Awards I 43rd Cinéma du réel
AWARDED BY THE FEATURE DOCUMENTARY FILM JURY
The Feature Documentary Film Jury comprised the following members: Rémi Bonhomme (Director of the Festival International du Film de Marrakech and Ateliers de l’Atlas), Hassen Ferhani (filmmaker), Juruna Mallon (filmmaker and sound designer), Laetitia Moreau (filmmaker), Yolande Zauberman (filmmaker)
Cinéma du réel Grand Prize
Funded by the Bibliothèque publique d’information (€ 5,000) and the Procirep (€ 3,000), and awarded to one feature film from both International and French Selections
THE INHERITANCE by Ephraim Asili
2020 / United States / 100 min
Laudatum Jury :
For its cinematographic power, its historical relevance to the dark hours of the America of yesterday and today, History writ large with an axe and bombardment, against a backdrop of racial domination… This film is a cinematographic deflagration based on reconstitution, humour and the transmission of sufferings… A film on the story of the vanquished who do not see themselves as victims but as full-fledged actors of the film and of History. A throb of energy to build tomorrow’s World.
La Scam International Award
€5,000 funded by La Scam, is awarded to a feature film from the International Selection
ODORIKO by Yoichiro Okutani
2020 / Japan, United States, France / 114 min
Laudatum Jury :
Odoriko, a film shot with mini DV,
beautiful, delicate, sensual,
about women, the acrobats of love.
The filmmaker reveals the art of these dancers,
their sisterly solidarity,
their magnificent seriousness in preparing their appearance,
their performance,
there, where others would see only vulgarity.
Odoriko, a film for cinema.
Institut Français – Louis Marcorelles Award
€ 5,000 funded by the Institut français and awarded to a mainly French production feature film from both International and French Selections
L’ÉTAT DES LIEUX SERA DRESSÉ À ONZE HEURES EN PRÉSENCE DE LA FEMME DU POÈTE by Martin Verdet
2021 / France / 62 min
Laudatum Jury :
The jury has decided to give the award to a deeply moving film, where the void left by the passing of poet Franck Venaille is filled with the intensity of his words, in a harrowing and sublime dialogue with mental images. A bold, magical and vital cinematic gesture that reveals to us the invisible, has us look death in the face, in order to build a resolutely living memory.
Original Music Award
€ 1,000 funded by the Sacem and awarded to the composer of a film from both International and French Selections
ROCK BOTTOM RISER by Fern Silva
2021 / United States / 70 min
Original Music by Sergei Tcherepnin & Aditional Original Music by Lea Bertucci
Laudatum Jury :
Music becomes a fundamental element in the synesthetic experience of Rock Bottom Riser due to its rich and versatile construction, integrating different kinds of sounds from this insular landscape.
A music that, in addition to re-signifying and revealing the power of the image, frees itself from its musical functions to transform itself into raw material for the film.
A music worth listening to and watching.
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AWARDED BY THE SHORT FILM AND FIRST FILM JURY
The Short Film and First Film jury comprised the following members: Fatma Chérif (filmmaker), Elisabeth Franck-Dumas (critic), Damien Manivel (filmmaker), Catherine Millet (author), Michael Wahrmann (producer, filmmaker)
Loridan-Ivens / Cnap award
Funded by Capi Films (€ 2,500) and the Cnap (€ 4,000), is awarded to a first feature film from both International and French Selections
FEAST by Tim Leyendekker
2021 / Netherlands / 84 min
Laudatum Jury :
The Loridan-Ivens/CNAP Award is given to a debut feature-length film. This year the jury is delighted to award it to a first film that also shows astonishing mastery: Feast by Tim Leyendekker. Through its daring construction, Feast makes it possible to tackle a particularly harrowing news item. The award recognises the courage involved in overcoming difficulty without relinquishing a rigorous formal search.
Special Mention to
Dear Hacker by Alice Lenay
2021 / France / 60 min
Laudatum Jury :
This film drew our attention because of its freshness and unobtrusive audacity. Without any fuss, Alice draws us into a question game which at first seems almost absurd, but which unfolds in a very modern way. She questions the new manifestations of presence via Webcams, and the way in which a person becomes embodied on the screen. The filmmaker talks about “incarnate research”: she is at the centre of her experiment.
Short Film Award
Funded by the Bibliothèque publique d’information (€ 2,500) and awarded to a short film from both International and French Selections
RANDOM PATROL by Yohan Guignard
2021 / France / 30 min
Laudatum Jury :
With a narrative construction worthy of the best short-story writers and a very simple device, Random Patrol explores the figure of the “cop” in American culture by drawing a portrait of one of them. Filmed entirely from the front passenger seat of a police car in Oklahoma, the film sketching out the dull everyday life of the patrol officer. With skilfully simple means, the film successfully points up the fears and neuroses of the profession (and their potentially deadly consequences), at the same time upending the usual expectations of the police series.
Special Mention to
NIGHTVISION by Clara Claus
2021 / France / 37 min
Laudatum Jury :
We unanimously chose to give a special mention to Clara Claus’s Nightvision, a sort of filmed diary that aims to observe with painstaking care reality and its depiction on the screen, in particular, that of the surveillance camera. It creates the precipitate of an ordinary horror film while skilfully questioning the filmmaker’s fears and projections.
Tënk Short Film Award
Funded by Tënk (500 € and acquisition of SVOD broadcasting rights on the platform Tënk) and awarded to a short film from both International and French Selections
UN MAL SOUS SON BRAS by Marie Ward
2021 / France / 16 min
Laudatum Jury :
A cow floats in the sea. A futuristic 3D city is imagined. Important men meet at a sports club. They exercise as if they were dancing. They go behind the fence, into a dark forest, they touch each other, they make love. A storm abruptly disturbs life in a futuristic city on the Middle-East coast. Or was it an explosion?
Through an associative narrative, the film presents a fresh political stance on a post-colonial society full of contradictions. In doing so, it reveals to us the unique and emerging voice of a true author to keep an eye on.
The Tënk Award goes to: Un mal sous son bras by Marie Ward
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AWARDED BY THE YOUNG JURY
This year, the Young Jury–Cinéma du réel comprised the following members: Agathe Arnaud, Pierre Gaudron, Antonius Ghosn, Rose Hirgorom, Antony Labiod, Barbara Perin accompanied by the filmmakerSophie Bredier
Cinéma du réel Young Jury Award
Funded by Ciné+ and awarded to a feature film from both International and French Selections. It guarantees that the film is bought by the channel for €15,000 and broadcast. This sum will be paid to the distributor on condition that the film is theatrically released on French territory in the two coming years and that the distributor provides in advance a release plan.
LES PRIÈRES DE DELPHINE by Rosine Mbakam
2021 / Belgium, Cameroon / 90 min
Laudatum Jury :
This account has reached us and we can no longer say that we did not receive it. Today still, her voice resounds in our heads.
Because the film has a raw and honest power, a deep radicality despite its apparent simplicity.
Because the portrait is moving, true, mysterious.
Because the words spoken are intimate, violent and political.
Because, we have lived through 20 years of life with her.
Special Mention to
TAMING THE GARDEN by Salomé Jashi
2021 / Switzerland, Germany, Georgia / 92 min
Laudatum Jury :
Several of these films sparked debate, which is why we decided to give a special mention.
It is a story of trees, a story that, thanks the power of its mise en scene, shows us the tragic side of uprooting and the domination of man over man, Taming the Garden by Salomé Jashi.
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AWARDED BY THE LIBRARY JURY
This year, the Library Jury comprised the following members: Fabrice Ballery, Guénaelle Slanoski, Christophe Thomas accompagnied by the filmmaker Simone Bitton.
Library Award
Funded by the Direction générale des médias et des industries culturelles of the Ministry of Culture (€ 2,500) and awarded to a film of more than 50 minutes from the International Competition. The awarded film is purchased by the Bibliothèque publique d’information for inclusion in the library’s Catalogue national – Les Yeux Doc
LANDSCAPES OF RESISTANCE by Marta Popivoda
2021 / France, Serbia, Germany / 95 min
Laudatum Jury :
For the tender and relentless way in which the filmmaker creates a bridge between the narrative of her character’s anti-fascist resistance and the current battles of a new generation of women involved in struggles; also for her documentary honesty, for her elegant aesthetic, for her ability to listen, for the evidence of filiation, for the energy and hope that the film inspires in us, we are giving the Library Award to Landscapes of Resistance by Marta Popivoda.
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AWARDED BY THE CULTURAL INTANGIBLE HERITAGE JURY
This year, the Cultural Intangible Heritage Jury comprised the following members: Valérie Perles, Damien Mottier, Thomas Mouzard.
Cultural Intangible Heritage Award
Awarded and funded by the département du Pilotage de la recherche etet de la Politique scientifique de la direction générale des Patrimoines of the Ministry of Culture (€ 2,500) to a film from both International and French Selections
ODORIKO by Yoichiro Okutani
2020 / Japan, United States, France / 114 min
Laudatum Jury :
It is still possible to witness the appearance of an Odoriko – an erotic female character – on the stages of a handful of Japanese striptease theatres that are resisting closure. With this film, Yoichiro Okutani opens for us the door to the backstage and changing rooms, introducing us to the women who are continuing or beginning their Odoriko career. The camera and film crew trio manage to make the artists forget their presence and, on the big screen, we enter into the reality of those who are about to or have just embodied an Odoriko, a dancing female body that stokes desire and inspires wonder. It places us face to face with the transmission of a cultural practice, from the “older sisters” to those with less experience and who are leaning with great respect and humility. Theatre after theatre, placing his camera opposite the stage, in the changing room or sometimes obliquely to the mirrors where the artists are getting ready or reveal themselves indirectly to the filmmaker, the film creates a mise en abîme of the gaze, of representation and revelation. While eroticism is a transgression, what is at work here in this transgression of erotic fiction into reality?
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OTHERS PRIZES
“FIRST WINDOW” AUDIENCE AWARD
One of the films in the First Window section will receive an Audience award, based on the votes of Internet users who saw the films broadcast on Mediapart from 8th to 31st March 2021. This award is funded by the CNC (€2,000), who buys the rights from the author or the production structure for inclusion in the CNC-Images de la culture catalogue.
WADI JHANNAM (La vallée de l’enfer) by Zoé Filloux
2020 / France / 33 min
“COUP DE COEUR” STUDIO ORLANDO
Studio Orlando, partner of the festival, has chosen to support in post-production one of the projects selected at ParisDOC Works-in-Progress.
ICI BRAZZA, by Antoine Boutet (France)
Production : Julie Paratian (Sister Productions)
Laudatum Jury :
Studio Orlando wishes to give its “Coup de coeur” award to the film Ici Brazza by Antoine Boutet for the hypnotic qualities of his shots, the starkness and precision of his framing, the skill of his sound editing choices.
A true and dialectic object about the transformation of the urban landscape, the film aims to show a world that is disappearing – be it pigeons or the homeless – to clear the way for a reputedly desirable eco-responsible city.
ROUTE ONE / DOC AWARD (new prize)
The Route One / DOC Jury comprised the following members: Régis Sauder, Alice Guilbaud, Lev Khvostenko, Eva Markovits, and Guillaume Massart.
This year, the festival has created the Route One/Doc Award, funded by the CNC (€2,000), which signs a contract with the project’s author to buy the rights for its catalogue, CNC-Images de la culture. The award is given to a young graduate who obtained a diploma in 2019 or 2020 and who is working on a first professional film project. The award-winner will be given support to move his or her project forward by Régis Sauder, this year’s sponsor of the award.
MORGANE by Charles Moreau-Boiteau
Laudatum Jury : We were swept away by the highly cinematographic writing of the author, who transported us to the plain of La Crau. He manages to give a very vivid description of his film’s territory, its mystery, its hazy frontiers marked by the Fata Morgana – an optical phenomenon produced by a combination of mirages that blur the horizon. The author travels through these uncertain fringes of the world in search of silhouettes that he can make out in the distance. He shares with us his sensitive and patient method, and gives us an exceedingly generous narrative that introduces us to the characters living there. We have the feeling that the film very aptly falls under the aegis of Robert Kramer, whose sensitivity and gaze we miss. We are happy to have read a project that belongs to this fold and which symbolically takes the route one, with all its promise of narratives. Congratulations to Charles – we are impatient to discover his film.