The Vanishing Soldier wins the top prize at the Haifa Film Festival by Hannah Brown
The movie, The Vanishing Soldier, directed by Dani Rosenberg, was awarded the prize for the Best Israeli Feature Film at the 39th International Film Festival, which just concluded. It was scheduled to continue all day on Saturday, but the organizers announced in the morning that it had already ended, due to the security situation. The prizes were awarded at a festive ceremony at the Hotel Botanica in Haifa on Thursday night.
The Vanishing Soldier, which tells the story of an Israeli in the IDF fighting in Gaza who goes AWOL to Tel Aviv, had its world premiere last summer at the Locarno International Film Festival.
The award for the Best Israeli Debut Feature Film was given to Running on Sand by Adar Shafran. The movie is a comedy-drama about an Eritrean asylum seeker in Tel Aviv who is about to be deported when is mistaken for a Nigerian soccer star. The Anat Pirchi Award for Best Screenplay was also given to Running on Sand, which was written by Yoav Hebel, Sarel Piterman, and Assaf Zelicovich.
The Haifa Cultural Foundation Award for Artistic Achievement in an Israeli Feature Film was given to Debbie Was Here by Dana Goldberg. It tells the story of the life story of a woman who is hospitalized in a psychiatric ward.
The Haifa Cultural Foundation Award for Acting was presented to Yuval Segal for his role in the movie, Haim’s Story, which was directed by Tova Ascher. Segal plays a security guard facing a crisis.
The Tobias Szpancer Award for Best Israeli Documentary Film was awarded to Telling Nonie by Paz Schwartz. It tells the story of an elderly, former Mossad agent who reaches out to the daughter of a man he killed in a targeted assassination in Gaza decades ago.
An Honorable Mention in the competition for Best Israeli Documentary went to My Sister’s Keeper by Sarit Asnapi, which looks at four ultra-Orthodox women who speak out about the issue of sexual assault in their community.
The award for the Best Independent Short Feature Film was awarded to two films, The Dissipation of Clouds by Muhammad Abu Ahmad and Her Name Was Zehava by Tamar Baruch.
The first film is about how a father and son bond after the son gets arrested on a weapons charge, while the second tells the story of a Palestinian transgender woman living in Israel. These films are now eligible to be considered for an Oscar nomination.
The winner of the Carmel International Competition was Ali Ahmadzadeh’s Critical Zone, the story of a lonely drug dealer in Tehran who finds a way to resist the regime. The film was secretly filmed in Iran without official permission. An Honorable Mention in this category was given to The Zone of Interest by Jonathan Glazer, an adaptation of the Martin Amis novel about the commander of Auschwitz and his family, who lived on the grounds.
Kamal Lazraq’s Hounds, the story of a father and son involved in crime in Casablanca, won the Golden Anchor Competition for Debuts.
קבלו עדכונים על סרטים, אירועים, המלצות והטבות. לנרשמים תוענק הטבת הצטרפות!
