Loveable biggest winner at the Norwegian Amanda Awards

On the evening before the Norwegian International Film Festival in Haugesund officially opened with director Daniel Fahre’s The Battle of Oslo (Blücher), portraying the dramatic events in April 1940 when German warships were closing in on Oslo, the 41st Amanda Awards ceremony took place on Saturday 16 August in Haugesund’s Festiviteten Concert Hall.

Celebrating the previous year’s national film premieres, more exactly from 1 July 2024 to 30 June 2025, the Norwegian Amanda Awards are held annually as part of the Haugesund festival. The ceremony is aired by public broadcaster NRK.

Receiving the Amanda Award for Best Film, as well as Best Actor in a Leading Role to actress Helga Guren, Best Director and Best Screenplay, Loveable (Elskling) by writer/director Lilja Ingolfsdottir won big this year. With its four awards, Ingolfsdottir’s debut feature was the evening’s most-winning film.

Loveable premiered at last year’s Karlovy Vary International Film Festival, where it took five prizes: Winning the Special Jury Prize as well as the Best Actress Award to lead actress Guren, the film received the maximum amount of two awards from the main competition jury, and also won all three non-statutory jury awards. Following Karlovy Vary, the film has won several other international prizes, and has been a huge domestic success with a total audience number of 150,000 in Norwegian cinemas. Loveable is produced by Thomas Robsahm for Nordisk Film Production and Amarcord.

With nods in nine categories, Loveable also had most nominations for this year’s Amanda Awards, followed by Dag Johan Haugerud’s Golden Bear winner Dreams (Drømmer) and Halfdan Ullmann Tøndel’s Caméra d'Or winner Armand, with seven nominations each.

Ullmann Tøndel’s first feature was the evening’s second biggest winner, ending up with three prizes. For her role in Armand, Ellen Dorrit Petersen won Best Actor in a Supporting Role, and the film also took the awards for Best Cinematography (Pål Ulvik Rokseth) and Best Sound Design (Mats Lid Støten). While he is not the only one among this year’s winners who has previously won one or more Amandas, Ulvik Rokseth also won Best Cinematography last year for Handling the Undead (Håndtering av udøde).

Dreams, also known as Dreams (Sex, Love) as part of filmmaker Haugerud’s trilogy, received one award, with Jens Christian Fodstad winning the Amanda for Best Editing. Fodstad is also the editor of the two other films in the trilogy, Sex and Love (Kjærlighet).

Actress Lea Myren won the prize for Best Debut Performance for her lead role as the titular stepsister in Emilie Blichfeldt’s first feature The Ugly Stepsister (Den stygge stesøsteren), which premiered in Sundance’s Midnight section before in went on to the Berlinale’s Panorama programme. The debut/breakthrough Amanda award was introduced last year. At the same time, the now three acting categories were made gender-neutral.

In addition to Myren’s newcomer prize, The Ugly Stepsister won the award for Best Make-up (Thomas Foldberg and Anne Cathrine Sauerberg).

This year’s opening film at CPH:DOX, Tommy Gulliksen’s Facing War (Stoltenberg: Facing War), took the award for Best Documentary. Mikkel Brænne Sandemose’s animated feature The Polar Bear Prince (Kvitebjørn – Østenfor sol og vestenfor måne), based on a beloved fairy tale adapted for the screen by writer Maja Lunde, won the Amanda for Best Children’s Film.

The People’s Amanda, voted on by audiences from six nominated films, went to director John Andreas Andersen’s World War II thriller Nr. 24, which also won Best Visual Effects (Alf Martin Løvvold).

The prize for Best Foreign Language Film went to The Brutalist, directed by Brady Corbet and written by the director together with Norwegian Mona Fastvold.

This year's Honorary Amanda was awarded director Hans Petter Moland, whose credits include Out Stealing Horses (Ut og stjæle hester, 2019), In Order of Disappearance (Kraftidioten, 2014), A Somewhat Gentle Man (En ganske snill mann, 2010), The Beautiful Country (2004), Aberdeen (2000) and Zero Kelvin (Kjærlighetens kjøtere, 1995). The honorary industry award, The Golden Clapper, went to veteran film composers Geir Bøhren and Bent Åserud. At the very first Amanda Awards in 1985, the duo won the prize for Best Original Score for director Ola Solum’s action-thriller Orion’s Belt (Orions belte), which marked their breakthrough as film composers.

Full list of Amanda awards 2025:

Best Film: Loveable (Director: Lilja Ingolfsdottir, producer: Thomas Robsahm)
Best Director: Lilja Ingolfsdottir for Loveable
Best Actor in a Leading Role: Helga Guren for Loveable
Best Actor in a Supporting Role: Ellen Dorrit Petersen for Armand
Best Debut Performance: Lea Myren for The Ugly Stepsister
Best Documentary: Facing War (Director: Tommy Gulliksen, producers: Anne Marte Blindheim and Danielle Turkov Wilson)
Best Children’s Film: The Polar Bear Prince (Director Mikkel Brænne Sandemose, producer Cornelia Boysen)
Best Short Film: Mercy (Nåde) (Director: Hedda Mjøen, producers: Oda Kruse and Stian Skjelstad)
Best Foreign Language Film: The Brutalist (Director: Brady Corbet, distributor: UIP Norway)
Best Screenplay: Lilja Ingolfsdottir for Loveable
Best Cinematography: Pål Ulvik Rokseth for Armand
Best Editing: Jens Christian Fodstad for Dreams
Best Sound Design: Mats Lid Støten for Armand
Best Original Score: Thomas Dybdahl for Everything Must Go (Alt skal bort)
Best Costume Design: Karen Fabritius Gram og Ingjerd Meland for Quisling: The Final Days (Quislings siste dager))
Best Make-up Design: Thomas Foldberg and Anne Cathrine Sauerberg for The Ugly Stepsister
Best Production Design/Scenography: Kate Van Der Merwe for Safe House (Før mørket)
Best Visual Effects: Alf Martin Løvvold for Nr. 24
The People’s Amanda: Nr. 24 (Director: John Andreas Andersen, producers Espen Horn, Kristian Strand Sinkerud, Terje Strømstad and John M. Jacobsen)
The Amanda Committee’s Honorary Award: Hans Petter Moland
The Amanda Committee’s Golden Clapper: Geir Bøhren and Bent Åserud