Vancouver International Film Festival Awards
THE LIVES OF OTHERS and MYSTIC BALL win audience awards
Alan Franey, Director of the Vancouver International Film Festival and the Vancouver International Film Centre, today announced the following award winners:
AUDIENCE AWARDS
The People’s Choice Award for Most Popular International Film
The People’s Choice Award for Most Popular International Film goes to DAS LEBEN DER ANDEREN / THE LIVES OF OTHERS (Germany). This unexpectedly heartwarming political thriller tells a story of surveillance, deception and betrayal in 1984 East Berlin. It is the debut feature of Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck.
Federal Express Award for Most Popular Canadian Feature Film
This year the voters for the Federal Express Award for Most Popular Canadian Feature Film selected Greg Hamilton’s MYSTIC BALL (Ontario).
From a very strong field of Canadian films, three especially won over our audiences. AWAY FROM HER and FIDO touched the heart and the funnybone respectively, but MYSTIC BALL was the winner: a standing ovation at the premiere and a first-time director, Greg Hamilton, whose journey to the heart of the Burmese sport of chinlone was a revelation.
JURIED AWARDS
The National Film Board Award for Best Documentary Feature
Jurors Mark Achbar (filmmaker, The Corporation), Thom Andersen (California Institute of the Arts, Los Angeles Plays Itself), and Mike Maggiore (New York Film Forum) gave the National Film Board Award for Best Documentary Feature to
HAVE YOU HEARD FROM JOHANNESBURG ? by Connie Field (USA).
This award carries a $2,500 cash prize.
The jury stated: “We award the NFB Documentary prize to a film that exemplifies and reinvigorates the NFB's long history of championing progressive social change through film. Its inspiring account of the anti-Apartheid struggle in the United States is particularly relevant and important today, when so many have fallen prey to despair over the supposed futility of organized political action.”
SPECIAL JURY PRIZE
“For its innovative narrative strategies to engage, amuse, and enlighten about the changing face of the suburbs, we award a Special Jury Prize to Gary Burns and Jim Brown for RADIANT CITY (Canada).”
The Dragons & Tigers Award for Young Cinema
As announced late last week, John Torres won the Dragons & Tigers Award for Young Cinema with TODO TODO TEROS (The Philippines). The jury stated it is
“… a multi-dimensional manifesto on personal experience, filmmaking and life under difficult political conditions. This film shows that low-grade video can be art, while adopting an evocative, surprising approach to the issue of terrorism. And it’s a dynamic and inventive assembly of footage as well as an energetic melding of the personal and the political.”
Selected for Special Mentions were FACELESS THINGS (South Korea) by KIM Kyong-Mook and GEO-LOBOTOMY (South Korea) by KIM Gok and KIM Sun.
Citytv Western Canada Feature Film Award
Director Paul Fox wins the Citytv Western Canada Feature Film Award for his feature Everything’s Gone Green (British Columbia).
Fox’s film earned praise from jurors Mark Adams (ICA Films, London, UK),
Carl Spence (Palm Springs and Seattle Film Festivals), and Anne Wheeler (filmmaker, Bye Bye Blues), “for its skillful storytelling, eloquent visual style, and genuine sense of humour”. The award, sponsored by Citytv, is accompanied by a cash prize of $12,000.
The jury continued, “Coming to a conclusion was a difficult process – so we would like to give special mention to a film that had a bold and provocative directorial style – Unnatural and Accidental (British Columbia) by Carl Bessai.”
Women in Film & Video Vancouver’s Artistic Merit Award
Carmen Moore receives the Women in Film & Video Vancouver’s Artistic Merit Award for Carl Bessai’s Unnatural and Accidental. The award is given annually to a B.C. woman filmmaker or performer of distinction.
