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Guy Maddin and Evan Johnson will share the C$100,000 Rogers Best Canadian Film Award following the critics group’s gala dinner on January 5.

The Toronto Film Critics Association presented C$5,000 runner-up prizes from Rogers Communications to Philippe Falardeau’s My Internship In Canada and Andrew Cividino’s Sleeping Giant.

This marks Maddin’s second win of the Toronto Film Critics Association’s top Canadian prize after he won for My Winnipeg in 2008.

“At its best, Canadian cinema is notorious for stunning the world with outlandish originality,” said Tfca president Brian D Johnson. “And that’s what Guy Maddin and Evan Johnson have done with The Forbidden Room.

“Their film is a tour de force. The stellar casting, the visual wit, the narrative gymnastics — this is a cinematic cirque that leaves us amazed that it could even exist.”

“Guy Maddin won our inaugural Rogers Best Canadian Film Award with My Winnipeg,” said Phil Lind...

(Possible alternate title: "Men Suck And All Women Are Whores!" )

 

The Serbs must have a very peculiar view of their own nationality, judging by the way they choose to portray themselves in recent cinematic output. Soon to be seen at SXSW 2010 is Srdjan Spasojevic's "A Serbian Film", but at the International Film Festival Rotterdam this year we got another Serbian debut: Vladimir Paskaljevic's "Devil's Town".

 

Yet while "A Serbian Film" is already creating a violence-related hype as strong as "Antichrist" did last year or "Martyrs" did two years ago, "Devil's Town" takes a different route: that of the satiric ensemble-comedy. Nevertheless, Vladimir has to use quite some sex and violence (and often both) to show his opinion about the people currently living in present-day Belgrade...

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Audiences at the 21st annual Palm Springs International Film Festival, which concludes Monday, honored Niels Arden Oplev's "The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo," an adaptation of Stieg Larsson's mystery novel, with the fest's Mercedes-Benz Audience Award for Best Narrative Feature.

The Audience Award for Best Documentary Feature went to "The Most Dangerous Man in America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers," directed by Judith Ehrlich and Rick Goldsmith.

The runner-up film for best narrative feature was "The World Is Big and Salvation Lurks Around the Corner." In the doc field, the runner-up was "Inside Hana's Suitcase."

A jury of international film critics reviewed the official Oscar foreign-language film submissions that screened at the fest and presented the Fipresci Award for Best Foreign Language Film of the Year to Sweden's entry, Ruben Ostlund's comedy "Involuntary."

Tedo Bekhauri received the Fipresci Award for Best Actor for his performance in "The Other Bank,...

The Palm Springs International Film Festival has introduced a new program highlighting Australian cinema.

Organized in partnership with G'Day USA, the Australian Consulate General in Los Angeles and Tourism Australia, the program will feature Robert Connolly's "The Balibo Conspiracy," Rachel Ward's "Beautiful Kate," Ana Kokkinos' "Blessed," Tom Murray's "In My Father's Country," Glendyn Ivin's "Last Ride," Kriv Stender's "Lucky Country," Sarah Watt's "My Year Without Sex," Warwick Thornton's "Samson & Delilah" and Ted Kotcheff's "Wake in Fright."

"The Australian production boom was brought on by tax incentives, but it is the new talent behind the work that will sustain it," fest director Darryl Macdonald said.

Also, as part of its Awards Buzz program, the Jan. 7-18 fest will screen 41 of the 65 films that have been submitted to the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences for best foreign language film consideration.

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