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The 69th Berlinale, the international film festival - one of the top three on European soil with Cannes and Venice - ends this Sunday. This Saturday evening, the winners were awarded by the jury chaired by French actress Juliette Binoche. An audacious prize list that crowned Ours d'Or, a French film directed by Israeli filmmaker Nadav Lapid.
Premium originality and daring. The jury celebrates Nadav Lapid's film Synonyms , inspired by the life of the Israeli director in Paris at the beginning of the 2000s. We see a student, Yoav, land in the French capital. He literally and metaphorically exposes himself in search of an identity different from his nationality. He now refuses to speak Hebrew as opposed to Israeli politics.
Receiving his award, the director himself recognizes that this film as burlesque as tragic, French production, could create a scandal in Israel.
The grand prize of the jury is due to another French film, more classic, but effective and remarkably written and interpreted: Thanks to God , by François Ozon, on the scandal of pedophilia in the diocese of Lyon.
Yong Mei and Wang Jingchun, best actress and best actor, are also singled out for Wang Xiaoshuai's Chinese film So Long My Son , a story about the impact of the One Child Policy.
Finally, the documentary Talking About Trees , directed by the Sudanese Suhaib Gasmelbari, on four old directors trying to revive the flame of the 7th art in Sudan, won several awards, including the best documentary.