– Alexandra Makarová’s drama has picked up eight trophies, including Best Feature Film, while Adrian Goiginger’s family drama went home with five awards
The winners of the Austrian Film Awards (© AÖF/eSeL.at/Lorenz Seidler)
For the second year running, the hq7 studios in Vienna’s Simmering district opened their doors to Austrian cinema. On 18 June, the venue hosted the 16th Austrian Film Awards, drawing over 1,000 guests. Organised under the motto “A Stage for Film”, the evening’s artistic concept was overseen by Julia Edtmeier and Alexander Pschill, who together founded Vienna’s Bronski & Grünberg theatre.
The ceremony was opened by the presidents of the Austrian Film Academy, Verena Altenberger and Arash T Riahi, who underlined a new record for submissions as well as the industry’s international festival success. Riahi issued a stark warning about the recent cuts to the ÖFI+ fund. A number of this year’s nominated films, he said, especially the ones by minority filmmakers or featuring minority stories or characters, would simply no longer be possible to make under current funding conditions. Altenberger added that the industry’s “fat years” are over, but stressed that the academy was not complaining and was instead pinning its hopes on the long-demanded streaming levy. She also pointed out the 12 Austrian films screened at this year’s Berlinale and three at Cannes, the latter all directed by women.
The evening belonged to Alexandra Makarová‘s drama Perla, which led the pack with a record-breaking 13 nominations and eight trophies, including the Award for Best Feature Film, collected by producers Arash T Riahi and Sabine Gruber. The film also won Best Leading Actor (Simon Schwarz), Best Cinematography (Georg Weiss), Best Costume Design (Monika Buttinger), Best Production Design (Klaudia Kiczak), Best Score (Johannes Winkler, Rusanda Panfili) and Best Sound (Johannes Baumann, Atanas Tcholakov, Rudolf Pototschnig), and shared the Best Make-up Award (Sam Dopona, Verena Pellegrini) ex-aequo with Welcome Home Baby (Helene Lang).
The runner-up of the night was Adrian Goiginger‘s family drama Four Minus Three, which took home five trophies: Best Director for Goiginger himself, Best Screenplay (Senad Halilbašić), Best Casting (Angelika Kropej), Best Leading Actress (Valerie Pachner) and Best Supporting Actor (Robert Stadlober). Further accolades went to Olga Kosanović‘s Noch lange keine Lipizzaner (Best Documentary), to Reza Rasouli‘s Night of Passage (Best Short Film), and to Florian Pochlatko’s How to Be Normal and the Oddness of the Other World, which picked up two prizes, for Elke Winkens (Best Supporting Actress) and Julia Drack (Best Editing). The crowd-pleasing comedy Aufputzt is’ took home the Award for Most-watched Film in Cinemas, having taken 448,429 admissions, the highest of any Austrian release this year.
The evening also made room for more profound topics beyond the funding debate. While presenting the Award for Best Supporting Actress, Hilde Dalik used her speech to address the still-excessive demands being placed on leading actresses in the industry. Winner Elke Winkens lamented in her acceptance speech that, at 56 years of age, an actress is barely seen by the industry any more, framing her award as a statement against the disappearance of older female thesps from the screen.
But it was not only living actresses and minorities who were honoured at the event. In remembrance of late multimedia artist Valie Export, who also originally designed the Austrian Film Award trophy, the academy announced that the statuette will from now on officially be named the “VALIE”.
Here is the complete list of award winners:
Best Feature Film
Perla – Arash T Riahi, Sabine Gruber (Austria/Slovakia)
Best Documentary
Noch lange keine Lipizzaner – Olga Kosanović (Austria)
Best Short Film
Night of Passage – Reza Rasouli (Austria)
Best Director
Adrian Goiginger – Four Minus Three (Austria/Germany)
Best Leading Actress
Valerie Pachner – Four Minus Three
Best Supporting Actress
Elke Winkens – How to Be Normal and the Oddness of the Other World (Austria)
Best Leading Actor
Simon Schwarz – Perla
Best Supporting Actor
Robert Stadlober – Four Minus Three
Best Screenplay
Senad Halilbašić – Four Minus Three
Best Casting
Angelika Kropej – Four Minus Three
Best Cinematography
Georg Weiss – Perla
Best Editing
Julia Drack – How to Be Normal and the Oddness of the Other World
Best Costume Design
Monika Buttinger – Perla
Best Make-up (ex-aequo)
Sam Dopona, Verena Pellegrini – Perla
Helene Lang – Welcome Home Baby (Austria/Germany)
Best Production Design
Klaudia Kiczak – Perla
Best Score
Johannes Winkler, Rusanda Panfili – Perla
Best Sound
Johannes Baumann (production sound), Atanas Tcholakov (sound design), Rudolf Pototschnig (mixing) – Perla
Most-watched Film in Cinemas
Aufputzt is’ – Claudia Jüptner-Jonstorff (Austria)
