Norwegian film “The Almost Man” grabs top prize at Karlovy Vary film festJuly 9, 2012 - 16:36 AMT PanARMENIAN.Net - Norwegian filmmaker Martin Lund's (pictured) film The Almost Man, won the Grand Prix Crystal Award ($25,000) at the main competition Karlovy Vary International Film Festival in Karlovy Vary, a hilly and picturesque spa town in the Czech Republic, The Hollywood Reporter said. The film is a character study about the efforts of thirtysomething man named Henrik, portrayed by Henrik Rafaelsen, to resist inevitable changes in his life that come with getting older. Rafaelsen picked up the festival's Best Actor award for his portrayal. The Almost Man was one of a bumper crop of films that picked up two awards each at the festival, but Rafaelsen had to share the Best Actor limelight with Polish actor Eryk Lubos, who was also awarded for his work in Jan Jakub Kolski's To Kill a Beaver. Another double prize-winner was French-Canadian director Rafael Ouellet's Camion, a drama about a tragic accident that brings a scattered family back together. The film won the Ecumenical Jury Prize and a Best Director nod for Ouellet. Iranian director Ali Mosaffa's The Last Step won the FIPRESCI prize “for the unsettling way it plays with memory, with strong performances and a fresh take on Iranian cinema,” according to the jury. Lead actress Leila Hatami, who is Mosaffa's wife and looks slightly like Isabella Rossellini, took the Best Actress Award. Piazza Fontana: The Italian Conspiracy, also a double-winner, tells the true story of a terrorist attack in December 1969 at a bank on Piazza Fontana in Milan. The film picked up the Special Jury Prize and the European Cinemas Label Award. Eva Neymann's black-and-white Ukrainian production House with a Turret, a WWII-era drama about a boy whose mother dies from illness, won the East of the West competition prize ($20,000), for which films from Eastern Europe competed. Serbian director Miroslav Momcilovic's Death of a Man in Balkans, a chamber-piece about the chaos that ensues in an apartment after the composer living there commits suicide, picked up the festival's Forum of Independents Independent Camera Award. Belgian director Geoffrey Enthoven's Come as You Are, a comedy about disabled people resorting to prostitution, won the festival's audience award. The film had previously won the audience award at the Montreal World Film Festival. The documentary competition awarded prizes of $5000 each to Ilian Metev's feature-length Sofia's Last Ambulance, about an overworked ambulance in the Bulgarian capital, and Sergio Oksman's short A Story for the Modlins, a chronicle of a Madrid couple's bizarre apocalyptic art project. This year's lifetime achievement awards went to Helen Mirren and Susan Sarandon. Mirren visited in the early days of the festival to collect her Crystal Globe for Outstanding Artistic Contribution and Sarandon showed up to do the same in the latter half. At the awards ceremony, Sarandon praised the video montage of her work, calling it “one of the best montages I've seen,” and upon being handed the trophy, got teary-eyed and dedicated the prize to the late Nora Ephron, calling her “my friend and wonderful director.” Top stories The creative crew of the Public TV had chosen 13-year-old Malena as a participant of this year's contest. She called on others to also suspend their accounts over the companies’ failure to tackle hate speech. Penderecki was known for his film scores, including for William Friedkin’s “The Exorcist”, Stanley Kubrick’s “The Shining”. The festival made the news public on March 19, saying that “several options are considered in order to preserve its running” Partner news | Titus, Bilirakis lead legislation to sanction Azerbaijani war criminals Representatives Dina Titus (D-NV) and Gus Bilirakis (R-FL) have introduced the bipartisan legislation. Azerbaijan must respect human rights, Scholz tells Aliyev German Chancellor Olaf Scholz has called for greater respect for human rights in Azerbaijan. Armenia: Defense Ministry warns against involving army in political processes The Ministry’s statement came after a video surfaced online, showing soldiers joining the protests in Tavush. Scholz hopes Armenia-Azerbaijan peace treaty will be signed this year German Chancellor Olaf Scholz hopes that a peace treaty between Armenia and Azerbaijan will be signed this year. |