Sunday, April 25, 2010

Christoph Waltz Gives an Award for a Change

<--- Oh look. Christoph Waltz, finally tiring of receving awards for Inglourious Basterds, is now giving them out. There he is (left) giving Best Actress to barefoot Sibel Kekilli at Germany's Oscars "The Lolas". I've never seen anyone accepting a Best Actress trophy while barefoot before but I hope to see someone do so sometime real soon.

If you've never heard the name Sibel Kekilli before, please do yourself a favor and rent Fatih Akin's erotic drama Head On (aka Gegen die Wand) She's got thunderclap force in that movie.
The Winners
Picture (Silver), Editing & Score: Hans-Christian Schmid's Storm, a war crime drama
Picture (Bronze) & Actress: When We Leave starring Sibel Kekilli
Supporting Actor: Justus von Dohnnanyi in Men in the City.
Children's Film: Lena Olbrich & Christian Becker's Vorstadtkrokodile which translates to something like Suburban Crocodiles
Documentary: Ernst Ludwig Ganzert and Ulli Pfau's The Heart of Jenin about a Palestinian father who donates his son's organs to Israeli children even though his son was killed by Israeli soldiers.
Lifetime Achievement: writer/producer Bernd Eichinger

But the night's big winner was The White Ribbon

Picture (Gold), Director, Screenplay, Actor (Burghart Klaussner, "The Pastor"), Supporting Actress (Maria-Victoria Dragus, "Klara"), Cinematography, Costumes, Art Direction, Makeup & Sound: Ten (that's right, ten!) statues went to Michael Haneke's Oscar nominee. That's a record. The previous Lola champ (winning nine) was the wonderful Goodbye Lenin! (2003) starring Daniel Brühl which had, like The White Ribbon after it, a very successful run in the international marketplace.

I was surprised to read the Supporting Actress winner. The White Ribbon had many fine small performances but the statue winner was neither the abused daughter (Roxane Duran) nor the humiliated midwife (Susanne Lothar, who was nominated as Best Actress instead). It also wasn't the teacher's sweet girlfriend (Leonie Benesch) or the rich baroness (Ursina Lardi). The winner was the manipulative leader of that creepy flock of school children that may be sabotaging everyone in town. "Forgive us Father."

Back to Sibel to wrap up. We've also never seen a Best Actress Oscar winner sit down on stage after winning. For all their 'I'm going to faint/cry' affectations, nobody actually collapses!

14 comments:

Guy Lodge said...

Speaking of matters German, a B+ for Soul Kitchen? I'm ... surprised. I found it so effortful in its faux-zaniness, such a letdown from Akin.

Interested to hear your thoughts on it as some point. It got the silver at Venice, too, so clearly I'm missing something.

impotenta said...

That is a real good thing...to precious our values:)

Staff said...

Wow, wow... a high 5 for you!!

Kara said...

Are we ever gonna find out the results to that An Education contest? haha

Andrea said...

Christoph Waltz shaved his beard? holy god I must google more pics of this.

Katey said...

I saw When We Leave at Tribeca a few days ago! The lead actress really is terrific in it, and looks much happier in those photos than she ever does in the film.

Robert said...

I loves me some Sibel Kekilli!!!!!

MrW said...

Small correction: Burghart Klaußner wasn't the doctor, but the priest.

Also, I loved another thing Sibel did after winning: In true Bette Davis style, she applied for a job. Said she wants to work and she'd play anything (lead or supporting) as long as it's good.

You have to love her.

Slayton said...

Roxane Duran deserved to be nominated over, and won over, Dragus. She was heartbreaking as the doctor's daughter.

Alex said...

Nice to see "The White Ribbon" finally get its due somewhere, even if the odds were heavily stacked in its favor with home-court advantage.

Anonymous said...

She looks like a young Mary McDonnell.

jason

Guy Lodge said...

"Finally get its due"?

And what's the Palme d'Or, chopped liver?

;)

anna said...

As I said before, I'm really really happy Sibel won. I hope people finally listen to her and give her some great roles. We've seen far too little of her since "Head-On".

I was also really happy with Justus von Dohnányi's win. "Männerherzen" isn't exactly a great film (btw, it was written and directed by Simon Verhoeven, son of director Michael Verhoeven (not related to Paul) and, still beautiful, actress Senta Berger), but I thought von Dohnányi was fantastic in it.

Also, I, too, would love to hear your thoughts on "Soul Kitchen". I liked it, but at the same time I couldn't help but feel a little disappointed.

Deus Ex Machina said...

Sibel Kekilli. I think she may be my new obsession. Love just looking at her! And I've never seen any of her films!