competition. Agnieszka Zwiefka received the Silver Horn for the Director of the Best Feature-length Documentary Film for The Queen of Silence [+see also:
trailer
film profile].

The jury, which consisted of Wieland Speck as chair (Germany), Martin Blaney (UK), Hans Robert Eisenhauer (Germany), Piotr Rosołowski (Poland) and Audrius Stonys (Lithuania), emphasised the high quality level of the Polish documentary films.

The laureate of the third edition of the International DocFilmMusic Competition was Brett Morgen for Kurt Cobain: Montage of Heck.

For the first time, the Krakow Film Festival also recommended three feature-length documentaries for the European Film Awards: Unstoppables by Bartosz M Kowalski, Dybbuk. A Tale of Wandering Souls by Krzysztof Kopczyński and the aforementioned Call Me Marianna by Karolina Bielawska.

The full list of winners can be found here.