11/09/2009

Dutch/Belgian co-production The Last Days of Emma Blank [+see also:
interview: The Last Days of Emma Blank…
film profile], by Alex van Warmerdam's, has been awarded the Europa Cinemas Label as Best European Film in the Venice Days section of the Venice Film Festival.

The Last Days of Emma Blank (see news) will now receive the support of the Europa Cinemas exhibitors who commit themselves to extend the length of its run on screen and additional promotion across the network.

The Europa Cinemas jury for this year's Venice Festival consisted of Andrea Crozzoli, exhibitor at Cinemazero in Pordenone (Italy); Frans Westra, Programmer of Cinema Images in Gröningen (The Netherlands); Christian Braschi, exhibitor at Cinema Le Royal in Toulon (France); Urzsula Sniegowska, exhibitor at Kino Lab Centre for Contemporary Art in Warsaw (Poland).

The jury issued the following statement: "The film takes a deliciously tragic-comic look at greed, manipulation and power at the heart of a family. Ironic and nightmareish at times, the director directs his cast with great skill and unerringly makes all the right tonal decisions. He manages to make his depiction of a family in a very Dutch setting seem universal. This is a true auteur's film but avoids pretension entirely. We trust that our awarding of the Label to this film will contribute to it attaining the wide European audience it deserves." It was an unanimous decision.