Tuesday, September 27, 2005

San Sebastian fest "surprise" awards

The 53rd San Sebastian festival wound up on Sept 24. Among the two most interesting awards were the Golden Shell going to the Czech film "Stesti" (Something Like Happiness). Actress Ana Geislerova also picked up a best actress award for her role in the film. The production company has stated it is "speechless" following the award given the heavyweight films in competition. "Stesti" was written and directed by Bohdan Slama.

The Jury Award for best Screenplay went to Wolfgang Kohlhaase for "Sommer Vorm Balkon" (Summer in Berlin), directed by Andreas Drasen. Veteran writer Kohlhaase has 20 films to his credit since the sixties, including "First Spaceship on Venus", "I Was Nineteen", "Rita's legends" and "Baby".

For the full award line-up visit San Sebastian International Film Festival.

UPDATE: Just days after winning at San Sebastian, "Stesti" has picked up the Best Film award at the 11th Athens International Film Festival. The Best Screenplay award went to Aku Luhimies who co-wrote (with Jari Rantala and Paavo Westerberg) and directed the Finnish entry "Paha Maa" (Frozen Land ). The Greek entry "Awakening" by Niko Grammatikos was the surprise winner of the Audience Award.

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