The main prize of the Visions du Réel International Film Festival in Nyon (VD), the Grand Prix, was awarded on Saturday evening to Lausanne director Tizian Büchi. His film ‘L’Îlot’ recounts a district of Lausanne, between magic realism and collective portrait.
It is the first time that a Swiss film has won the Grand Prize in the festival’s International Competition since 2013. This first feature film won over the jury with its “brilliant observation that rewrites the coordinates of geographical spaces in universal terms”, organizers said.
In ‘L’Îlot’, for some mysterious reason, two guards are in charge of securing access to the river in a Lausanne neighborhood populated by retirees and immigrant families. Through encounters, a territory takes shape, a friendship is built. ‘Between documentary and fiction, Tizian Büchi stages a fable tinged with magical realism that subtly questions the surveillance society’.
Portrait of award-winning volcanologists
The Audience Award went to American director Sara Dosa for her film ‘Fire of Love’, an epic and spectacular portrait of volcanologists Katia and Maurice Krafft.
‘A Long Journey Home’, the first feature film by Chinese director Wenqian Zhang, was honored as best film in the Burning Lights competition, dedicated to new vocabularies and writing, to narrative and formal freedom. Swiss-Japanese filmmaker Julie Sando won the National Competition Jury Prize as well as the Zonta Prize (support for future creations) with her film ‘Fuku Nashi’.
‘The list of winners this year includes seven first feature films. New voices thus rub shoulders with the work of established filmmakers (…) We are particularly pleased that the diversity of cinematographic genres, generations, approaches or geographies that guides us has been rewarded and praised by the public and by the juries’ , said Emilie Bujès, artistic director of Visions du Réel.
Pleasant attendance
The festival continues indoors until Sunday evening and online until Monday. According to a first estimate by officials, attendance is comparable to that of 2019, i.e. around 45,000 admissions. These are divided between the general public, some 2,100 accredited professionals, 2,600 children and teenagers in school screenings as well as participants in cultural mediation programs.
“We won our bet by betting on a reinvented festival thanks to a very strong return to the face-to-face and an increased virtual dimension acquired during the pandemic,” said Raymond Loretan, president of the event. ‘Visions du Réel is both a festival of direct encounters and a strong digital platform at the service of a diversified and globalized film culture’.
Nearly 70 countries represented
This 53rd edition has presented 160 documentary films from 68 different countries since April 7 for its big face-to-face return to cinemas. Out of 124 films in the official selection, 85 films had their world premieres.
The Italian director, screenwriter and producer Marco Bellocchio received the Honorary Prize for this 2022 edition. Kirsten Johnson, American filmmaker and director of photography was the special guest this year in Nyon.
The 54th edition of Visions du Réel will take place from April 21 to 30, 2023, the organizers have already announced.
/ATS