07/10/2008

The 16th Hamburg Film Festival (September 25-October 2) – which opened with Philipp Stölzl’s North Face – closed on Friday with the national première of Bouli Lanners’ French/Belgian road movie, Eldorado [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile]. The screening was attended by the director.

The previous day, the different juries announced the prize-winners. The first C.I.C.A.E. Award to be presented at the Hamburg festival went to German/French/Belgian co-production 35 Shots of Rum [+see also:
trailer
film profile] by Claire Denis. The film’s German distributor, Real Fiction, received €5,000 for the launch campaign from the Hamburg Schleswig-Holstein regional fund.

This year’s other new prize, the "Die Elfe" Award for Best Young Talent (worth €5,000 from Neue Sentimental Film Hamburg), went to French director Jean-Stéphane Sauvaire’s Johnny Mad Dog [+see also:
trailer
film profile].

In the Northern Lights section, the second Montblanc Award for Best Screenplay (€10,000) went to It's Hard to be Nice, written and directed by Bosnia’s Srdjan Vuletic.

Of the seven contenders in the "eurovisuell" section, Dany Boon’s successful French title Welcome to the Sticks [+see also:
trailer
film profile] picked up the Audience Award (€5,000). The third Micromovie Award – created by TV network Das Vierte to help budding film projects get off the ground – went to Jan Schwarze’s Gewonnen.

The Michel Children’s and Youth Film Festival – a parallel event sponsored by actor Jürgen Vogel – honoured an Australian title. Special mentions went to two films, including Swedish director Kjell-Åke Andersson’s Butterflies, which also scooped the Jetix Audience Award.

This year, a total of 35,000 viewers enjoyed the festival’s screenings of 134 films from 53 different countries.

(Translated from French)