Bobby Sands & Sexually Abused Women: Difficult Themes Top Ireland & Berlin

Michael Fassbender as Bobby Sands in director Steve McQueen’s Hunger.

With six wins, Steve McQueen’s Hunger was the big winner at the 2009 Irish Academy Awards. The story of Irish republican prisoner Bobby Sands’ last days, Hunger won trophies for best film, best actor (Michael Fassbender, as Sands), Best Supporting Actor (Liam Cunningham), original score (David Holmes), production design, and sound. Curiously, director Steve McQueen was passed over in favor of Lance Daly, whose Kisses follows two young runaways who find both thrills and some serious danger in the streets of Dublin. The best screenplay award went to Martin McDonagh for In Bruges. 2009 Irish Film Award winners: Feb. 14.

FILM CATEGORIES

Best Film
32A – Tommy Weir
A Film With Me In It – Alan Moloney, Susan Mullen
The Escapist – Alan Moloney, Adrian Sturges
* Hunger – Laura Hastings-Smith, Robin Gutch
Kisses – Macdara Kelleher, Lance Daly

Best Director
* Lance Daly, Kisses
Ian Fitzgibbon, A Film With Me In It
Martin McDonagh, In Bruges
Declan Recks, Eden

Best Screenplay
Lance Daly, Kisses
Mark Doherty, A Film With Me In It
* Martin McDonagh, In Bruges
Enda Walsh, Hunger

Best Actor In a Lead Role
Colin Farrell, In Bruges
* Michael Fassbender, Hunger
Brendan Gleeson, In Bruges
Dylan Moran, A Film With Me In It

Best Actress In a Lead Role
Jenn Murray, Dorothy
Kelly O’Neill, Kisses
Saoirse Ronan, City of Ember
* Eileen Walsh, Eden

Best Actor in a Supporting Role
* Liam Cunningham, Hunger
Stuart Graham, Hunger
Gerard McSorley, Anton
Peter O’Toole, Dean Spanley

Best Actress in a Supporting Role
Sarah Bolger, The Spiderwick Chronicles
Lesley Conroy, Eden
* Saoirse Ronan, Death Defying Acts
Ger Ryan, Dorothy

Best Feature Documentary
Dambé – The Mali Project – Dearbhla Glynn, Vanessa Gildea
Gabriel Byrne: Stories From Home – Pat Collins, Tina Moran
Saviours – Liam Nolan / Ross Whitaker
Seaview – Nicky Gogan, Maya Derrington
* Waveriders – Margo Harkin, Joel Conroy

Best International Film
The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas
* In Bruges
Man on Wire
WALL-E

Best International Actor
Casey Affleck, Gone Baby Gone
Josh Brolin, W.
* Robert Downey Jr, Iron Man
Ralph Fiennes, The Duchess

Best International Actress Award – People’s Choice
Angelina Jolie, Changeling
Kristin Scott Thomas, I’ve Loved You So Long
* Meryl Streep, Mamma Mia!
Emma Thompson, Brideshead Revisited

CRAFT / TECHNICAL CATEGORIES (FILM/TV)

Best Costume Design
* Joan Bergin, The Tudors
Driscoll Calder, 32A –
Eimer Ní Mhaoldomhnaigh, Brideshead Revisited
Leonie Prendergast, Kisses

Best Director of Photography
Seamus Deasy, A Film With Me In It
* PJ Dillon, 32A
Owen McPolin, Little Dorrit
Fergal O’Hanlon, Anton

Best Editing
* J. Patrick Duffner, Kisses
Shane Sutton, Fight or Flight
Ben Yeates, Raw
Gareth Young, Eden

Best Make Up & Hair
Eileen Buggy & Morna Ferguson, George Gently
Joni Galvin & Muriel Bell, Dorothy
Liz Byrne, Kisses
* Sharon Doyle & Dee Corcoran, The Tudors

Best Original Score
David Holmes, Cherrybomb
* David Holmes, Hunger
Stephen McKeon, Niko & The Way To The Stars
Anna Rice, Anton

Best Production Design
Tom Conroy, The Tudors
John Paul Kelly, The Other Boleyn Girl
* Tom McCullagh, Hunger
David Wilson, Dorothy

Best Sound
Brendan Deasy, A Film With Me In It
* Ronan Hill & Mervyn Moore, Hunger
John Fitzgerald, Patrick Drummond & Caoimhe Doyle, Niko and the Way to the Stars
Paul Maynes, Niall Brady & Garret Farrell, Waveriders

Rising Star Award
Sarah Bolger
* Michael Fassbender
Lance Daly
Enda Walsh

Industry Lifetime Contribution Award: documentary filmmaker George Morrison

Cinema Audio Society Awards (partial list)

2009 Cinema Audio Society nominations: Jan. 8. Cinema Audio Society winners: Feb. 14.

Motion Pictures
The Dark Knight
Iron Man
Quantum Of Solace
* Slumdog Millionaire
WALL-E

Television Movies and Mini-Series
Generation Kill, Episode 5: “A Burning Dog”
* John Adams, Episode 1: “Join or Die”
John Adams, Episode 2: “Independence”
John Adams, Episode 3: “Don’t Tread on Me”
Recount

Television Series
* 24: “Redemption”
Dexter: Episode 5: “Turning Biminese”
House: Last Resort
Lost: “Meet Kevin Johnson”
Mad Men: “The Jet Set”

CAS Filmmaker Award Honoree: Paul Mazursky

CAS Career Achievement Award Honoree: Dennis Maitland, CAS

South American cinema – once again – performed quite well at the Berlin Film Festival, which came to a close on Sunday, Feb. 15.

The Golden Bear for best picture went to La Teta Asustada / The Milk of Sorrow (the Spanish title would actually translate as “The Frightened Tit”), the first Peruvian production – actually a Spanish-Peruvian-Chilean co-production, made with the assistance of the Berlinale’s own World Cinema Fund – in the festival’s main competition.

Directed by Claudia Llosa (niece of writer Mario Vargas Llosa), The Milk of Sorrow tells the story of a young housemaid (Magaly Solier) born as a result of her mother’s rape during the years the Sendero Luminoso and government-sponsored paramilitary groups roamed the Peruvian countryside. While being breast-fed as a baby, the young woman had inherited her mother’s pains and fears; now, as an adult, she must find a way out of her gloom.

Adrián Biniez’s Uruguayan-Argentinian-German co-production Gigante won three awards: it shared both the Jury’s Grand Prix (with Maren Ade’s German drama Alle Anderen / Everyone Else) and the Alfred Bauer prize (with Andrzej Wajda’s Tatarak / Sweet Rush), and took the award for first film. Set in Montevideo, Gigante follows a burly supermarket guard (Horacio Camandule) who uses his many security cameras to spy on one of the employees with whom he’s in obsessively in love.

Also from the Western Hemisphere, Mexican filmmaker Julián Hernández’s 190-minute mystical-romantic drama Rabioso Sol, Rabioso Cielo / Raging Sun, Raging Sky earned the director his second Teddy Award for best film with a gay theme. Hernández had previously won in 2003, for A Thousand Clouds.

Other top Berlin winners were best director Asghar Farhadi for the Iranian psychological drama About Elly, the tale of a family vacation gone awry; best actor Sotigui Kouyate, playing a bereaved father who lost his son in the 2005 London bombings in Rachid Bouchareb’s London River; and best actress Birgit Minichmayr (above, with Lars Eidinger) as a woman unsure about both her future and her relationship with her boyfriend (Eidinger) in Everyone Else.

Also, best screenplay winners Oren Moverman and Alessandro Camon for the military drama The Messenger; and Alfred Bauer Prize co-winner Sweet Rush (above), a post-World War II story about the relationship between a terminally ill middle-aged woman (Wajda veteran Krystyna Janda) and a younger man (Pawel Szajda).

Last year, José Padilha’s controversial Brazilian slum-crime drama The Elite Troop, took the Golden Bear.

2009 Berlin Film Festival Awards

2009 Berlin Film Festival: Feb. 5–15.

2009 Berlin Film Festival: Competition Line-Up

Golden Bear for Best Film: La teta asustada / The Milk of Sorrow (Peru) by Claudia Llosa

Grand Jury Prize (tie): Alle Anderen / Everyone Else (Germany) by Maren Ade and Gigante (Uruguay / Argentina) by Adrián Biniez

Best Director: Asghar Farhadi for About Elly (Iran)

Best Actor: Sotigui Kouyate for London River by Rachid Bouchareb

Best Actress: Birgit Minichmayr for Everyone Else

Silver Bear – Best Screenplay: Oren Moverman and Alessandro Camon for The Messenger by Oren Moverman

Silver Bear – Outstanding Artistic Contribution: Gábor Erdély and Tamás Székely for the Sound Design of Katalin Varga by Peter Strickland

Alfred Bauer Prize: Gigante (Argentina) by Adrián Biniez and Tatarak (Sweet Rush) by Andrzej Wajda

Honorary Golden Bear: Maurice Jarre

Berlinale Camera: Claude Chabrol, Günter Rohrbach, Manoel de Oliveira

Best First Feature Award: Gigante by Adrián Biniez

Special Mention: Flickan (The Girl) by Fredrik Edfeldt

Short Films

Golden Bear: Please Say Something by David O’Reilly (Ireland)

Silver Bear: Jade by Daniel Elliott (Great Britain)

DAAD Short Film Prize: The Illusion by Susana Barriga (Cuba)

Berlinale Short Film Nominee for the European Film Awards 2009: Die Leiden des Herrn Karpf. Der Geburtstag by Lola Randl (Germany)

Special Mentions: VU by Leila Albayaty and contre-jour by Christoph Girardet and Matthias Müller

Generation Kplus Children

Crystal Bear for the Best Feature Film: C’est pas moi, je le jure! (It’s Not Me, I Swear!) by Philippe Falardeau

Special Mention for a Feature Film: Max Pinlig (Max Embarrassing) by Lotte Svendsen

Crystal Bear for the Best Short Film: Ulybka Buddy (Buddha’s smile) by Bair Dyshenov

Special Mention for a Short Film: Oh, My God! by Anne Sewitsky

Generation 14plus Youth

Crystal Bear for the best feature: My Suicide by David Lee Miller

Special Mention: Mary and Max by Adam Elliot

Crystal Bear for the best short film: Aphrodite’s Farm by Adam Strange

Special Mention: Slavar by David Aronowitsch and Hanna Heilborn

Generation Kplus

Grand Prix for the best feature: C’est pas moi, je le jure! (It’s Not Me, I Swear!) by Philippe Falardeau

Special Mention: Flickan (The Girl) by Fredrik Edfeldt

Special Prize for Best Short Film: Oh, My God! by Anne Sewitsky

Special Mention: Jerrycan by Julius Avery

Prizes of the Ecumenical Jury

Competition: Lille Soldat by Annette K. Ohleson

Special Mention: London River by Rachid Bouchareb and My One And Only by Richard Loncraine

Panorama: Welcome by Philippe Lioret

Forum: Treeless Mountain by So Yong Kim

FIPRESCI Prizes

Competition: La teta asustada (The Milk Of Sorrow) by Claudia Llosa

Panorama: Nord (North) by Rune Denstad Langlo

Forum: Ai no mukidashi (Love Exposure) by Sono Sion

Prize of the Guild of German Art House Cinemas: Storm by Hans-Christian Schmid

C.I.C.A.E Prizes

Panorama: Ander by Roberto Castón

Forum: Cea mai fericita fata din lume (The Happiest Girl in the World) by Radu Jude

Teddy Awards

Feature: Rabioso sol, rabioso cielo (Raging Sun, Raging Sky) by Julián Hernández

Documentary: Fig Trees by John Greyson

Short: A Horse Is Not A Metaphor by Barbara Hammer

Dialogue en perspective: Gitti by Anna Deutsch

Special Mention: Polar by Michael Koch

Actor’s Award: Franziska Petri in Für Miriam (For Miriam) by Lars-Gunnar Lotz and Jacob Matschenz in Fliegen (Fly) by Piotr J. Lewandowski

Caligari Film Prize: Ai no mukidashi (Love Exposure) by Sono Sion

NETPAC Prize (tie): Ma dai fu de zhen suo (Doctor Ma’s Country Clinic) by Cong Feng and Eoddeon gaien nal (The Day After) by Lee Suk-Gyung

Peace Film Award: The Messenger by Oren Moverman

Amnesty International Film Prize: Storm by Hans-Christian Schmid

Femina Film Prize: Silke Fischer for production design in Alle Anderen (Everyone else) by Maren Ade

Label Europa Cinemas Prizes (tie): Nord (North) by Rune Denstad Langlo and Welcome by Philippe Lioret

READERS JURIES AND AUDIENCE AWARDS

Panorama Audience Award: The Yes Men Fix The World by Mike Bonanno, Andy Bichlbaum, Kurt Engfehr

Berliner Morgenpost Readers’ Prize: Storm by Hans-Christian Schmid

ELSE Siegessäule Reader’s Choice Award: City Of Borders by Yun Suh

Tagesspiegel Readers’ Prize: Hayat var (My Only Sunshine) by Reha Erdem

Volkswagen Score Competition Award: Atanas Valkov

Berlin Today Award: Supriyo Sen for Wagah

Golden Bear Jury: British actress Tilda Swinton (president), Hong Kong-born filmmaker Wayne Wang, Spanish filmmaker Isabel Coixet, German film, theater and opera director Christoph Schlingensief, and American food activist and author Alice Waters, film director and educator Gaston Kabore of Burkina Faso, Swedish author Henning Mankell

Berlin Film Festival Site

Orange British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) Awards

2009 BAFTA award winners: Feb. 8.

BAFTA Awards 2009 Longlists

It’s Hollywood on the Thames. Notice the absence of talent involved in small British films, including Mike Leigh and Sally Hawkins, both of whom have been honored in the United States. (In fact, Happy-Go-Lucky received no nominations, though Mamma Mia! can be found among the top five British films.)

Meanwhile, Brad Pitt got two nominations, one of which for Burn After Reading.

Viola Davis in the running for Doubt? No, Amy Adams.

Gus Van Sant, whose Milk is a Best Picture nominee, in the running for best director? No, let’s get a real director-star: Clint Eastwood for Changeling.

It’s amazing that British Academy voters – are they handpicked by Hollywood studios? – didn’t find room for George Clooney, Tom Cruise, Ben Stiller, and Jennifer Aniston as well. Perhaps next year.

And people still single out the Hollywood Foreign Press Association as a can’t-take-them-seriously star-struck group.

In fact, Bafta chair David Parfitt is one of those people. Defending Sally Hawkins’ snub in spite of her Golden Globe win, he told The Independent that “the Globes are chosen by a bunch of foreign hacks, and there’s only around 50 of them. We are 6,000 industry professionals.”

Yet a look at both the Globe and the Bafta nominations clearly shows that the dozens of “foreign hacks” and the thousands of “industry professionals” have a lot more in common than Parfitt would have us believe.

BEST FILM
THE CURIOUS CASE OF BENJAMIN BUTTON – Kathleen Kennedy, Frank Marshall, Ceán Chaffin
FROST/NIXON – Tim Bevan, Eric Fellner, Brian Grazer, Ron Howard
MILK – Dan Jinks, Bruce Cohen
THE READER – Anthony Minghella, Sydney Pollack, Donna Gigliotti, Redmond Morris
* SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE – Christian Colson

OUTSTANDING BRITISH FILM
HUNGER – Laura Hastings-Smith, Robin Gutch, Steve McQueen, Enda Walsh
IN BRUGES – Graham Broadbent, Pete Czernin, Martin McDonagh
MAMMA MIA! – Judy Craymer, Gary Goetzman, Phyllida Lloyd, Catherine Johnson
* MAN ON WIRE – Simon Chinn, James Marsh
SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE – Christian Colson, Danny Boyle, Simon Beaufoy

FILM NOT IN THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE
THE BAADER MEINHOF COMPLEX – Bernard Eichinger, Uli Edel
GOMORRAH – Domenico Procacci, Matteo Garrone
* I’VE LOVED YOU SO LONG – Yves Marmion, Philippe Claudel
PERSEPOLIS – Marc-Antoine Robert, Xavier Rigault, Marjane Satrapi, Vincent Parannaud
WALTZ WITH BASHIR – Serge Lalou, Gerhard Meixner, Yael Nahl Ieli, Ari Folman

ANIMATED FILM
PERSEPOLIS – Marjane Satrapi, Vincent Parannaud
* WALL-E – Andrew Stanton
WALTZ WITH BASHIR – Ari Folman

DIRECTOR
CHANGELING – Clint Eastwood
THE CURIOUS CASE OF BENJAMIN BUTTON – David Fincher
FROST/NIXON – Ron Howard
THE READER – Stephen Daldry
* SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE – Danny Boyle

LEADING ACTOR
FRANK LANGELLA – Frost/Nixon
DEV PATEL – Slumdog Millionaire
SEAN PENN – Milk
BRAD PITT – The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
* MICKEY ROURKE – The Wrestler

LEADING ACTRESS
ANGELINA JOLIE – Changeling
KRISTIN SCOTT THOMAS – I’ve Loved You So Long
MERYL STREEP – Doubt
* KATE WINSLET – The Reader
KATE WINSLET – Revolutionary Road

SUPPORTING ACTOR
ROBERT DOWNEY JR. – Tropic Thunder
BRENDAN GLEESON – In Bruges
PHILIP SEYMOUR HOFFMAN – Doubt
* HEATH LEDGER – The Dark Knight
BRAD PITT – Burn After Reading

SUPPORTING ACTRESS
AMY ADAMS – Doubt
* PENÉLOPE CRUZ – Vicky Cristina Barcelona
FREIDA PINTO – Slumdog Millionaire
TILDA SWINTON – Burn After Reading
MARISA TOMEI – The Wrestler

ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY
BURN AFTER READING – Joel Coen, Ethan Coen
CHANGELING – J. Michael Straczynski
I’VE LOVED YOU SO LONG – Philippe Claudel
* IN BRUGES – Martin McDonagh
MILK – Dustin Lance Black

ADAPTED SCREENPLAY
THE CURIOUS CASE OF BENJAMIN BUTTON – Eric Roth
FROST/NIXON – Peter Morgan
THE READER – David Hare
REVOLUTIONARY ROAD – Justin Haythe
* SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE – Simon Beaufoy

CINEMATOGRAPHY
CHANGELING – Tom Stern
THE CURIOUS CASE OF BENJAMIN BUTTON – Claudio Miranda
THE DARK KNIGHT – Wally Pfister
THE READER – Chris Menges, Roger Deakins
* SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE – Anthony Dod Mantle

EDITING (six nominations due to a tie)
CHANGELING – Joel Cox, Gary D. Roach
THE CURIOUS CASE OF BENJAMIN BUTTON – Kirk Baxter, Angus Wall
THE DARK KNIGHT – Lee Smith
FROST/NIXON – Mike Hill, Dan Hanley
IN BRUGES – Jon Gregory
* SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE – Chris Dickens

MUSIC
THE CURIOUS CASE OF BENJAMIN BUTTON – Alexandre Desplat
THE DARK KNIGHT – Hans Zimmer, James Newton Howard
MAMMA MIA! – Benny Andersson, Björn Ulvaeus
* SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE – A. R. Rahman
WALL•E – Thomas Newman

PRODUCTION DESIGN
CHANGELING – James J. Murakami, Gary Fettis
* THE CURIOUS CASE OF BENJAMIN BUTTON – Donald Graham Burt, Victor J. Zolfo
THE DARK KNIGHT – Nathan Crowley, Peter Lando
REVOLUTIONARY ROAD – Kristi Zea, Debra Schutt
SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE – Mark Digby, Michelle Day

COSTUME DESIGN
CHANGELING – Deborah Hopper
THE CURIOUS CASE OF BENJAMIN BUTTON – Jacqueline West
THE DARK KNIGHT – Lindy Hemming
* THE DUCHESS – Michael O’Connor
REVOLUTIONARY ROAD – Albert Wolsky

SPECIAL VISUAL EFFECTS
* THE CURIOUS CASE OF BENJAMIN BUTTON – Eric Barba, Craig Barron, – Nathan McGuinness, Edson Williams
THE DARK KNIGHT – Chris Corbould, Nick Davis, Paul Franklin, Tim Webber
INDIANA JONES AND THE KINGDOM OF THE CRYSTAL SKULL – Pablo Helman
IRON MAN – Shane Patrick Mahan, John Nelson, Ben Snow
QUANTUM OF SOLACE – Chris Corbould, Kevin Tod Haug

SOUND
CHANGELING – Walt Martin, Alan Robert Murray, John Reitz, Gregg Rudloff
THE DARK KNIGHT – Lora Hirschberg, Richard King, Ed Novick, Gary Rizzo
QUANTUM OF SOLACE – Eddy Joseph, Chris Munro, Mike Prestwood Smith, Mark Taylor
* SLUMDOG MILLIONARE – Glenn Freemantle, Resul Pookutty, Richard Pryke, Tom Sayers, Ian Tapp
WALL•E – Ben Burtt, Tom Myers, Michael Semanick, Matthew Wood

MAKE UP & HAIR
* THE CURIOUS CASE OF BENJAMIN BUTTON – Jean Black, Colleen Callaghan
THE DARK KNIGHT – Peter Robb-King
THE DUCHESS – Daniel Phillips, Jan Archibald
FROST/NIXON – Edouard Henriques, Kim Santantonio
MILK – Steven E. Anderson, Michael White

SHORT ANIMATION
CODSWALLOP – Greg McLeod, Myles McLeod
VARMINTS – Sue Goffe, Marc Craste
* WALLACE & GROMIT: A MATTER OF LOAF AND DEATH – Steve Pegram, Nick Park, Bob Baker

SHORT FILM
KINGSLAND #1 THE DREAMER – Kate Ogborn, Tony Grisoni
LOVE YOU MORE – Adrian Sturges, Sam Taylor-Wood, Patrick Marber
RALPH – Olivier Kaempfer, Alex Winckler
* SEPTEMBER – Stewart le Maréchal, Esther May Campbell
VOYAGES D’AFFAIRES (THE BUSINESS TRIP) – Celine Quideau, Sean Ellis

THE CARL FOREMAN AWARD for Special Achievement by a British Director, Writer or Producer for their First Feature Film
SIMON CHINN (Producer) – Man On Wire
JUDY CRAYMER (Producer) – Mamma Mia!
GARTH JENNINGS (Writer) – Son of Rambow
* STEVE McQUEEN (Director/Writer) – Hunger
SOLON PAPADOPOULOS, ROY BOULTER (Producers) – Of Time And The City

THE ORANGE RISING STAR AWARD
(the winner is chosen by the filmgoing public; to vote, go here)
MICHAEL CERA
* NOEL CLARKE
MICHAEL FASSBENDER
REBECCA HALL
TOBY KEBBELL

OUTSTANDING BRITISH CONTRIBUTION TO CINEMA
PINEWOOD STUDIOS AND SHEPPERTON STUDIOS

ACADEMY FELLOWSHIP
TERRY GILLIAM