Odense International Film Festival

The national jury:

National Grand Prix: 13 by Malou Reymann

By unanimous decision, the jury has chosen to award the Grand Prix to a film that is, at the same time, simple and to the point. Moving, surprising and funny. A film that gives us an impressive performance by the leading actor. A film that unpretentiously joins the small and the great drama in an everyday setting.

Most inventive: I Touched Her Legs by Eva Maria Rødbro

This prize goes to an emotionally charged montage that records a group of teenagers in a poor, white suburban neighborhood in the USA. You see friendships, piercings, boozing and pets. Rough snapshots with a distinctive eye for the paradoxical alternation of teenagers between extreme fragility and youthful arrogance.

Most surprising: Fini by Jacob Schulsinger

Can it be surprising that there is no ball, when you’re playing table tennis? Or that the cup is empty, when you thought it was full of tea? Yes. To the senile demented, reality is always surprising. In this subtle portrait, the comical and the tragic are joined to a portrait of a man who has extended, by clowning, his contract with reality.

Special Mention: Thorshammer by Fenar Ahmad

An exciting story about a young man, who involuntarily finds himself in a boundless drama. The film’s beautiful pictures and visually consistent and pure style impressed the jury.

The international jury:

International Grand Prix: Little Children, Big Words by Lisa James-Larsson

Some times it is the tiniest situations that can invoke the strongest emotions. A teacher asks her pupils a simple question and receives an answer that shocks both the teacher and the audience. The acting moves you and with a sensuous language the audience is taken on a journey through every emotion and is touched and overwhelmed again and again.

Special Mention: Fungus by Charlotta Miller

We would like to give a Special Mention to 52 films but must settle for honouring just one. However, it is a film that with a simple set up with a view from a kitchen window succeeds in telling a story of despair but does it so humanely that one is lead to believe it is a comedy.

Most inventive: Sunday by Patrick Doyon

Sundays can be so boring. In this year’s most inventive, international short film, boredom is described with an amazing imagination and whether the focus is on coins, trains or various animal species, the film manages to give everything a very special twist and dimension in this unique universe. A truly animated animation film.

Most surprising: The Screamers by Roberto Pérez Toledo

A young couple enjoy themselves by screaming in turn. But suddenly a slight pause changes everything and reveals to the audience love’s true form and how fragile it is. Film art – it can truly be done this easily.

The animation jury:

Talent Award: Two friends by Paw Charlie Ravn

In spite of a traditional style in many ways, the director manages to make this film personal and real to such a degree that it appears fresh and innovative. Not least due to the untraditional choice of theme. You get sucked into a credible, big and organic world, where both picture and sound supports the longing, the danger and the beautiful in the story – a dark story, which yet leaves us with a faith in humanity. The films show the director’s obvious ability to communicate, not only with animation, but with the film language in general. In other words: we hope to soon se your first feature film in the cinema, Paw Charlie Ravn.

Best animation: Tussilago by Jonas Odell

In the well-timed meeting between voiceover and animation, the story lifts and grows into a larger whole. The acted tableaus are so convincingly directed, that we believe in the characters and their actions. We understand, and despair, the main character and her choice – or lack thereof. The animation shows the contrast between her imagination and the tough, violent reality. For example in the visualization of a planned shooting of two policemen illustrated with the help of humorously animated matchstick men. The director fully succeeds in treating a serious and very current topic with both respect and humour.

The Youth Jury:

Best national film: To all my friends by Behrouz Bigdeli

We have chosen the film because it takes place in a rough environment that is realistic to young people like us and we are able to relate to this environment. The story is incredibly exciting and you are quickly gripped. The story describes a strong friendship between two young men, who both had a difficult past. But when the leading character has a difficult choice, he does not know what to do. He has to choose between his best friend and his girlfriend. The two young men have known each other for a long time, they have built a strong friendship, almost like brothers. They sacrifice themselves and fight for each other and value their friendship above all. The sound is great and brings a tension to the film when you hear the heartbeat and when things disappear around them. The actors are fantastic and you almost believe that everything has happened in real life.

The film is: To all my friends by Behrouz Bigdeli

Best international film: Child’s Play by Lars Kornhoff

The film tells the story about a young boy who has become a father before he was ready and he has never had the choice whether he wants to keep his son or not, because the mother never wanted. It is a very realistic story, that describes the problem of being young parents and for once we see the problem from the perspective of the father. We follow the leading character one day and notice his development as both a boy and a father. We have chosen this film because it is very moving and we can relate to the leading character and put ourselves in his situation. The story is told very beautifully with pictures and music and the actors are playing great. In the end the leading character chooses to renounce his child, as the title says: Children should play.

The film is: Child’s Play by Lars Kornhoff

Pitch Me Baby – One More Time:

Lea Glob: En Fødselshistorie

This year’s Pitch Me is given to a supermotivated storyteller, who we have chosen to award for the personal and brave approach to the difficult art of pitching. The winner is a pitch that bridges the gap between fiction and documentary, and tells a private story with the opportunity of great common identification. The subject is classic: a family feud’s long-lived division of relations. A man breaks out of prison to be at his wife’s birth. By his father-in-law – a leading professor – he is prevented from receiving his own daughter, but why? What really happened that night? There is such great disagreement that the narrator’s family has been torn since 1964.The idea is a drama-documentary investigation of a mystery. As in Kurosawa’s Rashamon, we live through the same event told with very different perspectives. The film reflects on the relationship between reality and storytelling. It is a story about the classes of society, gender roles and love. The jury hopes that the award winner will use herself in the story, as it to us would strengthen the dramatic potential therein.

About the juries:

The international jury: Nils Malmros (Denmark), Montserrat Guiu Valls (Spain) and Peter Albrechtsen (Denmark).

The national jury: Bitte Eskilsson (Sweden), Lone Hørslev (Denmark) and Mads Matthiesen (Denmark)

The animation jury: Michael Hegner (Denmark), Esben Jacobsen (Denmark) and Helena Frank (Denmark).

The Youth Jury is the class of 8A from Højme Skole.

Read more about the juries on filmfestival.dk