Quebec actor Luc Picard'sdirectorial debut L'Audition tookthe top competition prize, the Gold Iris of Montreal, as the inaugural FestivalInternational de Film de Montreal (FIFM) stumbled to a conclusion on Sundaynight.

The awards announcementwas accompanied by a 1,000 word apologia from festival brass acknowledging that"this edition did not measure up to expectations."This is a major understatement: audiences didn't show up to many of the films,meaning near-empty houses for most screenings.

Hence, the audienceprizes, of which there were many, cannot be said to carry much weight. TheFIFM's closing night memo was blunt: "This firstfestival was faced with a big problem: many of its films, in particular thoseof the beginning of the week, attracted few spectators. We apologize to theirdirectors, many of whom were little known locally." The poor turn-outstoked gleeful competition among Montreal journalists trying to find cinemaswith the fewest paying customers. One report in the newspaper La Presse saidthat houses of fewer than 30 persons were common. At some screenings for filmsin the Iris Competition, French filmmaker Claude Lelouch and his fellow juristswere nearly alone in the vast 1,200-seat St. Denis auditorium.

Still, the event has vowedto press on, with one concern seemingly settled. Festival program directorMoritz de Hadeln, who at the beginning of the festival, spoke harshly about thelack of film festival expertise among event organizers Groupe Spectra, seems tobe holding on to his job.

The Grand Prize of theJury, a Silver Iris, went to Swiss-American director Peter Entell's Josh'sTrees, while Japanese filmmakerHiroshi Ishikawa took the director's prize, also silver, for Su-ki-da,

Angela Baraldi, star ofGabriele Salvatores' Quo Vadis Baby', took the Silver Iris for Best Actress while Park Ji-Bin won for actorin Ahnnyeong Hyeong-An (Little Brother) by South Korea's LimTay-hyung. The screenplay Iris went to EnriqueCortes and Eduardo Raspo for Raspo's Argentine production Tatuado (Tattooed).

The top audience award,the Toyota Canada Award for best film, was presented to Bulgarian filmmakerGeorgi Djulgerov's Lady Zee,while Picard's film won the audience prize for best Canadian film.

The Iris of Tomorrow,awarded to the best first or second film as decided by a separate jury, went toRussian filmmaker Artem Antonov's Polumgla. Special Mentions went to Belgium's Guillaume Malandrin's Ca M'EstEgal Si Demain N'Arrive Pas and hiscountryman Vincent Lannoo's Ordinary Man.

The NationalFilm Board of Canada Award for best documentary film went to Fernando Solanas DignityOf The Nobodies byFernando Solanas, an Argentina-Brazil-Switzerland coproduction.

The Air FranceQuebec Critics' Prize for Best French feature was awarded to Orso Miret's LeSilence.