03/12/2007

The Lëtzebuerger Filmpräis, the biennial film awards of the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, were handed out this weekend at a ceremony attended by over 800 film and industry professionals. It was an evening full of surprises and multiple prizes.

The jury headed by former Minister of Culture Erna Hennicot-Schoepges awarded the top prize for Best Luxembourg Feature to not one but two titles: Plein d’essence from Geneviève Mersch, a Samsa Film production about a Luxembourg petrol station, was named Best Documentary, while the Polish- and German-language Your Name is Justine from director Franco de Pena was named Best Fiction Feature. The story about a Polish woman forced into prostitution in Berlin was produced and shot locally by Hemispheres Films.

German-born Belgian director Sam Garbarski went home with the prize for Best Co-production for his Berlinale darling Irina Palm [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Sam Garbarski
interview: Sébastien Delloye
film profile], co-produced by Samsa Film, while the local box-office hit Perl oder Pica [+see also:
trailer
film profile], the country’s Luxembourgish-language Oscar submission for this year, went home with the Audience Award. It was produced by Red Lion.

The Prize for Best Technical or Artistic Contribution was also awarded twice: to director Donato Rotunno for his work on the Tarantula produced In a Dark Place, a retelling of Henry James’s ghost story The Turn of the Screw, and to editor Thierry Faber, who worked on Paul Kieffer’s recent Nuits d’Arabie [+see also:
trailer
film profile], amongst others. Composer Jeannot Sanavia was also awarded for his work on Kieffer’s latest, which was produced by Samsa and is currently in its third week of release.