Editor

A Cock and Bull Story wins Golden Tulip at İstanbul
Deneuve and Depardıeu attend closing ceremony

Michael Winterbottom’s “A Cock and Bull Story” won the Istanbul International Film Festival’s premier award, the Golden Tulip at a gala evening broadcast live over Turkish national television over the weekend and attended by Catherine Deneuve and Gerard Depardieu.
The movie was selected because of the “simplicity, invention and humour with which it successfully adapts a notoriously unadaptable novel, celebrating cinema and literature at the same time” the jury said in a statement.
Presided over by Jean-Paul Rappeneau (France), the jury also included Prune Engler (France), Reha Erdem (Turkey); Nick James (United Kingdom), Makram Khoury (Israel), and Işik Yenersu (Turkey).
“A Cock and Bull Story”, Winterbottom’s third English-literature adaptation, was a hot favourite to win the competition which is open only to works on art whether it be literature, theatre, music, dance, cinema or the plastic arts.
The film is based on the novel Tristram Shandy which was published between 1760 and 1770 and though not popular with all sections of society at that time is now considered to be a forerunner of post-modern writing.
The Golden Tulip was not the only award for Cock and Bull Story. It also picked up the FIPRESCI Award in the international competition “for its challenging and original approach towards adapting the novel that seems to be impossible to be adapted.”
In the national competition the Best Turksih Film of the Year award of US$30,000 was given to “Bes Vakit / Five Times” directed by Reha Erdem; for “expressing the universal, the sentiments and conflicts pertaining to all human kind, as well as its courageous approach to taboo subjects which society needs to confront, without giving any concession to cinematic concerns or aesthetics.”
The jury for the national competition was chaired by Zuhal Olcay (Turkey), and included Reis Çelik (Turkey), Leyla Özalp (Turkey), Daniela Sannwald (Germany) and Giorgio Gosetti di Sturmeck (Italy).
They gave the US$30,000 Best Turkish Director award to Kutlug Ataman for his film “Two Girls (İki Ki Genc) for “adapting and directing an international contemporary story with a radical aesthetic approach”.
The Best Actress Award went to Şerif Sezer for her performance in “My Father and Son (Babam ve Oğlum)” and the Best Actor award was won by Fikret Kuskan for his performance in the same film. Both actors won US$6,000 each.
The Special Prize of the jury went to the people of Mugla for the heartfelt support they had given to the art of cinema as cast and crew in the film “Ice Cream, I Scream (Dondurmam Gaymak)”.
While the FIPRESCI prize for best international film went to “A Cock & Bull Story”, their award for Best Turkish Film went to Five Times directed by Reha Erdem who “once again, proved his talent by beautifully capturing the universal themes of life and death.”
As in the previous years, local brewery Efes Pilsen gave a cash prize of US$30.000 to the FIPRESCI national competition winner.
The FIPRESCI Jury was chaired by Blagoja Kunovski (Macedonia), and included Ahmed Hassouna (Egypt), Ayla Kanbur (Turkey), Anita Piotrowska (Poland), Antti Selkokari (Finland) and Firat Yücel (Turkey).
The People’s Choice Awards, sponsored by the Radikal Newspaper and determined by the votes of the Festival audience, were given to “Separate Lies” by Julian Fellowes (United Kingdom) in the International Competition, and “My Father and Son / Babam ve Oglum” in the National Competition.
by Jeremy Colson