01/27/2022 | Press release | Distributed by Public on 01/27/2022 05:55
As is the case at the beginning of every year, the news is full of stories about nominations and awards given out by the major film academies, and we start to get a picture of which films will dominate the awards season for 2021 films.
Before turning to the 2022 Selection, now is the moment for the Festival de Cannes to look back on the prizes that the 2021 films have already won and to wish the best of luck to all those films in the festivals and ceremonies to come.
Long live the 2020 Selection!
In 2020, while the pandemic made it impossible for the Festival to be held as usual, there was nonetheless a Selection that served to promote these films at various festivals and awards ceremonies. (For more info, see ► The 2020 Official Selection Across the World)
To this day, around a dozen films from this selection continue to distinguish themselves around the world, as can be seen by the recent success at the European Film Awards of Francis Lee's AMMONITE and Steve McQueen's mini-series SMALL AXE, the first two episodes of which - MANGROVE and LOVERS ROCK - featured in the Cannes 2020 Selection. Viggo Mortensen's FALLING and Fernando Trueba's EL OLVIDO QUE SEREMOS (FORGOTTEN WE'LL BE) are nominated for the 2022 Goyas. And Xavier de Lauzanne's 9 JOURS A RAQQA, Samir Guesmi's IBRAHIM and Kamen Kalev's FEBRUARY were all nominated for the 2022 Lumières Awards, where Fanny Liatard and Jérémy Trouilh's GAGARINE (GAGARIN) took home the Lumière Award for Best First Film.
More particularly, Jonas Poher Rasmussen's FLEE, winner of four prizes at the European Film Awards, is in the running for the Oscar for both Best International Feature Film and Best Documentary Feature.
A 2021 Selection that has already won big
In July 2021, the Festival de Cannes returned to the Croisette. This reunion with cinema featured a historically rich and ambitious programme for the Festival's 74th edition. Its films travelled throughout France, Europe and around the world for the occassion of other festivals (notably Deauville, San Sebastian, Sitges and Toronto, where they were particularly appreciated). These films have already won over 230 awards around the world.
Some recent examples include Julia Ducournau's TITANE, Sebastian Meise's GROSSE FREIHEIT (GREAT FREEDOM), Kira Kovalenko's RAZZHIMAYA KULAKI (UNCLENCHING THE FISTS), Eskil Vogt's THE INNOCENTS and Valdimar Jóhansson's LAMB, all of which triumphed in December at the European Film Awards, taking home six awards in total. And on 10 January, Ryusuke Hamaguchi's DRIVE MY CAR, the most decorated film from Cannes 2021, added a Golden Globe for Best Foreign Language Film to its impressive list of honours.
The top 10 most award-winning films from the 2021 Selection
Success in theatres
In the current context, where the film industry has had difficulty recovering from Covid-19 and where theatres have been in difficulty due to restrictions that are still in place, we would like to take this opportunity to congratulate the excellent showings this past autumn of BAC NORD, OSS 117 (FROM AFRICA WITH LOVE) and ALINE (ALINE, THE VOICE OF LOVE), each of which drew over a million spectators in France.
In the US, we have been able to see a "Palme d'or effect" with the record-breaking release of TITANE stateside. On its first weekend, Julia Ducournau's film raked in over 530,000 dollars at the box office, the fourth best debut for a Palme d'or winner in the United states, trailing only Michael Moore's FARHENHEIT 9/11, Quentin Tarantino's PULP FICTION and David Lynch's WILD AT HEART. A week later, TITANE reached the top 10 at the US box office, crossing the threshold of over one million dollars in earnings. An exploit that only three other French productions had ever managed, including Paul Verhoeven's ELLE in 2016 and Céline Sciamma's PORTRAIT DE LA JEUNE FILLE EN FEU (PORTRAIT OF A LADY ON FIRE).
More recently, Marie Amiguet and Vincent Munier's LA PANTHÈRE DES NEIGES (THE VELVET QUEEN), which came out on 15 December 2021, saw 108,251 entries in France in its first week of release, placing it 8th in the country's box office, behind massive American movies like SPIDER MAN and WEST SIDE STORY. Well-earned word of mouth for this maginifenct journey to the Tibetan plateau, which has had 400,000 entries so far.
Acclaim from the critics
As far as the press is concerned, the 2021 Selection won over the American critics. The New York Film Critics Circle chose DRIVE MY CAR as the Best Film of the year and VERDENS VERSTE MENNESKE (THE WORST PERSON IN THE WORLD) as the Best Foreign-Language Film. Two films that also distinguished themselves among the National Society of Critics, which gave four awards to DRIVE MY CAR (Best Film, Best Director, Best Actor for Hidetoshi Nishijima and Best Screenplay), as well as Best Supporting Actor to Anders Danielsen Lie for his performance in VERDENS VERSTE MENNESKE (THE WORST PERSON IN THE WORLD). Finally, Jonas Poher Rasmussen's FLEE, a 2020 Festival de Cannes selection, was named Best Nonfiction Film by theNational Society of Critics.
Among the nominees for the 27th ceremony of the Critics' Choice Awards (the date of which is yet to be announced), we find Wes Anderson's THE FRENCH DISPATCH up for Best Comedy and Best Production Design, FLEE competing for Best Animated Feature and four films that made their worldwide debut at Cannes will be vying for Best Foreign Language Film: GHAHREMAN (A HERO), DRIVE MY CAR, FLEE andVERDENS VERSTE MENNESKE (THE WORST PERSON IN THE WORLD).
At the 27th Lumières Awards ceremony, which took place in Paris on 17 January, the international press acknowledged the year's French productions. Of the 13 awards handed out, nine were won by films from the Cannes 2020 or 2021 Selections. Leos Carax's ANNETTE won three awards: Best Director, Best Cinematography for Caroline Champetier and Best Music for SPARKS, making it the film with the most awards at this edition of the Lumières.
Awards season: the journeys of Cannes films
European Film Awards
The 34th edition of the European Film Awards took place on 11 December 2021. Among the winners were five films from the 2021 Official Selection and three films from 2020, totalling 11 awards.
2021 Selection:
2020 Selection:
Golden Globes
The 79th Golden Globes took place on 10 January 2022.
2021 Selection:
2020 Selection:
Goya awards
The ceremony for the 36th Goya Awards will take place on 12 February 2022. Among the nominees are two films from the 2020 Official Selection.
2020 Selection:
César awards
The 47th César Awards will take place on 25 February 2022. It will be an edition that showcases the films revealed at Cannes, with 68 nominations, compared to 40 last year. Of the 42 feature films nominated, more than half were a part of the 2020 and 2021 Official Selections. In total 23 films will compete in all "feature film" categories of the César Awards.
Another notable fact is that 11 films have more than one nomination. Notably ANNETTE, ALINE (ALINE, THE VOICE OF LOVE) and BAC NORD, all up for the César for Best Film and Best Director, and which - with 11, 10 and 7 nominations, respectively - rank among the top 4 most nominated films this year.
Finally, the 47th César Awards will be the occasion to spotlight talents revealed on the Croisette: GAGARINE (GAGARIN), LA PANTHÈRE DES NEIGES (THE VELVET QUEEN) and SLALOM are all up for the César for Best First Feature Film. And as for the Most Promising Actor and Actress categories, 5 of the 10 nominees saw their careers take off at Cannes. [For more information ► Cannes 2021: Disoveries and Revelations]
2021 Selection:
2020 Selection:
independent Spirit Awards
The ceremony for the 37th Independent Spirit Awards will take place on 7 March 2022. Among the nominees are four films from Cannes 2021 and two from Cannes 2020.
2021 Selection:
2020 Selection:
BAFTA awards
The ceremony for the 75th BAFTA Awards will take place on 13 March 2022.
►Check back on 3 February for the announcement of nominees.
the Oscars
On 27 March 2022, the 94th edition of the Oscars will close out the awards season.
After the success of Palme d'or winner PARASITE by Bong Joon-ho in 2019 (Oscar for Best Film, Best Director, Best International Feature Film and Best Original Screenplay) and Thomas Vinterberg's DRUK (ANOTHER ROUND) in 2020, films from Cannes still have pride of place among the international films presented to the Oscars.
This year, they are historically well represented in the Best International Film category with nine of the 15 films from the Offical Selection still in the running for this high distinction. (For more information ► The Cannes films en route for the 2022 Oscars)
►Check back on 8 February to discover the list of nominated films.