‘Memoir of a Snail,’ ‘Mother Vera’ Win BFI London Film Festival Awards
The 68th edition of the BFI London Film Festival (LFF) is wrapping up Sunday night with Piece by Piece, the animated LEGO biopic of Pharrell Williams by Morgan Neville (Won’t You Be My Neighbor?, 20 Feet From Stardom) following the unveiling of this year’s various competition winners, led by Adam Elliot’s claymation feature Memoir of a Snail.
Set in Australia in the 1970s, the movie, which had already won the animation-focused Annecy Film Festival, stars Succession‘s Sarah Snook as Grace Pudel, a shy girl born with a cleft palate who grows up with her wild and occasionally pyromaniac twin brother Gilbert (Kodi Smit-McPhee) but eventually becomes a lonely hoarder of ornamental snails. Her only friend is a wild octogenarian named Pinky (Jacki Weaver). Eric Bana, Dominique Pinon, and Nick Cave provide supporting voice work. IFC Films has set an Oct. 25 U.S. release date.
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Memoir of a Snail was honored as the best film in the 11-title official competition lineup of the LFF, with the jury lauding it as “a singular achievement in filmmaking,” adding: “Emotionally resonant and constantly surprising, Memoir tackles pertinent issues such as bullying, loneliness and grief head-on, creating a crucial and universal dialogue in a way that only animation can.”
A special jury mention in the main competition went to the Zambian family drama On Becoming a Guinea Fowl by Rungano Nyoni, which had debuted at Cannes.
Mother Vera, directed by Cécile Embleton and Alys Tomlinson, won the LFF Grierson Award in the LFF documentary competition. It is about a young Orthodox nun who must confront her past as she faces her desires and an uncertain future.
The special mention in the doc competition went to Eloise King’s The Shadow Scholars, which shines a light on the multi-billion-dollar global underworld of academic essay writing, “where overqualified yet underemployed young Kenyans write essays for students across the globe.”
Meanwhile, the Sutherland Award in the first feature competition went to Laura Carreira’s On Falling, the portrait of a young Portuguese warehouse employee in Scotland. Tomás Pichardo Espaillat’s Olivia & The Clouds, which blurs the line between memory and reality while exploring a range of animation styles, earned a special mention in the same category.
And Vibrations From Gaza, director Rehab Nazzal’s documentary about Palestinian Deaf children in Gaza, was awarded the best short film honor. The special mention went to the stop-motion animation Dragfox by Lisa Ott, about a child struggling with their identity and a charismatic fox learning to embrace their differences.
Last year, Ryusuke Hamaguchi’s Evil Does Not Exit won the top film award in the main competition, Mike Gustafson’s Paradise Is Burning earned the Sutherland Award in the first feature competition, Bye Bye Tiberias by Lina Soualem won the Grierson Award in the documentary competition, and Simisolaoluwa Akande’s The Archive: Queer Nigerians won the best short film award.
The weekend had gotten off to a tricky start for the LFF. Organizers pulled Undercover: Exposing the Far Right, a documentary directed by Havana Marking (Ashley Madison: Sex, Lies & Cyber Attacks, The Kleptocrats) about far-right activists in the U.K., from the weekend program of the 68th BFI London Film Festival (LFF) at the last minute amid concerns over the safety and wellbeing of staff, security and audience members.
The LFF Audience Awards will be unveiled later in October, with audiences being able to vote for their favorite work, be it fiction, documentary, short, or immersive work. Three awards, namely for best narrative feature, best documentary feature and best short film, will be awarded.
The 68th edition of the LFF screened more than 250 titles, mixing such highlights from this year’s fest circuit as Sean Baker’s Cannes-winning Anora, Jacques Audiard’s Emilia Pérez, Pablo Larraín’s Maria, Mike Leigh’s Hard Truths, Marielle Heller’s Nightbitch, Ali Abbasi’s The Apprentice and Edward Berger’s Conclave, with around 40 world premieres. Its Expanded program this year added video games to immersive installations and experiences.
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