Les Misérables triumphs at the Lumières Awards
- With three awards including Best Film, Ladj Ly’s feature debut comes on top, with other winners including Noémie Merlant, Roschdy Zem, Jérémy Clapin and Yolande Zauberman
Handed out by foreign journalists stationed in Paris to the best French and French-speaking films and artists, the 25th Lumières Awards have crowned Les Misérables, which thus receives three more awards in addition to the many others it has received since its Jury Prize win in Cannes: the Lumières award for Best French Film of 2019, the award for Best Script (written by the director together with Giordano Gederlini and Alexis Manenti), and the award for Most Promising Actor (for the latter, who therefore wins two awards to his name). Nominated for the International Feature Film award, the feature was produced by Toufik Ayadi and Christophe Barral for SRAB Films, co-produced by Rectangle Productions and Lyly Films, distributed in France by Le Pacte and sold internationally by Wild Bunch.
Among the very diverse list of winners this year, another film has been particularly successful, receiving two Lumières awards: Portrait of a Lady on Fire [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Céline Sciamma
film profile] by Céline Sciamma, with a win for Noémie Merlant, crowned Best Actress, and for director of photography Claire Mathon, who won in the Best Photography category.
The international press also celebrated Roschdy Zem, who won the Best Actor award (for his charismatic performance in Oh Mercy! [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Arnaud Desplechin
film profile]) and crowned Oscar nominee I Lost My Body [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Jérémy Clapin
film profile] by Jérémy Clapin in the Animation category. Yolande Zauberman’s incredible film M [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile], meanwhile, won the award for Best Documentary. All of these were relatively predictable victories, such as Nina Meurisse winning Most Promising Actress for her performance in Camille [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Boris Lojkine
film profile]. Must less expected were the Best First Film award going to Laure de Clermont-Tonnerre’s The Mustang [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Laure de Clermont-Tonnerre
film profile] and, to a lesser degree, the award for Best Director going to Roman Polanski for An Officer and a Spy [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile] (though technically well-deserved, this decision could have been affected by self-censorship from the members of the Lumières Academy due to the controversy surrounding the filmmaker, which was not ultimately the case).
The full list of award winners:
Best Film
Les Misérables [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Ladj Ly
film profile] - Ladj Ly
Best Director
Roman Polanski -An Officer and a Spy [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile] (France/Italy)
Best Actress
Noémie Merlant – Portrait of a Lady on Fire [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Céline Sciamma
film profile]
Best Actor
Roschdy Zem – Oh Mercy! [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Arnaud Desplechin
film profile]
Best Script
Ladj Ly, Giordano Gederlini and Alexis Manenti - Les Misérables
Best Photography
Claire Mathon – Portrait of a Lady on Fire
Most Promising Actress
Nina Meurisse – Camille [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Boris Lojkine
film profile]
Most Promising Actor
Alexis Manenti - Les Misérables
Best First Film
Nevada [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Laure de Clermont-Tonnerre
film profile] – Laure de Clermont-Tonnerre (France/Belgium/United Kingdom)
Best international Co-Production
It Must Be Heaven [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Elia Suleiman
film profile] – Elia Suleiman (France/Germany/Canada/Turkey/Qatar)
Best Animated Film
I Lost My Body [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Jérémy Clapin
film profile] - Jérémy Clapin
Best Documentary
M [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile] – Yolande Zauberman
Best Music
Alexandre Desplat – Adults in the Room [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Costa-Gavras
film profile] (France/Greece)
(Translated from French)
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