It´s just a few days before the Oscars or the
Academy Awards ceremony which is the most important event worldwide as far as
the film industry is concerned; however, we can´t deny that – these days – cinema plays a very important role in the entertainment
events calendar of different countries. This month also includes a red-letter
day for the Spanish film industry because the Goya Awards ceremony was held last
Saturday but it is also essential for Britain thanks to the Baftas. However,
the event which catches our attention for a longer time is the Berlin film
festival which lasts ten days.
Antonio Banderas was honoured with a Life
Achievement Award at the Goya Awards ceremony.
The poster for the 65th Berlin
International Film Festival.
The world premiere of Fifty Shades of Grey will take place today at the Berlin film
festival. Fifty Shades of Grey is an
adaptation of EL James´ bestselling novel of the same name but it does not
compete for Berlin´s Golden Bear. Irrespective of the critical reviews, this
film has already obtained a great deal of media coverage and its trailer was
named the most viewed of 2014. Nevertheless, the Berlin film festival has also
focused its attention on less commercial films: Andrew Haigh´s 45 Years, Isabel Coixet´s Nobody Wants the Night, Wim Wenders´ Every Thing Will Be Fine or Werner
Herzog´s Queen of the Desert. In
addition to Wenders and Herzog, who are two prominent figures of German
cinema´s establishment, a new generation of German film-makers is represented
by Oliver Hirschbiegel. His Princess Diana biopic Diana was poorly received but Downfall
has been described by a German critic as “the ability to turn history into
entertainment and also into awe-inspiring art.”
Another film-maker who is worth mentioning is Jafar
Panahi. In his third film Taxi, the
Iranian director appears as a taxi driver who drives a number of passengers – a
DVD bootlegger, a schoolteacher and Panahi´s own niece – through the chaotic
streets of Tehran. Jafar Panahi has been arrested in his house since 2010.
Last Sunday –
8th February – the historic Royal Opera House in Covent Garden played host to the BAFTA Film Awards , that is,
the British Academy Film Awards. Among the winners, some very well-known stars
such as Julianne Moore who won the award for her role in Still Alice as best actress
in a leading role; she is also nominated for the Oscar award in the same
category. Boyhood won the awards for best film and best direction and the actress Patricia Arquette won the award for
her role as the supporting actress of
this film. The Theory of Everything
also won three awards: one award for its adapted
screenplay, another one as Best
British Film and the actor Eddie Redmayne won the award for his role as a leading actor in this film. This year, the
British Academy decided to give its annual Bafta fellowship to Mike Leigh, a
veteran director who has been recognised in the same way as Ken Loach, Vanessa
Redgrave or Terry Gilliam were
previously honoured with the Bafta fellowship, an award which was first awarded
in 1971 to Alfred Hitchcock.
The 2015 BAFTA winners.
Have you
watched any of the films which were competing for the awards that I have
mentioned? In what ways does winning an award make a film more appealing to the
public?
