Hungarian director Gábor Reisz’s Explanation For Everything received the Grand Prix and a cash prize of €10,000 at the 24th edition of the New Horizons International Film Festival (18-28 July) in the Polish city of Wroclaw.
Reisz’s third feature film, which is being handled internationally by Films Boutique, premiered at last year’s Venice Film Festival where it won the award for best film in the Orizzonti competition.
It also won a Golden and Silver Hugo Award in Chicago as well as prizes at Les Arcs, Febiofest Bratislava and Uruguay IFF, among others.
The International Competition Jury, which included last year’s Grand Prix winner Rodrigo Moreno (The Deliquents), Polish-born actress Kasia Smutniak, Polish director Jan P. Matuszyński and Berlin-based filmmaker and visual artist Ann Orem, described the film as “a clever treatment to a story exploring polarization in society, starting with present day Hungary yet easily resonating to the world that we all know.”
New Horizons festivalgoers voted for UK writer-director Luna Carmoon’s Hoard, which premiered in Venice’s Critics’ Week sidebar, winning the Grand Prix.
The New Horizons Association, which organises the festival in Wroclaw, has acquired Polish theatrical distribution to Carmoon’s debut feature.
The Zuzanna Jagoda Kolska Award for best film in the festival’s Shortlist section for filmmakers under the age of 30 went to Mariusz Rusiński for Sister of Mine, with the jury praising “the unique combination of subtlety and courage with which the director portrayed a difficult moment in the lives of those closest to him.”
Matuszyński, von Horn and Kocur in Gdynia competition
The titles for this year’s main feature film competition at the 49th Polish Film Festival (23-28 September) in Gdynia were unveiled during the festival week in Wroclaw.
The line-up includes Jan P. Matuszyński’s Minghun and Magnus von Horn’s The Girl With The Needle, which were both shown in New Horizons’ Gala Screenings section, as well as three titles presented during the Polish Days - closed industry screenings of Wieslaw Paluch’s Go Against The Flowand Adrian Panek’s Simona Kossak, and Damian Kocur’s second feature Under The Volcano in the work in progress section.
Other films competing for the Golden and Silver Lions awards are Agnieszka Holland’s Green Border, Malgorzata Szumowska and Michal Englert’s Woman Of.. and Justyna Mytnik’s feature-length debut Wet Monday which had been presented as work in progress at Polish Days in 2023 and is being handled internationally by Reel Suspects.
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