Ozer Kiziltan's Turkish-German production A Man's Fear Of God (Takva) won the Heart of Sarajevo award for the best feature film at the 13th Sarajevo Film Festival (Aug 17-25).
The jury, presided by Jeremy Irons and including Frederic Maire, Ozgu Namal, Andrea Staka and Meinholf Zurhorst, gave the $34,160 (Euros 25,000) prize provided by the local Ministry of Culture and Sport of to the religious drama about a man whose devotion to God is challenged by social and financial success in the modern world that he had been avoiding all his life.
A Man's Fear Of God also took the CICAE prize which consists of support for distribution in its network of 3,000 cinemas.
The Special Jury Award worth $13,665 (Euros) 10,000 went to Macedonian-Slovenian-Belgian-French production I Am From Titov Veles (Jas Sum Od Titov Veles) by Teona Strugar-Mitevska, one of the winners of 2005's CineLink, the festival's co-production market.
Eran Kolirin's Israeli-French The Band's Visit (Bikur Hatizmoret) won the audience award.
Saadet Isil Aksoy from Semih Kaplanoglu's Turkish feature Egg (Yumurta) took the best actress award, while Bosnian Sasa Petrovic was pronounced best actor for his role in the festival's opening film, Srdjan Vuletic's Bosnian-Slovenian-Serbian-German-UK It's Hard To Be Nice (Tesko Je Biti Fin). They received $3,416 (Euros 2,500) each.
A special mention went to Hungarian actress Maria Varga from Csaba Bollok's Iszka's Journey (Iszka Utazasa).
Romanian Adrian Sitaru's The Waves (Valuri) won the best short film award of $4,100 (Euros 3,000) given by the Sarajevo Film Festival. Hungarian director Balint Kenyeres, Frederic Boyer and Bosnian director Namik Kabil who sat on the jury also gave two special mentions: to Hungarian Marton Szirmai's Tripe And Onions (Szalont Do) and Marko Santic's Croatian-Slovenian The Hole (Rupa) with financial prizes of $1,366 (Euros 1,000) each. Santic had won at the 2006 Sarajevo with his previous short Good Luck Nedim (Srecan Put Nedime).
Members of the documentary film jury, Bulgarian director Adela Peeva, Swiss director Stefan Haupt and Bosnian photographer Tarik Samarah awarded Bosnian Namik Kabil's Interrogation (Informativni Razgovor) and the Human Rights Award went to Bulgarian Andrey Paounov's The Mosquito Problem And Other Stories (Problemat S Komarite I Drugi Istorii), winner of this year's Motovun Film Festival's 'A to A' award.
The two films received $4,100 (Euros 3,000) each from the Swiss Federal Department of Foreign Affairs. Special Mention went to Serbian Marko Popovic's Echo (Echo). Croatian Nebojsa Slijepcevic won The European Documentary Network's Talent Grant aimed at providing support to talented documentary directors from the Balkans for In 4 Years (Za 4 Godine).
Steve Buscemi received The Honorary Heart Of Sarajevo Award 'in recognition of the outstanding contribution to the art of cinema and the support to the development of the Sarajevo Film Festival'.
Michelle Ohayon, Croatian director Dalibor Matanic and Nikolai Nikitin gave the UK's Jamie Rafn's Tokyo Jim the UIP prize of $2,733 (Euros 2,000), including automatic nomination for the European Film Awards.
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