VPRO Tiger Award winners 2008

IFFR ceremony and announcements of the VPRO Tiger Awards. The winners, from left; Omar Shargawi (director Ma salama Jami, Denmark), Aditya Assarat (director Wonderful Town, Thailand) and Liew Seng Tat (director Flower in the Pocket, Malaysia). Photo: Bram Belloni © 2008 Bram Belloni, all rights reserved.

The main tranche of IFFR 2008 awards was announced Friday evening. The Daily Tiger’s Edward Lawrenson rounds up the beautiful films taking off with the prizes.

Still from Wonderful TownStill from Flower in the PocketStill from Go With Peace Jamil

Tiger Awards
IFFR's 2008 VPRO Tiger Awards, open to fifteen first or second-time features, went to: Wonderful Town, Aditya Assarat’s delicate love story set in a town in the south of Thailand recovering from the Tsunami; Flower in the Pocket, Malaysian director Liew Seng Tat’s touching teen drama; and Go with Peace Jamil, Omar Shargawi’s urban revenge drama set among Copenhagen’s young Muslim community. 

The award includes a cash prize of €15,000, up €5,000 on last year. In a statement released by the five-person jury chaired by Iranian director Jafar Panahi, the jurors praised the winning films.

Wonderful Town was commended for its ‘amazing imaging through the film and a fresh perspective on the disaster of the Tsunami.’ Flower in the Pocket won, the jury continued, ‘because of its well-considered and aware look at the world of children.’ The ‘strong directing and acting work’ of Go With Peace Jamil also impressed the jury.

FIPRESCI Award
The Rotterdam 2008 FIPRESCI Award went to El cielo, la tierra y la lluvia (The Sky, the Earth and the Rain), Chilean director Jose Luis Torres Leiva’s debut fiction feature. Chosen from entries for the VPRO Tiger Awards competition, the film is an atmospheric rural drama revolving around three lonely women in southern Chile.
A statement by the jury of five international critics said: ‘The jury has selected this film for its breathtaking cinematography, combined with subtle sound design that seamlessly integrates and contrasts human beings and nature.’

Dioraphte Award
Awarded to the best of the twenty-two Hubert Bals-supported films playing at IFFR, the Dioraphte Award went to Mutum, Sandra Kogut’s Brazilian drama revolving around a sensitive child protagonist on a remote farm.
Admitting to being ‘very moved’ by the film, the international jury of three said of Mutum: ‘With its condensed emotion and boundless energy, this precisely directed and acted film tells the story of a harsh world with genuine urge. It is uncompromising in its vision and unsentimental in its treatment. Its poetic wholesomeness is evident in the textured details of a remote time and place that are also very close to our hearts.’

NETPAC Award
Established to promote Asian cinema, the NETPAC Award, open to all Asian titles at IFFR, went to What On Earth Have I Done Wrong?!, Taiwanese director Niu Chen-zer’s mockumentary self-portrait.
Explaining their decision, the three-member jury said: ‘It is a début film that has deftly crafted a humorous drama that mocks filmmaking with great sensitivity and arrives at a profound insight into the human condition.’
They also made a Special Mention of Crude Oil, Wang Bing’s documentary about oil refining in the Gobi Desert. ‘Its dispassionate expose of the hardship of human labour which is the basis of economic progress.’

KNF Award
Cargo 200, Alexei Balabanov’s grueling thriller, won the KNF Award, the Association of Dutch Film Critics’ prize for best film in the official selection that hasn’t yet been acquired for Dutch distribution. The award includes a grant for subtitling the film, to boost its distribution prospects.