Locarno International Film Festival
Encyclopedia
The Film Festival Locarno is an international film festival
held annually in the city of Locarno
, Switzerland
since 1946. After Cannes and Venice and together with Karlovy Vary, Locarno is the Film Festival with the longest history. The main feature of the festival is the open-air screening space in the astonishing Piazza Grande, with room for over 8,000 spectators, and with one of the largest open air screens in the world (26x14 metres).
The top prize of the Festival is the Golden Leopard
awarded to the best film in the international competition. Other awards include the Leopard of Honour
for outstanding career achievements, and the Prix du Public UBS, the public choice award.
The Locarno Film Festival is well known worldwide to be a festival of discovery. Throughout its history the festival has discovered new trends and launched the career of numerous directors and actors. Although the festival aims at the films, rather than at stars and glamour, several well-known personalities of the international film industry have been to the Locarno International Film Festival in recent years. To name just a few: Willem Dafoe
, Terry Gilliam
, Anthony Hopkins
, Aki Kaurismäki
, Abbas Kiarostami
, Mike Leigh
, Ken Loach
, Gregg Araki
, John Malkovich
, Carmen Maura
, Rose McGowan
, Frank Oz
, Michel Piccoli, Robert Rodriguez
, Susan Sarandon
, Christian Slater
, Alexander Sokurov
, Wim Wenders
and Gus Van Sant
.
Chief Operating Officer: Marco Cacciamognaga
Artistic Director: Olivier Père
(Leopard of Honour
) has provided an opportunity to commend illustrious film directors, who embody the very idea of cinema that the Festival has supported so passionately since its inception: the bes of auteuer film, creative and audacious, with a strong vision and a personal style, endlessly reinventing itself. Locarno is proud to number amongst recipients of the Pardo d‘onore such master filmmakers as Jacques Rivette, Manoel de Oliveira
, Samuel Fuller, Bernardo Bertolucci
, Jean-Luc Godard
, Daniel Schmid, Ken Loach, Ermanno Olmi, Terry Gilliam, Abbas Kiarostami, Wim Wenders, Aleksandr Sokurov, Hou Hsiao-Hsien, Amos Gitai
, William Friedkin and, in 2010, Alain Tanner, but also to Jia Zhangke
.
, Willem Dafoe
, Carmen Maura, Michel Piccoli, Toni Servillo
and Chiara Mastroianni
. Sponsored by Moët et Chandon
.
and, in 2011, Mike Medavoy
. The Best Independent Producer Award was established in 2002 in memory of Raimondo Rezzonico, president of the event for almost twenty years. The Prize is offered by th City of Minusio
.
s connections with the film industry and its authority within the sector.
Film festival
A film festival is an organised, extended presentation of films in one or more movie theaters or screening venues, usually in a single locality. More and more often film festivals show part of their films to the public by adding outdoor movie screenings...
held annually in the city of Locarno
Locarno
Locarno is the capital of the Locarno district, located on the northern tip of Lake Maggiore in the Swiss canton of Ticino, close to Ascona at the foot of the Alps. It has a population of about 15,000...
, Switzerland
Switzerland
Switzerland name of one of the Swiss cantons. ; ; ; or ), in its full name the Swiss Confederation , is a federal republic consisting of 26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in Western Europe,Or Central Europe depending on the definition....
since 1946. After Cannes and Venice and together with Karlovy Vary, Locarno is the Film Festival with the longest history. The main feature of the festival is the open-air screening space in the astonishing Piazza Grande, with room for over 8,000 spectators, and with one of the largest open air screens in the world (26x14 metres).
The top prize of the Festival is the Golden Leopard
Golden Leopard
The Golden Leopard is the top prize at the Locarno International Film Festival, an international film festival held annually in Locarno, Switzerland since 1946. Directors in the process of getting an international reputation are allowed to be entered in the competitive selection. The winning films...
awarded to the best film in the international competition. Other awards include the Leopard of Honour
Leopard of Honour
The Leopard of Honour is a life's work achievement award at the Locarno International Film Festival, an international film festival held annually in Locarno, Switzerland. The award has been given out since 1989 with an exception in 2001...
for outstanding career achievements, and the Prix du Public UBS, the public choice award.
The Locarno Film Festival is well known worldwide to be a festival of discovery. Throughout its history the festival has discovered new trends and launched the career of numerous directors and actors. Although the festival aims at the films, rather than at stars and glamour, several well-known personalities of the international film industry have been to the Locarno International Film Festival in recent years. To name just a few: Willem Dafoe
Willem Dafoe
Willem Dafoe is an American film, stage, and voice actor, and a founding member of the experimental theatre company The Wooster Group...
, Terry Gilliam
Terry Gilliam
Terrence Vance "Terry" Gilliam is an American-born British screenwriter, film director, animator, actor and member of the Monty Python comedy troupe. Gilliam is also known for directing several films, including Brazil , The Adventures of Baron Munchausen , The Fisher King , and 12 Monkeys...
, Anthony Hopkins
Anthony Hopkins
Sir Philip Anthony Hopkins, KBE , best known as Anthony Hopkins, is a Welsh actor of film, stage and television...
, Aki Kaurismäki
Aki Kaurismäki
-Career:After studying Media Studies at the University of Tampere, Aki Kaurismäki started his career as a co-director in the films of his elder brother Mika Kaurismäki. His debut as an independent director was Crime and Punishment , Dostoyevsky's famous crime story set in modern-day Helsinki...
, Abbas Kiarostami
Abbas Kiarostami
Abbas Kiarostami is an internationally acclaimed Iranian film director, screenwriter, photographer and film producer. An active filmmaker since 1970, Kiarostami has been involved in over forty films, including shorts and documentaries...
, Mike Leigh
Mike Leigh
Michael "Mike" Leigh, OBE is a British writer and director of film and theatre. He studied theatre at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, and studied further at the Camberwell School of Art and the Central School of Art and Design. He began as a theatre director and playwright in the mid 1960s...
, Ken Loach
Ken Loach
Kenneth "Ken" Loach is a Palme D'Or winning English film and television director.He is known for his naturalistic, social realist directing style and for his socialist beliefs, which are evident in his film treatment of social issues such as homelessness , labour rights and child abuse at the...
, Gregg Araki
Gregg Araki
Gregg Araki is an American independent filmmaker. He is involved in New Queer Cinema.-Early life:Araki was born in Los Angeles but grew up in Santa Barbara, California...
, John Malkovich
John Malkovich
John Gavin Malkovich is an American actor, producer, director and fashion designer with his label Technobohemian. Over the last 25 years of his career, Malkovich has appeared in more than 70 motion pictures. For his roles in Places in the Heart and In the Line of Fire, he received Academy Award...
, Carmen Maura
Carmen Maura
Carmen García Maura is a Spanish actress. In a career that has spanned six decades, Maura is best known for her collaborations with noted Spanish film director Pedro Almodóvar.-Early life:...
, Rose McGowan
Rose McGowan
Rose Arianna McGowan is an actress and singer. She is known for her role as Paige Matthews in The WB Television Network supernatural drama series Charmed. She played Ann-Margret alongside Jonathan Rhys Meyers as Elvis Presley in the CBS mini-series Elvis...
, Frank Oz
Frank Oz
Frank Oz is a British-born American film director, actor, voice actor and puppeteer who is known for creating and performing the characters Miss Piggy and Fozzie Bear in The Muppet Show, Cookie Monster, Bert and Grover in Sesame Street, and for directing films, including the 1986 Little Shop of...
, Michel Piccoli, Robert Rodriguez
Robert Rodriguez
Robert Anthony Rodríguez is an American film director, screenwriter, producer, cinematographer, editor and musician. He shoots and produces many of his films in his native Texas and Mexico. He has directed such films as Desperado, From Dusk till Dawn, The Faculty, Spy Kids, Sin City, Planet...
, Susan Sarandon
Susan Sarandon
Susan Sarandon is an American actress. She has worked in films and television since 1969, and won an Academy Award for Best Actress for her performance in the 1995 film Dead Man Walking. She had also been nominated for the award for four films before that and has received other recognition for her...
, Christian Slater
Christian Slater
Christian Michael Leonard Slater is an American actor. He made his film debut with a small role in The Postman Always Rings Twice before playing a leading role in the 1985 film The Legend of Billie Jean...
, Alexander Sokurov
Alexander Sokurov
Alexander Nikolayevich Sokurov is a Russian filmmaker. His most significant works include a semi-documentary, Russian Ark , filmed in a single unedited shot, and Faust , which was honoured with the Golden Lion, the highest prize for the best film at the Venice Film Festival.- Life and work...
, Wim Wenders
Wim Wenders
Ernst Wilhelm "Wim" Wenders is a German film director, playwright, author, photographer and producer.-Early life:Wenders was born in Düsseldorf. He graduated from high school in Oberhausen in the Ruhr area. He then studied medicine and philosophy in Freiburg and Düsseldorf...
and Gus Van Sant
Gus Van Sant
Gus Green Van Sant, Jr. is an American director, screenwriter, painter, photographer, musician, and author. He is a two time nominee of the Academy Award for Best Director for his 1997 film Good Will Hunting and his 2008 film Milk, both of which were also nominated for Best Picture, and won the...
.
Management and Direction
President: Marco SolariChief Operating Officer: Marco Cacciamognaga
Artistic Director: Olivier Père
Olivier Père
Born in 1971 in Marseilles, a French national, Olivier Père graduated with a degree in Humanities at the University of Sorbonne .He joined the French Cinémathèque in 1995, and soon became in charge of the programme, organizing numerous retrospectives and thematic seasons...
Concorso internazionale (international competition) Awards
- Pardo d'oro (Golden LeopardGolden LeopardThe Golden Leopard is the top prize at the Locarno International Film Festival, an international film festival held annually in Locarno, Switzerland since 1946. Directors in the process of getting an international reputation are allowed to be entered in the competitive selection. The winning films...
) - Festival Grand Prize from the City and Region of LocarnoLocarnoLocarno is the capital of the Locarno district, located on the northern tip of Lake Maggiore in the Swiss canton of Ticino, close to Ascona at the foot of the Alps. It has a population of about 15,000...
, for the best film in the Concorso internazionale (international Competition), that is shared equally between the director and the producer. - Special Jury Prize from the Cities of AsconaAsconaAscona is a municipality in the district of Locarno in the canton of Ticino in Switzerland.It is located on the shore of Lake Maggiore.The town is a popular tourist destination, and holds a yearly jazz festival, the Ascona Jazz Festival....
and LosoneLosoneLosone is a municipality in the district of Locarno in the canton of Ticino in Switzerland.-History:The peat bogs of Arcegno, the rock shelters of Quarigo and the rock carvings in soapstone and gneiss appear to confirm that Losone has been inhabited since the Neolithic period. In 1934 and again in...
, for the second best film in the COncorso internationale (International Competition), that is shared equally between the director and the producer. - Leopard for the Best Direction - Prize from the City and Region of Locarno, for the best directed film in the Concorso internazionale (International COmpetition), that is shared equally between the director and the producer.
- Leopard for the Best Actress
- Leopard for the best Actor
Concorso Cineasti del Presente (Filmmakers of the present) Awards
- Pardo d'oro Cineasti del presente - George Foundation Prize: awarded to the best film of this competition which is dedicated to first or second features
- CINÉ CINÉMA Special Jury Prize - Cineasti del presente: the French television channel CINÉCINÉMA offers the broadcast rights to the winning film and guarantees the broadcast on their channel.
Pardo per la Migliore Opera prima
Pardo per la Migliore Opera prima (Leopard for the Best First Feature), Prize on the City and Region of Locarno, that is shared equally between the director and the producer, for the best first film screened in the Concorso internazionale, the Concorso CIneasti del presente and the Piazza Grande sectionPardi di domani (Leopards of tomorrow) Awards
- Pardino d‘oro for the Best International Short Film - SRG SSR Pize: awarded to the best short film in the International Short Film Competition Pardi di domani.
- Pardino d‘oro for the Best Swiss Short Film - Swiss Life Prize: awarded to the best short film in the National Short Film Competition Pardi di domani.
- Pardino d‘argento (Silver Pardino: offered by Swiss Life. THe prize is to be shared by a Swiss film and a film of the International Competition Pardi di domani.
- Locarno short film nominee for the European Film Awards - Pianifica Prize goes to a short film made by a European director, presented in one of the two competitions. The Award incluedes an automatic nomination in the short film category of the European Film Awards. Offered by the Studio Pianifica.
- Action Light Prize for Best Swiss Newcomer: provides equipment offered Action Light, Avant-première, EgliFilm, Film Demnächst, Kodak, Sound Design Studio, Swiss Effects, Taurus Studio, Titra Film and YAK Film.
- Film and Video Subtitling Prize sponsored by the subtitling company Film und Video Untertitelung Gerhard Lehmann AG. The winning will be subtitled in three central European languages. This subtitling can be inserted on film, video or DVD format.
- The "Cinema e Gioventù" Jury Prizes - Pardi di domani: offered by the Departement for Education, Culture and Sport of Canton Ticino (DECS). Prices are to be shared by a Swiss film and a film of the International Short Film Compteition presented in the Pardi di domani (Leopards of Tomorrow).
Pardo d'onore Swisscom
For some 20 years now, the Pardo d‘onore SwisscomSwisscom
Swisscom AG is a major telecommunications provider in Switzerland. Along with Swiss Post, it is a successor company to the former state-owned PTT. Its headquarters are located at Worblaufen near Bern...
(Leopard of Honour
Leopard of Honour
The Leopard of Honour is a life's work achievement award at the Locarno International Film Festival, an international film festival held annually in Locarno, Switzerland. The award has been given out since 1989 with an exception in 2001...
) has provided an opportunity to commend illustrious film directors, who embody the very idea of cinema that the Festival has supported so passionately since its inception: the bes of auteuer film, creative and audacious, with a strong vision and a personal style, endlessly reinventing itself. Locarno is proud to number amongst recipients of the Pardo d‘onore such master filmmakers as Jacques Rivette, Manoel de Oliveira
Manoel de Oliveira
Manoel Cândido Pinto de Oliveira, GCSE is a Portuguese film director born in Cedofeita, Porto. He began working on films in the late 1920s, but did not receive international recognition until the early 1970s. Since the late 1980s he has been one of the most prolific working film directors and...
, Samuel Fuller, Bernardo Bertolucci
Bernardo Bertolucci
Bernardo Bertolucci is an Italian film director and screenwriter, whose films include The Conformist, Last Tango in Paris, 1900, The Last Emperor and The Dreamers...
, Jean-Luc Godard
Jean-Luc Godard
Jean-Luc Godard is a French-Swiss film director, screenwriter and film critic. He is often identified with the 1960s French film movement, French Nouvelle Vague, or "New Wave"....
, Daniel Schmid, Ken Loach, Ermanno Olmi, Terry Gilliam, Abbas Kiarostami, Wim Wenders, Aleksandr Sokurov, Hou Hsiao-Hsien, Amos Gitai
Amos Gitai
Amos Gitai , born 11 October 1950 in Haifa, Israel, is an Israeli filmmaker and director. He is mainly known for making documentaries and experimental / minimalist feature films...
, William Friedkin and, in 2010, Alain Tanner, but also to Jia Zhangke
Jia Zhangke
Jia Zhangke is a Chinese film director. He is generally regarded as a leading figure of the "Sixth Generation" movement of Chinese cinema, a group that also includes such figures as Wang Xiaoshuai and Zhang Yuan....
.
Excellence Award Moët & Chadon
Every year this prestigious award celebrates one or more internationally acclaimed actors or actresses, who, through their work and talent, have enriched the cinema with their unique contribution. Since 2004, the Locarno Festival has been honoured to thus pay tribute to Oleg Menchikov, Susan Sarandon, John MalkovichJohn Malkovich
John Gavin Malkovich is an American actor, producer, director and fashion designer with his label Technobohemian. Over the last 25 years of his career, Malkovich has appeared in more than 70 motion pictures. For his roles in Places in the Heart and In the Line of Fire, he received Academy Award...
, Willem Dafoe
Willem Dafoe
Willem Dafoe is an American film, stage, and voice actor, and a founding member of the experimental theatre company The Wooster Group...
, Carmen Maura, Michel Piccoli, Toni Servillo
Toni Servillo
Toni Servillo; is an award-winning Italian television and film actor and director of theater, opera and film.-Personal life:Servillo was born in Afragola, Campania, the brother of musician Peppe Servillo...
and Chiara Mastroianni
Chiara Mastroianni
Chiara Charlotte Mastroianni is a French actress and singer.-Biography:Mastroianni was born in Paris, the daughter of Catherine Deneuve and Marcello Mastroianni. Her elder half-brother is Christian Vadim; her elder half-sister is Barbara Mastroianni.She had relationships with the actors Benicio...
. Sponsored by Moët et Chandon
Moët et Chandon
Moët & Chandon , or Moët, is a French winery and co-owner of the luxury goods company Moët-Hennessy • Louis Vuitton. Moët et Chandon is one of the world's largest champagne producers and a prominent champagne house. The company holds a Royal Warrant to supply champagne to Elizabeth II...
.
The Best Independent Producer Award - Raimondo Rezzonico Prize
Wishing to highlight a key figure in film, and to salute their courage, their ability to take a risk and support auteurs, with this Award the Locarno Festival has already paid tribute to the work of such renowned producers as Paulo Branco, Ruth Waldburger, Karl Baumgartner, Jeremy Thomas, the French collective Agat Films & Cie, Lita Stantic, Christine Vachon, Martine Marignac, Menahem GolanMenahem Golan
Menahem Golan is an Israeli director and producer. He has produced movies for such stars as Sean Connery, Sylvester Stallone, Chuck Norris, Jean-Claude Van Damme, and Charles Bronson, and was known for a period as a producer of comic book-style movies like Masters of the Universe, Superman IV:...
and, in 2011, Mike Medavoy
Mike Medavoy
Morris Mike Medavoy is an American film producer and executive, co-founder of Orion Pictures , former chairman of TriStar Pictures, former head of production for United Artists and current chairman and CEO of Phoenix Pictures.-Early life and career:Medavoy was born in Shanghai, China in 1941 to...
. The Best Independent Producer Award was established in 2002 in memory of Raimondo Rezzonico, president of the event for almost twenty years. The Prize is offered by th City of Minusio
Minusio
Minusio is a municipality in the district of Locarno in the canton of Ticino in Switzerland.-History:In the Ceresole section, a significant Iron Age necropolis was discovered. It held about 20 graves and rich grave goods. Nearby, several Roman graveyards from the 1st and 2nd Centuries AD, were...
.
Prix du Public UBS
The official jury is not the only one to hand out prizes at the Festival. Every night, the audience in Piazza Grande is on jury service, voting to decide the winner of the ”Prix du public UBS”.Variety Piazza Grande Award
The Variety Piazza Grande Award is awarded by a jury of several of the American paper's critics who will attend Locarno. It will go to a film screeened in the Piazza Grande programme as a world or international première. The prize will recognise a film that stands out for both its artistic qualities and its potential fro theatrical release. This award is intended to assist the international career of a film in selection thank to VarietyVariety (magazine)
Variety is an American weekly entertainment-trade magazine founded in New York City, New York, in 1905 by Sime Silverman. With the rise of the importance of the motion-picture industry, Daily Variety, a daily edition based in Los Angeles, California, was founded by Silverman in 1933. In 1998, the...
s connections with the film industry and its authority within the sector.
External links
- Festival del film Locarno Official Site (in English and Italian)
- Festival del film Locarno at Internet Movie Database
- Olivier Père (Artistic Director) personal blog (in French)