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Filmmaker Mark Cousins is to curate the ceremony of the 38th European Film Awards, turning it into “a live film-essay”.
The awards’ organiser, the European Film Academy, said Cousins’ appointment is designed to create more impact for its annual ceremony, and that it wants to “steer away from generic scripts dominated by award categories and acceptance speeches.”
The Academy said that the annual award show for European cinema will ask, “Why do we love cinema?” and be an artistic experience in itself.
The reimagining of the event comes in the same year that the awards move forward by a month to January 17, so it takes place more prominently in the international awards season just after the Golden Globes and during the Oscar nomination voting period.
Cousins will collaborate with film composer Dascha Dauenhauer, who will be responsible for the musical concept of the event, and theatre director Robert Lehniger, who will be stage director and oversee the awards ceremony.
Cousins’ most recent work, A Sudden Glimpse To Deeper Things, about artist Wilhelmina Barns-Graham, won the Crystal Globe for best film in Karlovy Vary in 2024. His film The March On Rome was nominated for best European Documentary at the 2022 European Film Awards, while Women Make Film: A New Road Movie Through Cinema (2019) was awarded the European Film Award for Innovative Storytelling in 2020.
Cousins has been co-director of a number of staged film events with Tilda Swinton, with whom he also initiated the 8 1/2 Foundation, aiming to link children to the world of cinema.
Cousins said: “I love playing with the form of film events, so I jumped at the chance to be part of the European Film Awards’ evening. We hope to have some surprises. We’ll try to conjure cinematic images, emotions and ideas. I’m honoured to work with Robert, Dascha and the Academy team, in a building I’ve long admired.”
Dauenhauer won a European Film Award for her original score of Burhan Qurbani’s Berlin Alexanderplatz. Lehniger was previously responsible for the stage direction of the 2023 European Film Awards.
Academy director Matthijs Wouter Knol said: “Together with Academy president Juliette Binoche and outgoing chairman Mike Downey, we have worked in the past year to fulfil our shared wish to create a more idiosyncratic form to celebrate European cinema. Cinema has been born in Europe. And Europe continuously forms the source of new international talent, daring storytelling and technical innovation, that all impact the images we see.
“Being able to work now with Robert, Dascha and Mark is an important step to create an event that can’t be missed. Every year, we want the European Film Awards ceremony to be a true celebratory highlight for everyone loving European films. And yes, we believe that European cinema deserves a bold, mesmerising, and inspiring celebration that may well last three hours once per year.”
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