“Slow,” Marija Kavtaradze’s delicate romance, won the Crystal Arrow at the 15th edition of Les Arcs Film Festival from a jury presided over by Oscar-nominated Iranian director Asghar Farhadi (“A Separation”).
Kavtaradze’s sophomore outing, “Slow” world premiered at the Sundance Film Festival where it won best director. The film revolves around the bond between Elena (Greta Grinevičiūtė), a contemporary dancer teaching to deaf youth, and Dovydas (Kęstutis Cicėnas), a sign language interpreter class.
“The Teachers’ Lounge,” meanwhile, won the jury prize. The satirical movie, directed Ilker Çatak, world premiered at the Berlin Film Festival, in the Panorama section, and was just shortlisted in the Oscar’s international feature film race. Leonie Benesch stars an idealistic teacher who tries to uncover a thief within her school and sparks chaos in the process.
Dimitra Vlagopoulou won best actress for her performance as an entertainer at an all-inclusive Greek resort in Sofia Exarchou’s “Animal;” while Gáspár Adonyi-Walsh won best actor for his role in as a slacker student in Budapest who triggers a tabloid scandal in Gábor Reisz’s “Explanation for Everything.”
The Audience Award went to the psychological thriller “The Successor,” Xavier Legrand’s follow up to his debut “Custody” which had won the Silver Lion at Venice.
Curated by Frederic Boyer, who is also Tribeca’s artistic director, Les Arcs Festival boasted a jury comprising of actors Rebecca Marder and Vincent Lacoste, musician Irène Drésel and novelist-turned-filmmaker Christine Angot.
The festival, which ran Dec. 16-23, brought together an impressive roster of high profile guests, including Isabelle Huppert, Antoine Reinartz, Jonathan Cohen, Vincent Macaigne, Joachim Lafosse, Matthias Schoenaerts, Michel Hazanavicius and Ruben Östlund, the two-time Palme d’Or winning director (“Triangle of Sadness”) who was this edition’s guest of honor and mentored participants of the Talent Village, one of Les Arcs’s industry events.
Les Arcs also held its 10th edition of the Femme de Cinema Awards in partnership with Sisley and honored Italian helmer Alice Rohrwacher (“La Chimera”). The celebratory event, spearheaded by Les Arcs co-founder Fabienne Sylvestre, also reunited previous Femme de Cinema award recipients, including Antoneta Alamat Kusijanović (“Murina”) and Mounia Meddour (“Papicha”).
