The Guilty triumphs at Denmark's Robert Awards

Gustav Möller’s thriller swept the floor on Sunday at the annual Danish film & TV awards, with seven wins including Best Film. Ride Upon the Storm 2 won Best TV Drama.

The Danish Film Academy’s 2,500 members rewarded Möller for his direction and original screenplay - co-written with Emil Nygaard Albertsen, The Guilty’s lead actor Jakob Cedergren, while Jessica Dinnage, who plays the kidnapped mother and is hardly seen in the film, still grabbed a Robert for Best Supporting Actress. Oskar Skriver, creator of the crucial sound design won in his category and Carla Luffe scooped Best Editor.

The other major winner at Sunday’s Robert awards ceremony in Copenhagen was stand-up comedian/writer/director Anders Matthesen for his animated film Checkered Ninja, directed with Thorbjørn Christoffersen for A Film. Matthesen took home Best Children & Youth Film, and was rewarded for the screen adaptation of his 2016 debut novel, and for his own original song ‘Skubber det sne’, composed with #KewantliggerBeatetNormal. The animated film is a huge box office success at home with 719,000 tickets sold since its Christmas 2018 release.

Bille August’s period Film A Fortunate Man won Best Actress (newcomer Katrine Greis-Rosenthal), Best Set Design (Jette Lehmann) and Costume Design (Manon Rasmussen), while top actor Fares Fares who plays detective Assad in Christoffer Boe’s box office hit The Purity of Vengeance picked up Best Supporting Actor.

Cinematographer Manuel Alberto Claro collected his third Robert Award for a Lars von Trier film for The House that Jack Built, after Nymphomaniac 1&2 and Melancholia. Trier’s thriller also won Best Special Effects (Peter Hjorth). 

The Roberts for Best Documentary went to Simon Lereng Wilmont’s The Distant Barking of Dogs and for Best Non-English Language Film to the Swedish Oscar entry Border by Ali Abbasi. 

In the TV category where twice as many nominees were running compared to last year, DR Drama’s Ride Upon the Storm season 2 dominated with three Roberts for Best TV Drama, Best Actor (International Emmy-awarded Lars Mikkelsen) and Best Actress (Ann Eleonora Jørgensen). 

Lars Ranthe who plays the dangerous boss of a biker gang in the TV2 drama Warrior won Best Supporting Actor-TV Series, while DR’s hit youth drama Doggystyle created by Anna Emma Haudal won Best Short Series and Best Supporting Actress (Josephine Park). 

The Blockbuster Audience award went to the animated film Team Albert produced by Regner Grasten Filmproduktion, and the IB honorary award to producer Per Holst. 

Nordisk Film & TV Fond was associated to 12 Robert awards for The Guilty (as funder of the film’s development), The House that Jack Built, The Distant Barking of Dogs, Border, and Warrior.

For the full list of Robert awards check: www.filmakademiet.dk