Friday, October 23, 2009

Rome FIlm Festival Winners


I probably should have started this earlier, but, hey, better now than later, right? That's right, it's time for the Oscar Buzz Ratings (ie: determining which films/performance have just gotten a boost up or down toward Oscar stardom).

Up:
Helen Mirren for Best Actress/Supporting Actress for "The Last Station" (which has secured 2009 release).

Down:
- none

Source: AP

ROME - A Danish movie about a gay love affair between two members of a neo-Nazi group won top honors Friday at the Rome Film Festival, while Helen Mirren won the best actress award.

Mirren won for her depiction of Leo Tolstoy's wife in Michael Hoffman's "The Last Station," while Meryl Streep picked up a career achievement award.

The winning movie, "Brotherhood," takes a hard look at the neo-Nazi group that the leading character, Lars, joins after leaving the army. The group carries out raids on homosexuals, but Lars and his mentor in the group, Jimmy, begin a love affair that they try to keep secret.

"Brotherhood" is the first feature film by Nicolo Donato, a 35-year-old who previously worked as a fashion photographer.

The jury handing out the awards was headed by Oscar-winning director Milos Forman.

The best actor award went to Italy's Sergio Castellitto, who played a single parent and blue-collar worker dreaming that his son will become a boxing champ in the movie "Alza la Testa."

The festival paid homage to Streep through the career award and a retrospective of her work. Her cooking flick "Julie & Julia," in which she plays Julia Child, was shown out of competition and was chosen to close the festival.

At the award ceremony, a black-clad Streep was presented with the career achievement prize by Giuseppe Tornatore, the Italian director who won an Oscar for best foreign film with "Cinema Paradiso."

No comments: