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The Last Family triumphs at the Lisbon & Estoril Film Festival

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- Jan P Matuszynski’s feature scooped both the festival’s Grand Prize and Revelation Award

The Last Family triumphs at the Lisbon & Estoril Film Festival
The Last Family by Jan P Matuszynski

First revealed at the latest Locarno Film Festival, The Last Family [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Dawid Ogrodnik
film profile
]
by Polish director Jan P Matuszynski has now won the Grand Prize at the Lisbon & Estoril Film Festival, which came to an end on Sunday evening. Based on the life of Polish painter Zdzislaw Beksinski, the film was also crowned with the Revelation Award. The jury members included Jerzy Skolimowski, Marthe Keller, Valentina Lodovini and André Saraiva.

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Sand Storm [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile
]
by Israeli director Elite Zexer received the Special Jury Prize. The film, which is Israel’s Oscars submission (read more), explores women struggling in a patriarchal society through the story of a girl whose love affair with a young man outside of her tribe challenges the traditions of her Bedouin mother and father.

Screened in competition, Elle [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile
]
by Paul Verhoeven was crowned with the Audience Award – which seems to bode well for the Isabelle Huppert-starrer, as it is scheduled to open this week in local theatres, courtesy of Paulo Branco’s distribution outfit, Medeia Filmes. 

The Best Short Film Award – which focuses on the works of students from international film schools – went to The Sleeping Saint by Laura Samani, from Italy’s Centro Sperimentale de Cinematografia.

This year’s Lisbon & Estoril Film Festival included several retrospectives (dedicated to Jean-Luc Godard, Emir Kusturica, Jerzy Skolimowski and Teresa Villaverde, among others) and visits from several celebrities, such as Monica Bellucci, Jim Jarmusch (as the producer of Gabe Klinger’s film Porto [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Gabe Klinger
film profile
]
), Fanny Ardant and Gérard Depardieu (the latter of whom are respectively the director and lead actor of Le Divan de Staline [+see also:
trailer
film profile
]
, which also screened at the festival). Without specifying any figures, artistic director Paulo Branco announced that the number of audience members had increased compared to previous editions: “It was a great surprise, particularly since we have programmed difficult titles, which, in principle, would be risky to show.”

The closing ceremony was followed by a screening of Tom Ford’s new film, Nocturnal Animals [+see also:
trailer
film profile
]
.

Here is the complete list of award winners:

Grand Prize - Jaeger-LeCoultre
The Last Family [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Dawid Ogrodnik
film profile
]
- Jan P Matuszynski (Poland)

João Bénard da Costa Special Jury Prize
Sand Storm [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile
]
- Elite Zexer (Israel/France)

TAP Revelation Award
The Last Family - Jan P Matuszynski

Audience Award – NOS
Elle [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile
]
– Paul Verhoeven (France/Germany/Belgium)

Best Short Film Award
The Sleeping Saint - Laura Samani (Italy)

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