The Little Room wins biggest Quartz

by Nina Scheu

14/03/2011 - With two top awards going to The Little Room [trailer, film focus], in addition to a win for Cleveland Versus Wall Street [trailer, film focus] in its category, the directors from French-speaking Switzerland claimed first place at the 14th edition of the Swiss Film Prize "Quartz" on March 12.

Stéphanie Chuat and Véronique Reymond, directors of the evening’s biggest winner, The Little Room (Vega Film), won Best Fiction Film and Best Screenplay, while Jean-Stéphane Bron picked up the Quartz for Best Documentary Film for Cleveland Versus Wall Street (Saga Production).

The night’s youngest winner, not yet 19 years old, was Scherwin Amini, who received the Quartz for Best Actor for his performance in Mike Schaerer’s Stationspiraten [trailer]. His counterpart, Isabelle Caillat, was presented the Best Actress award for her leading role in All That Remains [trailer] by Pierre-Adrian Irlé and Valentin Rotelli.

Carla Juri won Best Performance in a Supporting Role for her turn in 180° [trailer].

Best Film Score went to Marcel Vaid for Goodnight Nobody, Best Short Film to Anthony Vouardoux for Yuri Lennon's Landing On Alpha 46 (Oliwood Production) and Best Animation Film to Miramare by Michaela Müller.

Three hundred members of the Swiss Film Academy voted on the nominations and prizewinners. A jury of Academy members appointed by the Swiss Federal Office of Culture (SFOC) selected Gerald Damovsky as the winner of the Special Jury Prize for his production design in Sennentuntschi [trailer].

Special tribute in the form of the Honorary Quartz was paid to Marcel Hoehn, producer of, amongst other titles, Die Schweizermacher (1978), the most successful Swiss film in 40 years.