The Gravedigger’s Wife bags top awards at Lübeck Nordic Film Days

The 63^rd Nordic Film Days in Lübeck closed on Saturday with an awards ceremony where ten prizes worth €58,000 were handed out.

On top of the double win for Khadar Ayderus Ahmed’s movie, Finland brought home another two prizes for The Blind Man Who Did Not Want to See Titanic.

The Mogadishu-born Helsinki-based director was handed both the €12,500 NDR Film Prize and the €5,000 Interfilm Church Prize for his heartfelt debut film The Gravedigger’s Wife, which first received warm kudos at Cannes Critics Week.

The film produced by Finland’s Bufo, with France’s Pyramide Productions and Germany’s Twenty Twenty Vision opens this Friday in Finland via Bufo’s distribution arm B-Plan.

Teemu Nikki’s The Blind Man Who Did Not Want to See Titanic produced by It’s Alive Productions, continued its glorious festival run with a double win in Lübeck - the €3,000 Baltic Film Prize for a Nordic Feature Film and a Special Mention from the Interfilm Church Prize jury. The film won earlier awards in Venice, Antalya and El Gouna festivals.

Iceland, which bagged Lübeck’s top NDR prize in 2018 for A Woman at War and in 2019 for A White, White Day, brought home this year the €7,500 Prize of the Friends of the Nordic Film Days Lübeck, handed out to the opening film Cop Secret. Director and goalkeeper celebrity Hannes Þór Halldórsson was in Lübeck to receive the prize.

Denmark picked up the €5,000 Audience Award for Charlotte Sieling’s historical drama Margrete-Queen of the North, set to open in German cinemas early 2022 via Splendid Film.

Sweden was honoured through William Johansson Kalén and Lars Edman’s film Arica, awarded the €5,000 Documentary Film Prize, the €5,000 Children’s Jury Award to Eva & Adam by Caroline Cowan, and €5,000 Children and Youth Film Award to Nelly Rapp Monster Agent by Amanda Adolfsson.

Finally Norway received the Youth Jury Award’s main €5,000 prize for Yngvild Sve Flikke’s Ninjababy, a special mention for Hello World by Kenneth Eivebakk, and the Children’s Jury special mention for the animated film Christmas at Cattle Hill by Will Ashurst.

The Lübeck Nordic Film Days headed by artistic director Thomas Hailer, also handed out an honorary award to Danish star Trine Dyrholm.