Iranian director Ali Ahmadzadeh‘s Critical Zone has won the Locarno Film Festival top prize, the Golden Leopard.
The Iranian-German co-production, secretly shot on the streets of Tehran without official permission, follows a man driving through Tehran’s underworld with his dog, dealing drugs, healing troubled souls and discovering seeds of resistance.
Director Ahmadezadeh, who was prevented from travelling to Locarno to present his film in person, had faced pressure from the Iranian authorities ahead of the festival to withdraw his film from the competition and was also under investigation by Iran’s security ministry.
Announcing their decision, jury president Lambert Wilson said that it had been an unanimous decision to award “a film that has collectively electrified us, a film that is as immersive and defiant as it is compassionate and tender. With inventive and disciplined photography and sound design, the director draws authentic and audacious performances in spite of an oppressive and dangerous reality. This film is a 99-minute scream in the name of rebellion and freedom.”
Ahmadezadeh’s films depicting rebellious youth and their confrontation with Iran’s theocracy have consistently been banned in the country.
Speaking via a weblink from Teheran after the awards ceremony, Ahmadezadeh said that he was “extremely happy” about the exposure and attention that would now be generated by winning the Golden Leopard.
Ahmadezadeh admitted though that “even this interview [with Mauro Donzelli of Locarno Daily] could be risky for me, but, at the same time, I know that this recognition and the award that the film won is very important for underground cinema in Iran. It can give hope, courage and support for other filmmakers to come and people who need this support to move on. International attention and recognition is extremely precious for all of us.”
Critical Zone is being handled internationally by Luxbox and world premiered in Locarno’s International Competition. Ahmadzadeh made his feature debut in 2013 with Kami’s Party, followed by Atomic Heart which premiered in Berlin in 2014 and 2017’s Phenomenon (Padideh).
This is the third time in the festival’s history that the top award has gone to an Iranian filmmaker following Ebrahim Fourouzesh in 1994 for The Jar and Jafar Panahi two years later in 1996 with The Mirror.
Sponsored by the City of Locarno, the award for best film includes a cash prize of CHF 75,000 to be shared equally between the film’s director and producer.
During the awards ceremony in the GranRex cinema, the International Jury headed by the French actor Lambert Wilson presented the Special Jury Prize to Radu Jude for Don’t Expect Too Much From The End of the World and the Leopard for Best Direction to Ukrainian-born Maryna Vroda for her debut feature Stepne.
This year saw the Leopards for Best Actress and Best Actor of previous years being presented for the first time as gender-neutral awards for best performances, with the Leopard statuettes going to Dimitra Vlagopoulou for her role as the animator Karla in Sofia Exarchou’s Animal and to Dutch actress Renée Soutendijk for her portrayal of a plantation head’s widow in Ena Sendijarević’s second feature Sweet Dreams.
The International Jury also gave a Special Mention to French director Sylvain George’s Obscure Night - Goodbye Here, Anywhere.
Filmmakers of the Present
The jury for the Filmmakers of the Present competition awarded its Golden Leopard for best film to Dreaming & Dying by Singaporean filmmaker Nelson Yeo, while the Best Emerging Director Award was presented to Germany’s Katharina Huber for her first feature A Good Place.
The Special Jury Prize Ciné+ went to Éléonore Saintagnan’s debut feature Camping du Lac.
The two German films selected for this year’s Filmmakers of the Present competition clinched the gender-neutral Leopards for the best acting performances: Clara Schwinning for her role as Güte in Katharina Huber’s A Good Place, while Isold Halldórudóttir and Stavros Zafeiris shared a statuette for their performances of a forbidden relationship between a caregiver and her paraplegic charge in Claudia Rorarius’ Touched.
Special mentions were also given by the jury to Bosnian filmmaker Una Gunjak’s Excursion and Spain’s Colectivo Negu’s Negu hurbilak.
The Swatch First Feature Award went to Nelson Yeo’s Dreaming & Dying, while the Pardo Verde Ricola - the “Green Leopard” which was introduced at the festival’s 2022 edition - was presented to the Serbian actor-director-producer Dragan Bjelogorić for his drama based on true events in Guardians of the Formula.
Special mentions were also made by the jury to the Out of Competition title Procida made by the participants of the Procida Film Atelier on the island in the Gulf of Naples and to Lukas Marxt’s short film Valley Pride.
Independent Juries
The award ceremony for the independent juries was held at the festival’s Forum @ Spazio Cinema venue an hour after the main juries had unveiled their prize winners.
The Ecumenical Jury gave its award to Italy’s Simone Bozzelli for Patagonia, with a Special Mention for Radu Jude’s Do Not Expect Too Much From The End Of The World.
The FIPRESCI Prize for a film in the main competition went to Kyiv-born Maryna Vroda for Stepne, a co-production between Ukraine, Germany, Poland and Slovakia.
Meanwhile, a jury of four European exhibitors from the Europa Cinemas network awarded this year’s Europa Cinemas Label to the French director Quentin Dupieux for his comedy Yannick which had its international premiere in the International Competition.
This was the tenth time that the Label had been awarded in Locarno and will see Europa Cinemas offering additional promotion and incentives to exhibitors to extend Yannick’s run on cinema screens.
The independent sidebar Semaine de la Critique, which is organised by the Swiss Association of Film Journalists in partnership with the festival, saw its jury handing out three awards to films that had screened in its showcase of seven international feature documentaries.
The Grand Prix Semaine de la Critique - Prix SRG SSR was presented to Israeli director Ohad Milstein’s Monogamia, the third chapter in his family trilogy preceded by Week 23 and Summer Nights, which had its world premiere in Locarno this week.
In addition, the Premio Zonta Club Locarno - for a film that promotes better justice and social ethics - went to French director-producer Eléonore Boissinot’s directorial debut The Pathan Sisters; while the Marco Zucchi Award for the most innovative film in terms of image and cinematic language was given to the French filmmaker and ethnologist Stéphane Breton’s 12th film The First Days.
Looking back at the past 11 days, the festival’s artistic director Giona A. Nazzaro said, “This has been a thrilling edition, reasserting the centrality of the Locarno Film Festival and its ability to explore contemporary cinema in every shape and size, capturing the hearts and minds of our generous, curious and passionate public, who crowded into the Piazza Grande and theaters in great numbers.”
The 77th Locarno Film Festival will be held from August 7-17, 2024.
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