VENICE, Sept 14 \u2014 The Venice Film Festival awarded its top prize on Saturday to a Danish-made drama about a woman trying to hide a wartime relationship with a Nazi \u2014 the only feature film with a female director in the competition.<\/p>\n
Woman Unknown had been a major talking point of the festival due to its subject matter, which has rarely been explored in film, and because director May el-Toukhy was almost alone as a woman director in the event.<\/p>\n
Only one other woman \u2013 Israel\u2019s Rachel Szor, co-director of the chilling documentary NAZA about Israel\u2019s war on Gaza \u2013 was behind the 21 films vying for prizes at the star-studded closing ceremony in Venice.<\/p>\n
\u201cWoman Unknown is about the female body as a battleground and a public matter. And at the same time, the film tells the tale of women who are invisible, unseen and voiceless,\u201d el-Toukhy told the ceremony.<\/p>\n
The head of this year\u2019s jury, American actor-director Maggie Gyllenhaal, had questioned the dearth of women-directed films on the opening day, but she declined to discuss the issue further at a final press conference.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think I\u2019m tired of talking about this same subject over and over,\u201d she said. \u201cI just want to celebrate a brilliantly made movie that I felt was like a laser beam.\u201d<\/p>\n
Other winners\u00a0<\/p>\n
The prize ceremony on Saturday wrapped up 10 days of often dark, disturbing programming that chief organiser Alberto Barbera had promised would echo the war-torn and anxiety-filled state of the world.<\/p>\n
The second-place Silver Lion went to Possible Love, a poignant relationship study by South Korean auteur Lee Chang-dong, which was one of the most highly praised movies of the festival.<\/p>\n
The best director prize went to Russian-born Ilya Khrzhanovsky for his vast, riotous and experimental cinema project DAU that chronicles the life of the troubled father of the Soviet nuclear programme, Lev Landau.<\/p>\n
The over three-hour film began two decades ago and involved 2,000 people, many of them actors who lived for months in character on a full-scale reconstruction of a secret Soviet research institute as Khrzhanovsky filmed.<\/p>\n
\u201cNot everyone believed that the movie will be finished, but I always believed,\u201d he told the audience, while dedicating the prize to the people of Ukraine \u201cwho are fighting in this terrible war for their freedom\u201d.<\/p>\n
The best actor award went to John Malkovich for his role as a jaded CIA agent in dark comedy Wild Horse Nine, which sees him take a break with a colleague on Easter Island in Chile ahead of the 1973 US-backed military coup there.<\/p>\n
Film magazine Variety said Malkovich was \u201cdrumming up awards buzz\u201d and tipped him for a possible first best actor Oscar at the next awards ceremony.<\/p>\n
Best actress was picked up by Denmark\u2019s Mathilde Arcel in her first film role as a bride-to-be who is desperately trying to hide the shame of a past relationship with a Nazi in Woman Unknown.<\/p>\n
The 30-year-old told AFP in Venice she disliked fame and celebrity, but Gyllenhaal tipped her for even greater success.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think she is going to blow our socks off,\u201d Gyllenhaal told reporters.<\/p>\n
Gaza film\u00a0<\/p>\n
NAZA, by Oscar-winning Israeli directors Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor, had been tipped by some critics for the prize for best film after a record-breaking 25-minute ovation at its premiere on Thursday.<\/p>\n
It won a special jury prize instead, an award handed out each year by the jury to recognise an outstanding work.<\/p>\n
In their 80-minute film, Abraham and Szor spoke to 24 different Israeli military or intelligence whistleblowers who outlined the AI-powered targeting systems used to bombard Gaza that have killed tens of thousands of civilians.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Israeli intelligence officers we spoke with talked to us about how this mass killing is systemic: not by accident, but by design, actions of murder and policies that are based on the total dehumanisation of Palestinians,\u201d Abraham told the audience.<\/p>\n
The film was described as an \u201curgent, gut-punch\u201d by film magazine Screen, while The Hollywood Reporter said it inspired \u201coutrage\u201d and \u201cmost certainly disgust, on a profound level, for the current Israeli regime\u201d.<\/p>\n
The Israeli military has criticised the use of anonymous testimonies in the film, saying on Friday the identities of the whistleblowers \u201ccannot be verified\u201d.<\/p>\n
Israel denies deliberately targeting civilians. \u2014 AFP<\/p>\n
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