Valeska Grisebach and Lucrecia Martel awarded at Seville European Film Festival 2017
Out of four female directors competing with other thirteen male directors in the Official Section, German director Valeska Grisebach received the Grand Jury Award in Seville for Western, and Argentinian Lucrecia Martel was rewarded with a Special Mention of the Jury for Zama. The top award of the Seville European Film Festival, the Golden Giraldillo for Best Film, has been given to A Nothing Factory by Pedro Pinho.
The jury of the 14th edition of the event outlined that Grisebach “creates a precise and tense metaphorical social portrait, which powerfully transcends realism acquiring a major sociopolitical magnitude from an apparently marginal and local story”. In the case of “Zama”, the award was deserved thanks to “trans-national, trans-territorial, poetically and politically exploring a fantasized yet historical universe which never ceases to evoke the present time”.
Swedish Maria Von Hausswolf was handed the Best Cinematography Award for Winter Brothers. While the Best Actress Award went to Italian Selene Caramazza for playing a confused Christian teenager in Pure Hearts.
Seville has also a special section, The New Waves, dedicated to new filmmakers and unclassifiable veterans of cinema. The New Waves Non Fiction Award went to Distant Constellation by American director with Turkish roots Shevaun Mizrahi. British Deborah Haywood’s Pin Cushion scooped a Special Award New Waves ex aequo with Bertrand Mandico’s The Wild Boys. EWA’s member Ayse Toprak took back to Turkey the 4th Ocaña Award to Freedom, a sort of Teddy Bear, for her documentary on homosexuals escaping from Syrian war, Mr Gay Syria.