French director Audrey Diwan received the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival on Saturday 11 September for The event, a raw, intimate and feminist film about a young woman who clandestinely aborts.
“Unfortunately when you work on abortion you are always in the news”Audrey Diwan, 41, who succeeds Chinese-American Chloé Zhao, who was crowned last year for Nomadland. “I made this film with anger and desire, I made it with my stomach, with my guts with my heart”, she added. “I wanted it to be an experience”, a “Journey in the skin of this young woman”. This award was awarded to him unanimously by the jury chaired by South Korean director Bong Joon-Ho (Parasite).
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The event, adapted from the eponymous autobiographical account of novelist Annie Ernaux, takes place in France in the 1960s, before the legalization of abortion. It shows the journey of a young student who becomes pregnant, interpreted by the Franco-Romanian Anamaria Vartolomei, a discovery.
The event is the second film by Audrey Diwan, who filmed a young couple struggling with drug addiction in but you are crazy (2019).
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Penélope Cruz receives the Best Actress Award
The Spanish star Penélope Cruz won the award for best performance by her role in Parallel mothers, his new collaboration with his compatriot Pedro Almodovar. “Thank you Pedro, you created a magic, I adore you”, reacted the actress by receiving her prize. She also dedicated her award to Pilar Bardem, the mother of her husband, actor Javier Bardem, who died in July. Almodovar had already allowed her to be rewarded with the interpretation prize at Cannes for Volver.
Film that opened the 78th Mostra, Parallel mothers is built on the cross path of two single mothers (Penélope Cruz and Milena Smit) who give birth on the same day in the same maternity. Penélope Cruz plays a forty-year-old photographer who becomes pregnant with an archaeologist and married friend, who has promised to help her find the burial place of her great-grandfather, who died at the start of the Spanish Civil War.
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John Arcilla wins Best Actor Award
Filipino actor John Arcilla, a star in his country, won the Best Actor Award. “Mille grazie, mille grazie”, he reacted in Italian. “I am the happiest actor in the world tonight, because I know that we come from different countries, different cultures, but tonight we all understand each other thanks to the cinema”, he added.
The actor is recognized for his role as a journalist facing fake news and corruption in On the Job: The Missing 8, a three and a half hour long film by Erik Matti. Although presented as a feature film in competition in Venice, the film will be cut into a mini-series for the American television channel HBO.
John Arcilla plays a radio presenter without qualms supporting local and national authorities, who must gradually revise his position in the face of a series of assassinations affecting colleagues and relatives.
This film is a sequel to On the job (2013), still by director Erik Matti, who had achieved immense success in the Philippines by recounting how the government had used detainees to carry out assassinations.
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Here are the winners of the other awards:
Silver Lion – Grand Jury Prize: God’s hand by Paolo Sorrentino
Silver Lion – Best Achievement Award: The dog’s share by Jane Campion
Marcello Mastroianni Prize for the best male or female hope: Filippo Scotti for his role in God’s hand by Paolo Sorrentino
Special Jury Prize: He Buco by Michelangelo Frammartino
Best Screenplay Award: Maggie Gyllenhaal for The lost daughter
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