PostHeaderIcon Filipino film director Dante Mendoza bags the Cannes Best Director Award

It’s with a sense of pride that Filipinos learned of Brillante (Dante) Mendoza, an upcoming film director who won the prestigious Best Director Award in the 62nd Cannes Film Festival in France. His socially charged movie Kinatay received mixed reviews during the 2009 international film festival, but nonetheless got the best director prize.

“The coveted Palme d’Or went to Austrian director Michael Haneke for his austere but powerful The White Ribbon, which addresses repression and cruelty among a small Protestant community in northern Germany in the months before the first World War. “----IrishTimes.com (05/25/09, Dwyer, M)

French director Jacques Audiard was bestowed the Grand Prix du Jury Award for his film “A Prophet” which portrays the failure of the French penal system as a place of rehabilitation for criminals.

Mendoza's Kinatay (Slaughter) depicted the life a young rookie Manila policeman in a world of sordid violence. It showed the gruesome abduction, torture, rape, and killing of a prostitute by corrupt men of the police force. The severed body parts of the woman were disposed of in various places of Manila.

The first Filipino to ever been awarded the Best Director prize in Cannes, Mendoza shares the honor of past respected movie makers who won the coveted prize. Counted among them are Martin Scorsese, Ingmar Bergman, Francois Truffaut, Luis Buñuel, Robert Bresson, Costa Gavras, and Werner Herzog---Inquirer (05/25/09, Nepales, R.)

Winners of the 2009 Cannes Film Festival

MAIN CATEGORIES

PALME D’OR - The White Ribbon , directed by Austrian Michael Haneke. A small village is rocked by a series of mysterious and cruel crimes. A group of young children are among the suspects.

GRAND PRIX (runner-up) - A Prophet directed by France’s Jacques Audiard.

SPECIAL CAREER PRIZE - Veteran French director Alain Resnais. This year he presented Wild Grass .

BEST ACTOR - Austrian Christoph Waltz for his role as a Nazi officer in Quentin Tarantino’s Inglourious Basterds .

BEST ACTRESS - Charlotte Gainsbourg for Antichrist, directed by Denmark’s Lars Von Trier.

BEST DIRECTOR - Kinatay , directed by Filipino Brillante Mendoza. Peping, a criminology student, joins his friend on a mission to earn some cash but regrets his decision as events turn sour.

BEST SCREENPLAY - Mei Feng for his script on Spring Fever, directed by China’s Lou Ye.

JURY PRIZE (shared) - Fish Tank directed by Britain’s Andrea Arnold, and Thirst directed by South Korean Park Chan-Wook.

CAMERA D’OR (for debut film) - Samson and Delilah directed by Australia’s Warwick Thornton.

BEST SHORT FILM - Arena directed by Portuguese director Joao Salaviza. – (Reuters) Photo Credit: Paolo Feliciano) =0=

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