18/10/2005

The Luxemburgish Film Week ended Friday evening with the awards ceremony of De Lëtzebuerger Filmpräis in the capital of the Grand Duchy. A total of eight awards were handed out during the evening which was presented by local celebrity Désirée Nosbusch. The evening was attended by the Luxemburgish Royal Couple as the Grand Duchess Maria-Teresa was part of this year’s jury.

The second edition of the Filmpräis awarded its SACEM prize for best score to Luxemburger Gast Waltzing for his work on the medieval Patrick Swayze-starrer George and the Dragon, whilst director Christophe Wagner won the prize of most promising young filmmaker. German actress of Turkish descent, Sibel Kekilli, crying with joy, was on hand to accept the Filmpräis for best European film for Head On, which had earlier won the Golden Bear at the Berlin Film Festival. Girl With A Pearl Earring won two awards; for best Luxemburgish co-production and best production design, the latter shared with La femme de Gilles. The technical award went to sound engineer Carlo Thoss, who worked on a staggering number of productions in competition including La femme de Gilles, Girl With A Pearl Earring, Os imortais and Heims in Reich.

(The article continues below - Commercial information)

The two most important prizes, the audience award and the best film prize, both unsurprisingly went to Heim ins Reich as well. The Claude Lahr-directed Second World War documentary was the biggest local box-office success of last year. The next edition of the Lëtzebuerger Filmpräis will likely take place in 2007.