Turkish drama also picks up Stockholm Film Festival audience award.
Deniz Gamze Ergüven’s Mustang been named the 2015 European Parliament LUX Prize for cinema at a ceremony in Strasbourg this morning. The winner is decided by a ballot of MEPs.
Mustang tells the story of five sisters who have been promised to husbands through forced marriages but who, determined to live their own lives, break the yoke of tradition.
It beat competition from Jonas Carpignano’s Italian immigration drama Mediterranea and Bulgaria-Greek co-pro The Lesson (Urok) by Kristina Grozeva and Petar Valchanov
Martin Schulz, president of the European Parliament, said of the finalists: “These very different films raise fundamental questions.
How must our continent of emigration change in order to evolve into a continent of immigration? What is the role of women in societies on our doorstep? How is the economic crisis undermining our lives together?
“These European films deserve our support and I am proud that the European Parliament is again this year helping to show these films as widely as possible.”
The three films on the shortlist for the LUX Prize are screened in the 28 European Union countries during the LUX Film Days event, from September to December in a bid to highlight the diversity of European cinema and spark discussion about the topics raised in the films.
Mustang’s Stockholm win
Mustang has also won the audience award at the Stockholm International Film Festival.
The film was also awarded with an Aluminium Horse for Best Script, written by Alice Winocour, director of Maryland, and Deniz Gamze Ergüven.
Mustang, which debuted in Directors’ Fortnight at Cannes in May, will be released in Swedish cinemas on March 4, 2016, distributed by Scanbox Entertainment.
Following films received the most votes:
- Mustang
- Wolfpack
- Suffragette
- Carol
- Angry Indian Goddesses
- Virgin Mountain
- Mediterranea
- Me and Earl and the Dying Girl
- Taxi Teheran
- Louder Than Bombs
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