{"id":758270,"date":"2026-07-12T09:13:17","date_gmt":"2026-07-12T09:13:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/758270\/"},"modified":"2026-07-12T09:13:17","modified_gmt":"2026-07-12T09:13:17","slug":"karlovy-vary-2026-film-awards-winners-fruit-gathering-the-guest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/758270\/","title":{"rendered":"Karlovy Vary 2026 Film Awards Winners: ‘Fruit Gathering,’ ‘The Guest’"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tAung Phyoe\u2019s Fruit Gathering<\/a> won the Grand Prix \u2014 Crystal Globe, the top award, at the closing ceremony of the 60th edition<\/a> of the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival<\/a> (KVIFF).<\/p>\n

\n\tThe Special Jury Prize went to\u00a0Mads Mengel\u2019s The Guest<\/a>, starring Trine Dyrholm<\/a>\u00a0(The Girl With the Needle,\u00a0Poison), Simon Bennebjerg (The Pact,\u00a0Promised Land) and Josephine Park (The Nurse,\u00a0Oxen).<\/p>\n

\n\tThe main competition jury lauded Fruit Gathering as \u201ca lush and meditative portrait of work and friendship before morphing, unexpectedly and organically, into a harrowing drama of obsession and queer desire.\u201d It also said that The Guest is \u201ca squirmingly funny yet precisely modulated drama that subtly raises questions about motherhood, filial duty and mental illness.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tMengel also won best director for The Guest, with the jury lauding him \u201cfor giving us a seat at the table with a superb ensemble of actors, orchestrated with great intelligence and tonal assurance.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tThe Hollywood Reporter\u2019s review<\/a> of The Guest noted that \u201cTrine Dyrholm gives a scorcher of a performance in a gutsy Danish party-gone-wrong drama,\u201d also highlighting: \u201cThe most audacious move here may be Mengel and co-screenwriter Christian Bengtson\u2019s choice to write something that will inevitably invite comparisons with\u00a0Festen\u00a0(The Celebration), arguably the most notorious Danish-language film of the last 30 years, which similarly revolved around a bougie gathering disrupted by angry revelations.<\/p>\n

\n\tMeanwhile, the best actress honor went to Anna Schinz for her role in the Swiss social drama A Happy Family<\/a>\u00a0from director Jan-Eric Mack. And the best actor award was bestowed upon Ghassan Saad\u00a0for\u00a0his\u00a0role in\u00a0Lebanese director Karim Kassem\u2019s Pipes. And B\u00e1ra \u2014 Diary of a Rockstar, directed by Helena T\u0159e\u0161t\u00edkov\u00e1, won the Pr\u00e1vo Audience Award.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe\u00a0fifth edition\u00a0of Karlovy Vary\u2019s Proxima competition, which focuses on bold works by young filmmakers and renowned auteurs alike, saw Slovak director Martina Buchelov\u00e1\u2019s\u00a0Lover, Not\u202f\u202fa Fighter crowned the Grand Prix winner, while the Special Jury Prize was awarded to Japanese director Shuntaro Uchida\u2019s Incinerator.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cIn a world of cinema where grandiose ambitions, particularly the masculine kind, are overvalued, this beautiful film arrives tenderly,\u202f gathering the quotidian moments and relationships that make up the substance of life into a film at once thrillingly familiar and original,\u201d the Proxima jury said about Lover, Not\u202f\u202fa Fighter. \u201cThe director understands what it\u2019s like to be young \u2014 she pulls off the Gen Z style without making it gimmicky, a rare feat! \u2014 and that one never stops growing up, change is constant, bringing both wonder and loss.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tAbout Incinerator, the jury said: \u201cHere is a film of deceptive simplicity \u2014 its subtlety and lightness belie layers of poetry and profundity. The director beautifully adopts the perspective of an unusual young girl who says little, but senses\u00a0everything;\u00a0like a Richter scale, her face records the unspoken tensions and tremulations of everyone around her.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tThe best director honor in the Proxima competition went to Efthimis\u00a0Kosemund-Sanidis\u2019\u00a0A Whole Person Almost<\/a>. And a Proxima Special Mention went to Anna and \u0160imon Dom\u010dek\u2019s 33 Steps. <\/p>\n

\n\tMeanwhile, the Grand Prize of the Ecumenical Jury went to Tonia Mishiali\u2019s The Lion at My Back<\/a>. The FIPRESCI prize for the best film in the Crystal Globe Competition was awarded to Ivan Ostrochovsk\u00fd\u2019s Only Beautiful Things to Look at, while the FIPRESCI honor for the best film in the Proxima Competition went to Mate Ugrin\u2019s Petty Thieves<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe double anniversary edition<\/a> of the fest in the Czech spa town, which also celebrated its 80th year in existence, wrapped on Saturday with more star power. Juliette Binoche<\/a> was honored with the KVIFF Crystal Globe Award for her \u201coutstanding artistic contribution to world cinema,\u201d while Jeffrey Wright, who had on Friday met the press, received the President\u2019s Award.<\/p>\n

\n\tKVIFF<\/a>\u00a02026 brought a\u00a0parade of stars<\/a>\u00a0to the picturesque Czech spa town, including Jesse Eisenberg<\/a>\u00a0(The Social Network,\u00a0A Real Pain),\u00a0Kevin Bacon, Kyra Sedgwick<\/a> and son Travis, Maggie Gyllenhaal<\/a>\u00a0(The Bride!,\u00a0The Lost Daughter),\u00a0Harvey Keitel<\/a>\u00a0(Mean Streets,\u00a0Reservoir Dogs), legendary\u00a0cinematographer\u00a0Robert Richardson<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0Dustin Hoffman<\/a>\u00a0(The Graduate,\u00a0Rain Man).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Aung Phyoe\u2019s Fruit Gathering won the Grand Prix \u2014 Crystal Globe, the top award, at the closing ceremony…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":750952,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[88,2091,305967,305968,305969],"class_list":["post-758270","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-entertainment","tag-international","tag-karlovy-vary-international-film-festival","tag-kviff","tag-kviff-2026"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/758270","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=758270"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/758270\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/750952"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=758270"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=758270"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=758270"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}