Vengeance Is Mine, All Others Pay Cash wins top prize at Locarno Film Festival

Indonesia’s Edwin has received Locarno Film Festival’s top honour, the Golden Leopard, for his latest feature Vengeance Is Mine, All Others Pay Cash, which had its world premiere in the Swiss festival’s International Competition.

The Indonesia-Singapore-Germany co-production – adapted and based on a literary work by Eka Kurniawan – is being handled internationally by The Match Factory.

It is also the first time in Locarno’s 74-year history that the Golden Leopard has gone to a filmmaker from Indonesia.

Accepting the award on behalf of Edwin, who had already returned home to Jakarta and is now in quarantine, one of the film’s producers Muhammad Zaidy said: “We would love to dedicate this to the Southeast Asian cinema, especially during this very hard situation when we are battling in Asia with the pandemic, and we hope this gives a boost of hope for all of us.”

In a video message broadcast at the ceremony, Edwin added: “I hope Southeast Asian cinema is always bringing us a lot of colours and flavours and, most importantly, always dares to speak out against injustice or anything that kills our humanity.”

During the awards ceremony which was held for the first time on a Saturday afternoon (August 14) at the GrandRex cinema, the international jury headed by US director Eliza Hittman presented the Leopard for best direction to veteran filmmaker Abel Ferrara for Zeros And Ones, and the special jury prize to Qiu Jiongjiong for his first fiction feature A New Old Play.

The Leopard for best actress went to Russia’s Anastasiya Krasovskaya for her role in Natalya Kudryashova’s Gerda. The best actor prize went to the real-life plumbers Mohamed Mellali and Valero Escolar for their performances in Neus Ballús’ The Odd-Job Men.

The international jury gave special mentions to The Sacred Spirit and Soul Of A Beast.