News

The 15th Beijing International Film Festival has revealed that acclaimed Chinese director and actor Jiang Wen will preside over the Tiantian competition jury, with celebrated Chinese-American actor and filmmaker Joan Chen joining the panel.

The seven-member international jury brings together a cross-section of global film talent, including British director David Yates, Chinese actor Ni Ni, Finnish director Teemu Nikki, Swiss director and actor Vincent Perez, and Hong Kong art director Tim Yip.

Hungarian auteur Béla Tarr will lead the jury for the festival’s Forward Future strand.

The main competition lineup features a diverse slate of films vying for the award, including Hao Ming and Li Peiran’s “Better Me, Better You,” Li Yongyi’s “Deep in the Mountains” and Zhang Qi’s “Trapped,” all from China, and Emine Yildirim’s “Apollon by Day Athena by Night” (Turkey), Sora Hokimoto’s “Baus: The Ship’s Voyage Continues” (Japan), Maria Brendle...

Chinese actor-director Jiang Wen (Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, Let the Bullets Fly) will serve as the head of the main competition jury at the 15th Beijing International Film Festival, which will hand out its Tiantan Awards.

The jury will also include Chinese American director and actor Joan Chen (The Last Emperor), British director David Yates (Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them), Chinese actor Ni Ni, Finnish director Teemu Nikki, Swiss director and actor Vincent Perez, and art director Tim Yip from Hong Kong. The panel will select the winners across 10 award categories, including best feature film, best director and best screenplay.

The festival also unveiled its 15 main competition films, with organizers saying they received a record 1,794 feature film submissions from 103 countries and regions, marking a 19 percent increase over last year.

The three Chinese films in the main competition lineup are Hao Ming and Li Peiran’s Better Me,...

While there’s a few more fall film festivals popping up in the next month, the major ones are behind us, which means we have a strong sense of the films to have on your radar in the coming months and even through 2025. We’ve asked our writers from across the globe to weigh in on their favorite world premieres from Locarno Film Festival, Venice Film Festival, Telluride Film Festival, Toronto International Film Festival, New York Film Festival, and BFI London Film Festival.

Our coverage will continue with a few more reviews this week, and far beyond as we provide updates on the journey of these selections, so continue to explore all of our festival coverage here. In the meantime, check out top picks from our writers below and return soon for our extensive year-end coverage.

Soham Gadre (@SohamGadre)

1. April (Dea Kulumbegashvili)

2 and 3. Youth (Homecoming and Hard Times) (Wang Bing...

Concluding its 20th year, the Zurich Film Festival has named the winners this year’s Golden Eye.

As the festival wrapped up this weekend in Switzerland, On Becoming a Guinea Fowl and Black Box Diaries took home the Zff’s Golden Eye awards in the Feature Film and Documentary Competitions.

On Becoming a Guinea Fowl was selected by jury president Lee Daniels and members Souheila Yacoub, Jo Willems, Ewa Puszczyńska and Sophie Deraspe, with Jianjie Lin’s Brief History of a Family earning special mention.

Black Box Diaries was chosen by jury president Kevin Macdonald and members Franziska Sonder, Vincent Kelner, Anna Hints and Ben Bernhard, with Sandi DuBowski’s Sabbath Queen and Kinshuk Surjan’s Marching in the Dark recieving special mention.

Other winners include Les Courageux, Leeuwin and Die Heinzels 2: Neue Mützen, Neue Mission, with the latter two competing in Zff for Kids. Also honored at the festival were Kate Winslet,...

“On Becoming a Guinea Fowl” has been awarded the Golden Eye at Zurich Film Festival.

Jury president Lee Daniels – joined by Souheila Yacoub, Jo Willems, Sophie Deraspe and Ewa Puszczyńska – praised director Rungano Nyoni and her “miraculous” second film about past traumas finally coming to the surface when a family prepares for a funeral of an uncle: “We believe she’ll take over Hollywood,” he said.

“From the first shot of this film, we are thrust into a world that is spectacularly shot, filled with incredible music, exquisite sound design and acting that left us all breathless,” he added, calling it a surreal, dramatic comedy full of surprises about the lies we tell ourselves.”

Following the film’s Cannes premiere, Variety’s Guy Lodge called Nyoni’s film “darkly transfixing” and “at once intrepidly daring and rigorously poised.”

Festival director Christian Jungen told Variety: “It’s a very original and...

Mike Flanagan’s The Life Of Chuck starring Tom Hiddleston is this year’s surprise winner of Toronto International Film Festival’s 2024 TIFF People’s Choice Award, a historically reliable bellwether of an Oscar nomination.

Over a sample pool of the last 15 years, all but one People’s Choice winner has gone on to garner a best picture Oscar nomination, and several – like 12 Years A Slave, Green Book and The King’s Speech – have won the top prize at the Academy Awards.

Yet The Life Of Chuck presents an anomaly – it currently lacks a US distributor. Buyers had been circling...

Mike Flanagan’s The Life Of Chuck starring Tom Hiddleston is this year’s surprise winner of Toronto International Film Festival’s 2024 TIFF People’s Choice Award, a historically reliable bellwether of an Oscar nomination.

Over a sample pool of the last 15 years, all but one People’s Choice winner has gone on to garner a best picture Oscar nomination, and several – like 12 Years A Slave, Green Book and The King’s Speech – have won the top prize at the Academy Awards.

Yet The Life Of Chuck presents an anomaly – it currently lacks a US distributor. Buyers had been circling...

The winners for this year’s Toronto International Film Festival have been announced, with Mike Flanagan’s The Life of Chuck taking home the People’s Choice Award.

Check out the full list of winners below:

People’s Choice Award: The Life of Chuck, dir. Mike Flanagan

People’s Choice Midnight Madness Award: The Substance, dir. Coralie Fargeat

People’s Choice Documentary Award: The Tragically Hip: No Dress Rehearsal, dir. Mike Downie

Short Cuts Award for Best International Film: Deck 5B, dir. Malin Ingrid Johansson

Short Cuts Award for Best Canadian Film: Are You Scared To Be Yourself Because You Think That You Might Fail?, dir. Bec Pecaut

Fipresci Award: Mother Mother, dir. K’naan Warsame

Netpac Award: The Last of the Sea Women, dir. Sue Kim

Best Canadian Discovery Award: Universal Language, dir. Matthew Rankin

Best Canadian Feature Film Award: Shepherds, dir. Sophie Deraspe

Platform Award: They Will Be Dust,...

Mike Flanagan’s The Life Of Chuck picked up the top People’s Choice honor Sunday at the Toronto Film Festival as its 2024 edition wrapped with renewed celebrity heat but still in the shadow of Venice and Cannes.

The Stephen King novella adaptation stars Tom Hiddleston, Mark Hamill, Karen Gillan and Chiwetel Ejiofor in a genre-tripping film about embracing hope in the face of tragedy and had a world premiere in Toronto. Flanagan in a statement thanked TIFF for the top audience award prize: “I’m absolutely overwhelmed. We’re so grateful that The Life of Chuck connected with audiences in such a powerful way, but never expected this.”

The second runner up for the People’s Choice Award was Jacques Audiard’s Emilia Pérez, a queer crime musical headed to Netflix that earned the jury prize in Cannes for the director, while the titular lead Karla Sofía Gascón became...

“The Life of Chuck,” director Mike Flanagan’s Stephen King adaptation starring Tom Hiddleston, has won the People’s Choice Award at the 2024 Toronto International Film Festival, TIFF organizers announced at an awards ceremony on Sunday.

In TheWrap’s review of the film, Chase Hutchinson called it “less of a horror film than it is an existential grappling with the end — while also being a jubilant celebration of the moments that make life worth living along the way. It’s Flanagan’s vibrant equivalent of Charlie Kaufman’s ‘Synecdoche, New York’ that finds hope and meaning in his own way just as it is one of the best modern Stephen King adaptations one could hope for.”

Unlike festivals like Cannes, Berlin, Sundance and Venice, Toronto does not give out a jury award to the festival’s top film. Instead, viewers at all public screenings are invited to vote for their...

The People’s Choice Award from the just-wrapped 2024 Toronto Film Festival has gone to The Life of Chuck, first runner-up is Emilia Pérez, and second runner-up is Anora. The Documentary Award goes to The Tragically Hip: No Dress Rehearsal, and the Midnight Madness winner is The Substance.

Both runners-up Emilia Pérez and Anora were big winners at Cannes in May (the latter taking the Palme d’Or), but Mike Flanagan’s Stephen King adaptation The Life of Chuck was a TIFF world premiere and a surprise winner of this award.

Tom Hiddleston stars in the film based on King’s novella about three chapters in the life of an ordinary man named Charles Krantz. It is an unusual winner here for this award as it currently is looking for distribution and has no set release date, which means it could be the first People’s Choice winner in recent memory...

Mathyas in Shepherds. Sophie Deraspe on her star Félix-Antoine Duval: 'When I prepared with him prior to shooting, I think the most important thing I told him is, “You cannot prepare that much, but the thing that you can do is to let your mind and heart and body and spirit open up to what can happen”' Sophie Deraspe's Shepherds (Bergers) transports us to the south of France where young Canadian Mathyas (Félix-Antoine Duval) has relocated from Montreal on impulse, with the romantic dream of becoming a sheep herder and writing a book about it. Based on the semi-autographic Where Are You From, Shepherd? it relates his experience of attempting to find his feet in the shepherding world at the same time as embarking on a relationship with a young bureacrat he meets, Élise (Solène Rigot), who makes an impetuous decision of her own.

This gentle drama, which has a strong documentary feel,...

The Zurich Film Festival has lined up world premieres of Constantin Film’s fantasy drama Hagen and western The Unholy Trinity starring Pierce Brosnan and Samuel L. Jackson as part of its Gala programme.

Two Swiss productions - Frieda’s Case by Maria Brendle and Aiming High - A Race Against The Limits by Flavio Gerber and Alun Meyerhans – will also world premiere in the ten strong Gala section.

Produced by Constantin, Hagen is a reimagining of the medieval Nibelungen folk saga directed by Cyrill Boss and Philipp Stenner. As well as a feature, it has been made as a six-part series.

Zurich Film Festival has revealed a second wave of Gala titles, which includes films starring Tilda Swinton, Sebastian Stan, Nicole Kidman, Pierce Brosnan and Samuel L. Jackson.

Among the 10 added titles are four world premieres, two international premieres and one European premiere.

Zurich will screen, among others, Ali Abbas’ “The Apprentice,” starring Stan, Pedro Almodóvar’s “The Room Next Door,” starring Swinton, and Halina Reijn’s “Babygirl,” starring Kidman.

Richard Gray’s Western “The Unholy Trinity,” starring Brosnan and Jackson, has its world premiere.

The other world premieres are “Frieda’s Case” by Maria Brendle, “Aiming High – A Race Against the Limits” by Flavio Gerber and Alun Meyerhans, and German epic adventure “Hagen.”

“The fact that we have the opportunity to present so many world and European premieres goes to show that the Zff holds a strong position in the international calendar,” Christian Jungen, artistic director of the festival, said.

Nutcrackers, David Gordon Green’s heartfelt comedy starring Ben Stiller, is set to open the 2024 Toronto Film Festival on Sept. 5.

The TIFF opener — marking Stiller’s first starring role in a movie since Mike White’s Brad’s Status and Noah Baumbach’s Netflix family drama The Meyerowitz Stories in 2017 — will have a world premiere at Roy Thomson Hall, which is filled with ordinary moviegoers (and not only industry people as in Cannes and Venice).

Written by Leland Douglas, Nutcrackers follows Mike (Stiller), a straight-laced workaholic who has to travel to rural Ohio to care for his four nephews after their parents die in a car accident. After weeks of farm-life mayhem, Mike realizes he won’t have to find a new home for the orphaned children. They found a new home for him.

Nutcrackers — with an ensemble cast that includes Linda Cardellini, Edi Patterson, Tim Heidecker and Toby Huss — is...

From his stint as a child actor to now being one of Hollywood’s greatest directors, Ron Howard has surely come a long way. The Academy Award winner has undoubtedly produced a wide range of films that cover every genre. Bringing another of his masterpieces, Eden, to the screen, the filmmaker demonstrated once more that a superb cast can accomplish what even the best marketing campaigns in the world cannot.

Ron Howard in American Graffiti (1973) || Universal Pictures

The ensemble was already fantastic, but the additions of Sydney Sweeney, Ana de Armas, and Venessa Kirby heightened the excitement surrounding the movie. Now, another good news awaits the fanatics.

Ron Howard’s Eden features a wonderful lineup of actresses

Previously named Origin of Species, Eden already boasted a cast consisting of Jude Law, Ana de Armas, and Daniel Brühl. However, things were further intensified when Vanessa Kirby and Sydney Sweeney joined the...

Sure, we’re still in the early days of summer, but that doesn’t mean we can’t look forward to fall. Specifically, the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF).

Read More: TIFF 2024: ‘Nightbitch,’ ‘The Wild Robot’ & ‘The Life Of Chuck’ Among First Six Selections

And today, TIFF announced several new films that will be making their highly anticipated world premieres at the event. Those films include “Eden,” from director Ron Howard and starring Jude Law, Ana de Armas, Vanessa Kirby, Daniel Bruhl, and Sydney Sweeney, “K-Pops,” the directorial debut of musician Anderson .Paak, “Shepherds,” from director Sophie Deraspe, “Superboys of Malegaon,” from filmmaker Reema Kagti,” and “We Live in Time,” from director John Crowley and starring Andrew Garfield and Florence Pugh.

Continue reading TIFF 2024: New Films Starring Andrew Garfield, Florence Pugh, Jude Law & More Debuting At This Year’s Event at The Playlist.

Toronto International Film Festival has added five more world premiere titles to its Gala and Special Presentation programs.

Ron Howard’s survival thriller Eden will debut in the Gala program. Based on true events about the lengths people go to in pursuit of a better life, it is written by Halifax-born Noah Pink and starsJude Law, Ana de Armas, Sydney Sweeney, Vanessa Kirby and Daniel Brühl.

It is produced by Howard’s Imagine Entertainment and AGC.

Other Gala titles include Indian director Reema Kagti’s Superboys of Malegaon about the life of amateur filmmaker of Nasir Shaikh.

Special Presentation additions include K-pops, a dramatic comedy that takes inspiration from eight-time Grammy Award winner Anderson .Paak’s own life, bridging family lineages and cultures, and John Crowley’s romance We Live in Time, starring Florence Pugh and Andrew Garfield as a couple whose chance encounter changes their lives as they fall in love,...

The 2024 Toronto International Film Festival is getting even more star power.

The festival unveiled four more titles as part of its highly-anticipated lineup which already includes the debuts of “Nightbitch” starring Amy Adams and Elton John documentary “Elton John: Never Too Late.” Now, buzzy titles “Eden” and “We Live in Time” join the festival premieres as part of the Gala and Special Presentation programs, sponsored by Dyson. The festival will take place from September 5 through 15.

Survival thriller “Eden,” directed by Ron Howard, stars Jude Law, Ana de Armas, Sydney Sweeney, and Vanessa Kirby. The feature was written by Noah Pink and is based on true events “about the lengths we will go to in pursuit of a better life,” per the elusive logline.

A24 and Studiocanal romance “We Live in Time” will also have its world premiere at the festival. Florence Pugh and Andrew Garfield star as a couple whose...

Ron Howard’s survival thriller Eden is set for a world premiere at the Toronto Film Festival in September, organizers said on Tuesday.

Eden, from Imagine Entertainment, stars Jude Law, Vanessa Kirby, Sydney Sweeney, Ana de Armas and Daniel Brühl and is based on real-life events and hails from Tetris scribe Noah Pink. The movie will play as a gala at Roy Thomson Hall.

Toronto also added world premieres for Anderson .Paak’s K-Pops; Shepherds, by Antigone director Sophie Deraspe; and Superboys of Malegaon, by Indian director Reema Kagti, which will play as a gala from Amazon MGM Studios. The film based on the life of Nasir Shaikh follows an aspiring filmmaker joining a group of friends to make a film for his town, Malegaon.

K-Pops marks the directorial debut of Grammy award-winning artist .Paak, with Yvette Nicole Brown and rapper Jonnie “Dumbfoundead” Park starring. The dramatic comedy portrays a...

Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) has announced five features that will receive their world premieres at the upcoming festival in September, including Ron Howard’s survival thriller Eden and We Live In Time starring Florence Pugh and Andrew Garfield.

The roster includes Anderson .Paak’s dramatic comedy K-pops based on his life; Sophie Deraspe’s Shepherds, about a young advertising executive who trades in his Montreal life to become a shepherd in France; and Reema Kagti’s Superboys Of Malegaon based on the life of Nasir Shaikh, an amateur filmmaker from India, which looks at what happens when filmmaking and friendships collide.

Cyprien Vial’s Guadalope-set volcano drama Magma, and Sophie Deraspe’s Bergers, about a man and women who trades in their lives as an ad exec and a civil servant to become shepherds in rural France, head Pyramide International’s busy Cannes Market slate.

Marina Fois, Theo Christine and Mathieu Demy star in Magma, which is produced by Isabelle Madelaine’s Dharamsala and Emilie Tisné’s Darius Films. Fois plays a woman running the Guadeloupe Volcano Observatory who dreams of managing a major eruption and comes face to face with the unpredictable La Soufrière volcano. Shot in Guadeloupe, the film...

French Canadian filmmaker Sophie Deraspe is currently taking big gulps of the French Alps for her sixth feature film currently in production. Saint-Narcisse thesp Félix-Antoine Duval toplines Berger – the book-to-film adaptation of D’où viens-tu, berger? micro_scope folks Luc Déry, Kim McCraw and Élaine Hébert are producing the project along with the Avenue B folks Caroline Bonmarchand, Xenia Sulyma and Sébastien Perret. Supporting players include Solène Rigot, Younes Boucif, Bruno Raffaelli, Véronique Ruggia, Michel Benizri, Guilaine Londez and David Ayala.

Set to conclude filming early next month, this will be ready for 2024. One noteworthy member of the tech squad is Viking filmmaker Stéphane Lafleur who also moonlights as a notable film editor.…...

Co-presidents Anick Poirier and Lorne Price led highly regarded business.

Montreal-based sales agent Sphere Films International is to close down on June 16 as parent company Sphere said it was refocusing its distribution activities.

The highly regarded sales business led by co-presidents Anick Poirier and Lorne Price was noted throughout the global independent community for championing arthouse film, often by first-time directors.

The company has been handling sales on Fantasia opener Red Rooms and its credits include award-winners such as Canada’s 2020 Oscar submission Antigone by Sophie Deraspe and more recently Anthony Shim’s Riceboy Sleeps, Stéphane Lafleur’s Viking, and Job Clerc’s Sweet As.

Several titles looking to follow in the wake of ‘Tenet’.

France, opening Wednesday September 2

The biggest opener in France this week is Anne Fontaine’s Police, first seen at the Berlinale in February. Released by Studiocanal, the drama (also known as Night Shift) centres on three Parisian police officers – played by Omar Sy, Virginie Efira and Grégory Gadebois – who debate whether to deport an illegal immigrant (Payman Maadi) while transporting him to the airport.

Sophie Letourneur’s Enormous will also receive a wide release through Memento Films Distribution. First screened at the International Film Festival Rotterdam (Iffr) in January, the...

Among the final national award ceremonies celebrating 2019 cinema, the Iris Awards (aka Quebec Oscars) follows in the footsteps of the Canadian Screen Awards. Tiff entry and Canada’s Oscar nom Antigone by Sophie Deraspe won the Best Canadian Film award and her she continued her winning streak claiming the Prix Iris for Best Film, Director, Screenplay and Best Newcomer (Nahéma Ricci). Matthew Rankin’s The 20th Century claimed a handful of prizes, while actress Andrée Lachapelle won posthumously for her role in Louise Archambault’s Il pleuvait des oiseaux (the picture won the Public Prize for Best Film). Xavier Dolan not nominated in the Best Film category walked away with a trio of prizes for Matthias & Maxime – including Best Score by Jean-Michel Blais.…...

Members of the Academy of Canadian Cinema and Television voted to crown Sophie Deraspe’s “Antigone” as best film at the Canadian Screen Awards Thursday, presented virtually by broadcasters CBC and CTV.

The film, a contemporary spin on the Greek tragedy, also won awards for lead female actor for Nahéma Ricci, female actor in a supporting role for Nour Belkhiria, adapted screenplay for Deraspe, and editing for Geoffrey Boulangé and Deraspe.

Variety’s review of the film, which was named best Canadian feature at the Toronto Film Festival, said it “feels refreshingly liberated by the spirit of Sophocles’ original material.” The “impassioned” film was “electrified by a performance of immense self-possession and dignity from revelatory new star Nahéma Ricci,” the critic wrote.

Elle-Máijá Tailfeathers and Kathleen Hepburn won the prizes for directing and original screenplay for “The Body Remembers When the World Broke Open.” The film also took the cinematography award for Norm Li.

Antigone, Sophie Deraspe’s haunting French-language drama that set its adaptation of the Greek tragedy as a tale of a modern-day refugee family in Montreal, won Best Picture and tied François Girard’s The Song of Names with five wins overall Thursday at the Canadian Screen Awards, Canada’s equivalent to the Oscars.

Winners in the Cinematic Arts categories came tonight in a virtual ceremony held by The Canadian Academy, culminating three days of award handouts spanning film, TV, news, sports and documentaries.

Antigone won the Best Canadian Feature Film at last year’s Toronto Film Festival on its way to becoming Canada’s official submission in the 2020 International Feature Film race. Tonight, it also took best actress for star Nahéma Ricci, supporting actress for Nour Belkhiria, adapted screenplay for Deraspe, and Geoffrey Boulangé and Deraspe won for editing.

Song of Names, about an Englishman who searches for his childhood friend,...

“Lunana: A Yak in the Classroom” — the story about a young displaced teacher who travels to Bhutan and is taught his own life lessons from the happy and kind locals (including a yak) — won the Audience Award for Best Narrative Feature at The Palm Springs International Film Festival (Psiff), it was announced Sunday.

“Gay Chorus Deep South” — a documentary following the San Francisco Gay Men’s Chorus as the group embarks upon a high-risk tour of the Deep South to spread a message of tolerance — won the Audience Award for Best Documentary Feature.

“Parasite” screenwriters Bong Joon Ho and Han Jin Won won the Fipresci Prize for International Screenplay for their tale about two Korean families — one wealthy and one poor — whose live intersect in the most unexpected way.

Among the acting awards, Bartosz Bielenia from “Corpus Christi” and Helena Zengel from “System Crasher” took top honors.

Also Read: Palm Springs: Renée Zellweger,...

Updated with Audience Award winners: The 31st annual Palm Springs Film Festival has named the Bhutan drama Lunana: A Yak in the Classroom the winner of its Audience Award for Best Narrative Feature, and Gay Chorus Deep South its Audience Award for Best Documentary.

The news Sunday comes after the fest yesterday revealed its juried award winners at a luncheon at the Hilton Palm Springs. There, Russian pic Beanpole took the Fipresci prize, while Bong Joon-Ho’s Oscar favorite Parasite copped the Fipresci Screenplay prize.

Lunana: A Yak in the Classroom, from director Pawo Choyning Dorji, was filmed on location at more than 16,000 feet in one of the most remote villages in Bhutan. The pic centers on a young displaced teacher who is taught his own life lessons from the happy and kind locals.

David Charles Rodrigues’ U.S. docu Gay Chorus Deep South follows the San Francisco Gay Men’s Chorus...

The Palm Springs International Film Festival, which began just after the New Year and wraps January 13, screened 188 films; 51 of them were submitted for the Best International Feature Film Academy Award. The Palm Springs Film Festival prize winners announced Saturday over brunch at the Hilton included a handful of these films. See the full list of winners below. Audience awards will be announced on Sunday.

Fipresci Prize for Best International Feature Film: “Beanpole” (Russia), Director Kantemir Balagov.

Fipresci Prize for Best Actor in a International Feature Film: Bartosz Bielenia from “Corpus Christi” (Poland).

Fipresci Prize for the Best Actress in a International Feature Film: Helena Zengel from “System Crasher” (Germany).

Fipresci Prize for International Screenplay: “Parasite” (South Korea), Screenwriters Bong Joon Ho and Han Jin-Won.

Fipresci Prize for International Screenplay Special Mention: “Antigone” (Canada), Screenwrier Sophie Deraspe.

The Fipresci jury members were film critics Pamela Biénzobas, Alferov Gavrylyshyn, and Tina Hassannia.

The Palm Springs Film Festival has announced its juried winners, with “Beanpole” taking the Fipresci prize for films in the international feature film Oscar submissions program. The documentary award went to “Talking About Trees.”

Acting prizes went to Bartosz Bielenia from “Corpus Christi” for actor and Helena Zengel from “System Crasher” for actress. “Parasite” won the screenplay prize from the Fipresci jury of international film critics.

The festival, held from January 2-13, screened 192 films from 81 countries.

The New Voices New Visions award for first and second time filmmakers went to “Song Without a Name,” while “Monos” received the Ibero-American Award for films from Latin America, Spain or Portugal.

Other prizes included the local jury award to “Adam,” the Young Cineastes Award to “Corpus Christi,” and the Bridging the Borders award to “Advocate.”

The audience prizes will be announced Sunday.

A complete list of winners follows:

Fipresci Prize for Best International...

Kantemir Balagov's war drama Beanpole on Saturday was awarded the Fipresci prize for best international feature film at the 31st annual Palm Springs International Film Festival, which revealed this year's juried award winners during a luncheon at the Hilton Palm Springs.

Bong Joon Ho and Han Jin-Won received the Fipresci prize for best international screenplay for the dark family farce Parasite, while a special mention was given to Sophie Deraspe's Canadian crime drama Antigone. 

Peruvian director Melina León was presented the New Voices/New Visions Award, which recognizes unique viewpoints from first- or second-time filmmakers, for her investigative drama ...

Kantemir Balagov's war drama Beanpole on Saturday was awarded the Fipresci prize for best international feature film at the 31st annual Palm Springs International Film Festival, which revealed this year's juried award winners during a luncheon at the Hilton Palm Springs.

Bong Joon Ho and Han Jin-Won received the Fipresci prize for best international screenplay for the dark family farce Parasite, while a special mention was given to Sophie Deraspe's Canadian crime drama Antigone. 

Peruvian director Melina León was presented the New Voices/New Visions Award, which recognizes unique viewpoints from first- or second-time filmmakers, for her investigative drama ...

WFF19 attracted a total of 12,339 attendees across our programming including 6,450 film-screening attendees and 2,180 special event attendees. On the Industry side, the Content Summit welcomed 2,655 attendees, 116 talent program attendees and 938 delegates.

The Whistler Film Festival’s Audience Award sponsored by Fisherman’s Friend went to the North American premiere of LIBERTÉ: A Call To Spy, an exciting true story about female spies during WWII. The film is an American title shot partly in Budapest and was produced, written by and stars Sarah Megan Thomas and was directed by Lydia Dean Pilcher. The Wff Audience Award runner-up was The Cuban directed by Sergio Navarretta, which had its world premiere at the festival. The Wff Audience Award for Most Popular Canadian Film went to Antigone, Canada’s official submission in this year’s international film Oscars category. Directed by Sophie Deraspe, the film won four of the five Borsos Competition Awards including Best Canadian Feature.

Canada contends this year with “Antigone” for its eighth Oscar nomination in the Best International Feature category, which has been renamed from Best Foreign Language Film. Canada was a staple of the race until recently, making the shortlist seven out of 10 times from 2003 to 2012. This included the country’s first and only win, for 2003’s “The Barbarian Invasions” by Denys Arcand, as well as three consecutive nominations from 2010 to 2012. Canada has been snubbed the last six years, only making the shortlist for 2016’s “It’s Only the End of the World,” which had won the Grand Prix runner-up award at the Cannes Film Festival for director Xavier Dolan.

“Antigone” is shaping up to be Canada’s most-acclaimed submission in years. Its premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival yielded the People’s Choice Award for Best Canadian Film and the film has 91% approval from critics on Rotten Tomatoes, the best rating...

There’s a moment in French-Canadian director Sophie Deraspe's vividly shot Antigone — a contemporary, Montreal-set update of the Greek myth — in which the titular protagonist is forced to have a sit-down with a psychiatrist. The elderly female analyst dons huge black sunglasses even though the conversation takes place indoors. Until she finally takes them off and it becomes clear that she is, in fact, blind. Up until that point, the story, which follows the 17-year-old granddaughter of an immigrant from Kabylia, could have been a fairly realistic drama, except for the weird fact that so many characters ...

There’s a moment in French-Canadian director Sophie Deraspe's vividly shot Antigone — a contemporary, Montreal-set update of the Greek myth — in which the titular protagonist is forced to have a sit-down with a psychiatrist. The elderly female analyst dons huge black sunglasses even though the conversation takes place indoors. Until she finally takes them off and it becomes clear that she is, in fact, blind. Up until that point, the story, which follows the 17-year-old granddaughter of an immigrant from Kabylia, could have been a fairly realistic drama, except for the weird fact that so many characters ...

“I was inspired by this story written more than 2000 years ago, but still is so relevant,” Sophie Deraspe says about adapting the Sophocles play ‘Antigone’ for her film of the same name, which is Canada’s entry for the Best International Feature Oscar. The writer-director elaborates in her interview with Gold Derby at the 19th Whistler Film Festival (watch above), “It was in my early 20s when I read the play and I felt like I had to bring it back into a contemporary setting because it feels still so relevant.” Deraspe’s film transposes Antigone from classical Greece to present-day Montreal as an Algerian immigrant.

Deraspe calls it “a very universal story about family, about love, about dignity and resistance,” so she wants audiences to know that “you don’t have to know the play in order to appreciate the film.” Deraspe explains that the main change from the...

The annual Palm Springs International Film Festival in California is always an opportunity to catch up on many of the contenders for the Best International Feature — née Best Foreign-Language — Film Academy Award. Now in its 31st edition, the festival this year has 51 of them, from favorite-to-beat “Parasite” from South Korea and Senegal’s “Atlantics,” to other films quietly making strides in the race: Czech Republic’s “The Painted Bird,” Sweden’s “And Then We Danced,” Russia’s “Beanpole,” Romania’s “The Whistlers,” North Macedonia’s documentary contender “Honeyland,” Norway’s “Out Stealing Horses,” and many more.

The festival will screen 188 films from 81 countries, including 51 premieres, from January 2-13, 2020. The Awards Buzz section includes a special jury of international film critics, who will review these films to present the Fipresci Award for Best Foreign Language Film of the Year, as well as Best Actor, Best Actress, and Best Screenplay in this category.

One hundred eighty-eight films films from 81 countries including 51 premieres highlight the lineup for the 31st annual Palm Springs International Film Festival, which kicks off January 2 with a star-studded gala that has become a must-stop during awards season for Oscar hopefuls. The festival, which runs through January 13, also is known for showcasing a large number of submissions in the Motion Picture Academy’s International Film (formerly Foreign Language) competition and will feature 51 of those entries.

The opening-night film on January 3 is the Italian farce An Almost Ordinary Summer, while the closer is director Peter Cattaneo’s heartwarming dramedy Military Wives in which Kristin Scott Thomas, Sharon Horgan and Jason Flemyng lead a superb ensemble cast. The film had its world premiere at September’s Toronto International Film Festival and became an instant crowd-pleaser. Bleecker Street releases it in 2020.

Among the previously announced honorees at the January 2 gala are Antonio Banderas, Renee Zellweger,...

WaZabi Films also closes deals with Italy, France, Mexico, South Korea.

Sophie Deraspe’s Canadian Oscar submission Antigone has secured Us distribution with Los Angeles-based Cinema Libre Studios as WaZabi Films reported a raft of international sales.

Rights have gone to Lucky Red in Italy, Ligne 7 in France and Belgium, Nachson Films in Israel, Cinemas Nueva Era in Mexico, and Green Narae Media in South Korea. WaZabi Films and the producer Acpav Corporation announced the deals on Monday evening (9).

Antigone premiered in Toronto where it won the Best Canadian Film award before going on to play at Rome International Film Festival,...

Canada's everyone-is-welcome immigration policy got worldwide attention in 2015 when Prime Minister Justin Trudeau personally greeted Syrian refugees at a Toronto airport.

But Antigone, Canadian director Sophie Deraspe's modern take on Sophocles' classic Greek tragedy, effectively indicts Quebec's refugee policies as unjust and heartless. "My Antigone is for our times and the problems we have and a young woman who feels her family bonds are stronger than laws written by men, and so she follows her heart and her own values," Deraspe tells THR.

Her refugee family drama has been tapped as Canada's official submission for ...

Canada's everyone-is-welcome immigration policy got worldwide attention in 2015 when Prime Minister Justin Trudeau personally greeted Syrian refugees at a Toronto airport.

But Antigone, Canadian director Sophie Deraspe's modern take on Sophocles' classic Greek tragedy, effectively indicts Quebec's refugee policies as unjust and heartless. "My Antigone is for our times and the problems we have and a young woman who feels her family bonds are stronger than laws written by men, and so she follows her heart and her own values," Deraspe tells THR.

Her refugee family drama has been tapped as Canada's official submission for ...

Simon Pegg may have done some snowboarding in Whistler, but he’s yet to attend a film fest there. Lucky for him, Katharine O’Brien’s “Lost Transmissions,” in which he stars alongside Juno Temple, is making its Canadian debut to open the Whistler Film Festival, which runs Dec 4-8. Pegg is thinking of bringing his snowboard, just in case, but mainly he’s there for the fest. Anything else is a bonus.

“It’s such a beautiful part of British Columbia,” he says by phone from his home in the U.K. “And it’s lovely for us to be the opening film there for a little film like this, which is very much a low-budget affair. It’s such an auspicious festival and it’s all you can hope for when you make these smaller films.”

Although Pegg is known more for comedies, this film, which tackles the subject of mental health,...

“Antigone” writer, director and cinematographer Sophie Deraspe discussed the inspiration for her film which was drawn from Sophocles’ tragedy at The Wrap screening series which took place on Monday at The Landmark in Los Angeles.

“I read ‘Antigone’ when I was in my early 20s and at that time I didn’t know I would make films but it really struck me,” Deraspe told TheWrap’s Steve Pond. “I was a student in literature and as a young woman it really felt like there is a character that I can totally relate to that is strong, intelligent and she stands up against what she feels is either unfair or unright. That spoke a lot to me at that time.”

Deraspe said the “Antigone” stayed in the corner of her heart and my head until many years later, when a tragedy that happened in Montreal that made her question what Antigone...

Among the record 92 submissions this year, 27 titles are directed or co-directed by women. There are six documentaries in the mix, as well as two animated features. Moreover, for the first time, Ghana and Uzbekistan are each fielding an entry. However, Nigeria’s submission was disqualified by the Academy as being mostly in the English language. Here’s a guide to the films, including logline and sales or production contact.

Albania

“The Delegation”

Director: Bujar Alimani

Logline: In autumn 1990,

a political prisoner is secretly taken out of jail to meet the head of the European delegation investigating human-rights violations. But nothing goes according to plan.

Key Cast: Viktor Zhusti, Ndriçim Xhepa, Xhevdet Feri

Sales: Art Film

Algeria

“Papicha”

Director: Mounia Meddour

Logline: A female student rebels against the bans set by radicals during the civil war and plans a fashion show.

Key Cast: Lyna Khoudri, Shirine Boutella, Amira Hilda Douaouda

Sales:...

Festival to run November 14-21; full line-up due later this month.

International feature film Oscar submissions The Traitor from Italy’s Marco Bellocchio and Antigone from Canada’s Sophie Deraspe will join Alice Winocour’s Proxima and Alex Gibney’s Citizen K at AFI Fest in the world cinema and documentary selections, announced on Tuesday (15).

World cinema entries include Academy Award submissions Corpus Christi from Poland, Sweden’s And Then We Danced, and Romania’s The Whistlers, playing alongside the Los Angeles premiere of Terrence Malik’s A Hidden Life.

Documentary entries include Alex Gibney’s Citizen K, Barbara Kopple’s Desert One,...

The American Film Institute unveiled their lineup for AFI Fest’s World Cinema and the inaugural Documentary section. The fest will take place November 14-21 in Los Angeles.

The world cinema section will include five international feature film Oscar submissions and 16 titles from 19 countries. This includes the Los Angeles premiere of Terrence Malick’s A Hidden Life as well as Levan Akin’s And We Danced from Sweden, Sophie Deraspe’s Antigone from Canada, Jan Komasa’s Corpus Christi from Poland, Marco Bellocchio’s The Traitor from Italy and Cornlieu’s The Whistlers from Romania.

On the documentary side, the fest will include Alex Gibney’s Citizen K as well as Desert One from two-time Academy Award winner Barbara Kopple. Other films in the doc lineup include Bikram: Yoga, Guru, Predator from Eva Orner, Jolie Coiffure from Rosine Mbakam and The Human Factor from Dror Moreh.

Read AFI Fest’s...

Mexican event runs from November 13-17.

Sophie Deraspe’s Canadian Oscar submission Antigone, Matías Meyer’s Modern Love, David Zonana’s Workforce and Michael Angelo Covino’s The Climb are among the Los Cabos International Film Festival’s competitive sections, Competencia Los Cabos and México Primero, announced on Tuesday (15).

Entries in the Competencia Los Cabos are: Modern Loves, Matías Meyer; Antigone (Canada), Sophie Deraspe; Ash (Canada), Andrew Huculiak; Greener Grass (Us), Jocelyn DeBoer and Dawn Luebbe; Honey Boy (Us), Alma Har’el; Holy Beasts, Laura Amelia Guzmán and Israel Cárdenas; The Body Remembers When The World Broke Open (Canada), Elle-Máijá...