John Skoog’s hybrid first feature film produced by Plattform Produktion was among 12 international films vying for the festival’s top award.

The contemplative film set during the summer follows Polish rural workers and the day to day life of a small community in Småland where the director grew up. The film was produced by Ruben Östlund’s producer Erik Hemmendorff, as part of the Swedish Film Institute’s Moving Sweden scheme.

The jury said: “We would like to honour a film that takes formal virtuosity to new heights, yet never loses sight of the human experience. If Tarkovsky had played video games and was a Swedish farmer, this might be what his films would have looked like."

Earlier this year in Göteborg, cinematographer Ita Zbroniec-Zajt had picked up the Sven Nykvist Award for the film. Plattform Produktion plans to release it through their new distribution company on May 3rd.

A Special Mention from the DOX:Award section was handed out to Searching Eva (Germany).

Other award winners were the following:
  • New-Vision to A Moon for My Father by Mania Akbari and Douglas White (Iran) 
  • FACT:Award to Dark Suns by Julien Elie (Canada), with a Special Mention to Midnight Family by Luke Lorentzen (Mexico/US) 
  • NORDIC:DOX award to The Men’s Room by Petter Sommer and Jo Vemund Svendsen (Norway), with a Special Mention to Mating by Lina Mannheimer (Sweden) 
  • NEXT:WAVE award to Kabul, City in the Wind by Aboozar Amini (Afghanistan/Netherlands/Japan/Germany), with a Special Mention to Inland by Juan Palacios (Spain) 
  • Politiken Audience Award to Push by Fredrik Gertten (Sweden).

Nordisk Film & TV Fond was associated to the two Swedish film winners Mating and Push.

At the 6th industry programme CPH:DOX FORUM, the €15,000 Eurimages Award for Best Pitch was given out to the project Four Brothers by Peter-Jan de Pue produced by Belgium’s Savage Film and Germany’s Gebrüder Beetz. The jury consisting of Gabor Greiner (Films Boutique), David Herdies (Memento Film) and Eurimages’ Tamara Tatishvili was impressed by “the integrity and powerful cinematic language of this project, which gives a contemporary look on the impact and the harshness of belonging and isolation within a family in a war situation”.