Opening with Sam Raimi's Send Help and closing with Christophe Gans' Return to Silent Hill, the 33rd Gérardmer International Fantastic Film Festival generated its fair share of thrills from 27 January to 1 February in the Vosges town, with tributes to British director Neil Marshall and French-Ukrainian actress Olga Kurylenko, as well as a Focus dedicated to Indonesian filmmaker Joko Anwar.

The feature film competition (judged by a jury composed of Alice Taglioni, Oulaya Amamra, Nathan Ambrosioni, Nadège Beausson-Diagne, Alice David, Cascadeur, Joséphine de Meaux and Maud Wyler) awarded the Grand Prix to Mother's Baby [+leggi anche:
recensione
trailer
intervista: Johanna Moder
scheda film] by Austrian director Johanna Moder. Unveiled in competition at the Berlinale, this co-production between Austria, Switzerland and Germany, sold by The Match Factory, follows a conductor who becomes pregnant after a successful fertility treatment; but complications arise during childbirth and the baby is taken away from her without her knowledge. When finally reunited with the child, Julia feels strangely distant and begins to doubt whether it is really her child.

The two jury prizes went to The Weed Eaters by New Zealander Callum Devlin and Cadet by Kazakh Adilkhan Yerzhanov, with the latter also winning the Critics' Award. It should be noted that the audience favourite was the American film Redux Redux by Kevin and Matthew McManus, while the youth jury voted for Don't Leave The Kids Alone by Mexico's Emilio Portes, and the Grand Prix for short films went to Exsanguina by France's Jonathan Brisé.

The winners:

Grand Prix
Mother's Baby [+leggi anche:
recensione
trailer
intervista: Johanna Moder
scheda film] - Johanna Moder (Austria/Switzerland/Germany)

Jury Prize
The Weed Eaters - Callum Devlin (New Zealand)
Cadet - Adilkhan Yerzhanov (Kazakhstan)

Other awards

Critics’ Award
Cadet - Adilkhan Yerzhanov

Audience Award
Redux Redux - Kevin and Matthew McManus (USA)

Youth Jury Award
Don’t Leave The Kids Alone - Emilio Portes (Mexico)

Short Film Grand Prix
Exsanguina - Jonathan Brisé (France)