25/05/2003

Norway and the United Kingdom will share the very first Europa Label award. Presented on 24 May and voted for by representatives of the Europa Cinemas network for films selected for Directors’ Fortnight, the winners were Kitchen Stories by Norway's Bent Hamer and The Mother by England’s Roger Mitchell. Both titles won considerable support in Cannes and are the result of very different production pathways.
Kitchen Stories, Bent Hamer’s second feature, is a Norwegian/Swedish co-production by Bulbul Films and Bob Films while The Mother is Roger Mitchell’s fifth feature film. This title represents a stylistic “detour” for the English director whose past films have all been big budget productions like Notting Hill. Produced by Free Range Film for BBC Films, The Mother is based on a novel by Hanif Kureishi that Directors’ Fortnight delegate-general François Da Silva called “a frieze of perfection”. It is the story of a middle-aged woman who has an affair with her daughter’s boyfriend who's thirty years her junior. The strong storyline and especially the contrast between the calm first half and the hectic pace of the second won Cannes audiences over.
Both titles will be distributed throughout the Continent by Europa Cinemas through their 453 screens in 50 countries.

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(Translated from French)