The 69th BFI London Film Festival (LFF) concluded yesterday, with the closing-night film, Julia Jackman’s feminist fantasy 100 Nights of Hero [+leggi anche:
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scheda film], capping off a lively fortnight of cinema in the UK capital. The full list of prizes from the festival’s three competitive sections was also confirmed; true to recent selections by past LFF juries, they allowed a broader and more idiosyncratic range of titles to be celebrated than those set to dominate the awards season.

The official competition jury, led by producer Elizabeth Karlsen, granted its Best Film Award to Lucrecia Martel’s critically praised documentary Landmarks [+leggi anche:
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intervista: Lucrecia Martel
scheda film]. Their statement reads: “With deep empathy and extraordinary journalistic and cinematic rigour, director Lucrecia Martel dives deep into the events surrounding the 2009 murder of Chuschagasta leader Javier Chocobar, in Argentina’s Tucumán Province. In foregrounding present-day voices and neglected histories, Martel emerges with a portrait of – and for – an indigenous community, and grants them a measure of the justice the courts have long denied them. Within a remarkably strong competition, our jury is proud to honour this singular achievement.”

The Sutherland Award winner has a notable history of going to British films, or already well-decorated titles on the festival circuit, but director Kibwe Tavares’s jury bucked convention this year by handing it to Vincho Nchogu’s One Woman One Bra, a Kenyan-Nigerian production that world-premiered in Venice’s Biennale College Cinema section. “We were incredibly impressed by her ability to confidently move between so many tones, while always holding the audience with care. Her film uses humour to shattering effect. Vincho also elicited fantastic performances from her entire cast, complemented by stunning cinematography throughout. The piece is at once funny, life-affirming and deeply moving; its emotional journey stayed with us and will continue to do so,” the jury stated.

The documentary competition jury, led by The Shadow Scholars [+leggi anche:
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scheda film] director Eloïse King, also went for a novel winner, handing their top prize to David Bingong for his migration study The Travelers, which bowed in the International Medium Length and Short Film Competition at Visions du Réel (although its running time reaches feature length at 61 minutes). “Facing the most inhumane of circumstances – a dangerous sea crossing from Morocco to Spain – these young Cameroonian men show a camaraderie that is rendered with kinetic intensity. An immersive journey of intimate photography, humour and a spontaneously arising soundtrack contextualise the past lives and present perils of its protagonists. In his raw film, Bingong, himself a migrant among them, offers a deeply personal and affecting lens on the humanitarian crisis of African refugees and asylum seekers adrift in both the Mediterranean Sea and the legal limbo of the EU’s broken immigration system,” went their detailed jury motivation.

A complete list of the award winners is below:

Best Film Award
Landmarks [+leggi anche:
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intervista: Lucrecia Martel
scheda film] - Lucrecia Martel (Argentina/USA/Mexico/France/Netherlands/Denmark)

Sutherland Award
One Woman One Bra - Vincho Nchogu (Kenya/Nigeria)

Grierson Award
The Travelers - David Bingong (Cameroon/Spain)
Special Mention
Always - Deming Chen (China/USA/France/Switzerland)

Short Film Award
Coyotes - Said Zagha (UK/France/Jordan, short film)