European Film Academy reveals one winner and further nominations

On the occasion of the 35th European Film Awards on 10 December in Reykjavik, the European Film Academy is honouring the Italian veteran auteur director Marco Bellocchio with the Award for European Innovative Storytelling for his outstanding mini-series Exterior Night.

The director will be guest of honour at the awards ceremony in Iceland. Furthermore, the Academy announces the nominations for the European Film Awards’ categories European Comedy, European Animated Feature Film and European Short Film.

With Exterior Night, Marco Bellocchio returns to the case of the kidnapping and assassination of former Italian Prime Minister Aldo Moro by the Red Brigades in 1978. Already at the centre of his feature film Goodmorning Night for which he received the FIPRESCI Prize at the 2003 European Film Awards, Bellocchio now dedicates a six-part mini-series to it. Where Goodmorning Night followed one woman at the centre of the kidnapping, EXTERIOR NIGHT takes different outside points of view – Moro’s fellow senior party colleagues, Red Brigade terrorists not in charge of the kidnapping, the Pope at the time, Paul VI, and Moro’s family.

The European Film Academy has introduced this new category in 2020 to reflect the changes in the cinematic landscape and to celebrate the great innovative achievements in European storytelling.

With Marco Bellocchio, the award goes to a filmmaker who has been active and never stopped searching for over 50 years. He premiered in Berlinale competition with AMORE E RABBIA (1969), at the same festival he won the 1991 Silver Bear with LA Condanna. In 2009, he won the Italian David di Donatello as Best Director for Vincere, in 2020 Best Film for Il Traditore. Marco Bellocchio was celebrated with a Career Golden Lion 2011 and an Honorary Golden Palm in 2021. But probably most telling is the fact that he received a Locarno Leopard of Honour in 2015 and six years later was nominated for the Leopard of Tomorrow. Because he truly never stops exploring.

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The European Film Academy also revealed the nominees of the following categories:

European Comedy:

COP SECRET (LEYNILÖGGA) directed by Hannes Þór Halldórsson (Iceland)
THE GOOD BOSS (EL BUEN PATRÓN) directed by Fernando León de Aranoa (Spain)
THE DIVIDE (LA FRACTURE) directed by Catherine Corsini (France)

European Animated Feature Film:

LITTLE NICHOLAS – HAPPY AS CAN BE (LE PETIT NICOLAS – QU’EST-CE QU’ON ATTEND POUR ÊTRE HEUREUX?) directed by Amandine Fredon & Benjamin Massoubre (France, Luxembourg)
MY LOVE AFFAIR WITH MARRIAGE directed by Signe Baumane (Latvia, United States, Luxembourg)
MY NEIGHBORS’ NEIGHBORS (LES VOISINS DE MES VOISINS SONT MES VOISINS) directed by Anne-Laure Daffis & Léo Marchand (France)
NO DOGS OR ITALIANS ALLOWED (INTERDIT AUX CHIENS ET AUX ITALIENS) directed by Alain Ughetto (France, Italy, Belgium, Switzerland, Portugal)
OINK (KNOR) directed by Mascha Halberstad (Netherlands, Belgium)

European Short Film:

GRANNY’S SEXUAL LIFE (BABIČINO SEKSUALNO ŽIVLJENJE) directed by Urška Djukič & Émilie Pigeard (Slovenia, France)
ICE MERCHANTS directed by Joăo Gonzalez (Portugal, France, UK)
LOVE, DAD (MILÝ TATI) directed by Diana Cam Van Nguyen (Czech Republic, Slovakia)
TECHNO, MAMA directed by Saulius Baradinskas (Lithuania)
WILL MY PARENTS COME TO SEE ME directed by Mo Harawe (Austria, Germany, Somalia)