By Lucia Caporalini
This year’s edition of the glitzy Cannes Film Festival came to an end on Saturday night after the Grand Jury, led by French actress Juliette Binoche, chose its winner.
Iranian director Jafar Panahi accepted the festival’s top prize, the Palme d’Or, for his film ‘It Was Just an Accident’.
Panahi’s absurdist feature follows five ex-prisoners who are trying to recognize the prosecutor who tortured them during their time in jail – the captives, however, were blindfolded, so none of them are certain about the keeper’s identity.
The director is no stranger to Cannes – his films ‘The White Balloon’ (1995), ‘Crimson Gold’ (2003), and ‘3 Faces’ (2018) all won prizes at the festival, although this is his first Palme d’Or.
Panahi had previously been arrested in 2010 and condemned to six years in prison by the Iranian government.
He was accused of ‘propaganda against the regime’ and was given a 20-year ban from directing and screenwriting, as well as travelling outside the country.
Accepting the prize, Panahi said: “I think it’s the moment to ask everyone, all the Iranians with opinions different from others, in Iran and throughout the world… I’d like to ask them one thing: put all the problems and differences aside.
“The most important thing is surely our country and the freedom of our country.”
‘A language of unification’
Norwegian director Joachim Trier’s ‘Sentimental Value’ was awarded the Cannes Grand Prix.
The film, starring Swedish legend Stellan Skarsgård and Norwegian actress Renate Reinsve (who also starred in Trier’s previous features ‘The Worst Person in the World’ and ‘Oslo, August 31st’), follows a director’s effort to rebuild his relationship with his estranged daughter by casting her in his new film.
When she refuses, an American actress (Elle Fanning) is cast instead. Chaos ensues.
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The film received an astonishing 19-minute standing ovation after its screening, and was immediately considered as a possible winner of the Palme d’Or.
Receiving the Grand Prix, Trier acknowledged art’s ineffable nature: “I don’t think art is just something you do for purpose or understanding.
“We don’t know why we do it. It’s something I watch my small children do.
“They sing and dance before they can speak. But it’s another language, it could be a language of unification.”
Brazil wins big, newcomer awarded with Best Actress prize
‘Narcos’ actor Wagner Moura won the prize for Best Actor for ‘The Secret Agent’ – Kleber Mendonça Filho’s new feature.
Filho was honored with the award for Best Director.
The film, set in Brazil’s military dictatorship of the 1970s, is already receiving Oscars buzz after the country’s cinematic landscape saw a renaissance in Hollywood.
Earlier this year, Walter Salles’ ‘I’m Still Here’ – set in the same historical setting – won the Oscar for Best International Feature Film and was awarded the Best Screenplay prize at the Venice Film Festival, where it premiered.
Finally, French actress Nadia Melliti won the Best Actress prize for her performance in Hafsia Herzi’s ‘Little Sister’, a coming-of-age queer story set in Paris.
Newcomer Melliti was cast after her talents were recognized during a guerrilla casting in France.
“When I met her, it was really an artistic love at first sight,” Herzi told Vulture.
“It was totally unexpected,” Melliti added.
“I’d never dreamt of being in a film by Hafsia or by any other filmmaker.
“And I consider myself so lucky to be able to participate in such an artistic and talent-playing environment as the one that was created on set,” she explained.
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