\tScandar Copti\u2019s \u201cHappy Holidays\u201d won top honors at the Marrakech Film Festival on Saturday, capping an emotional and politically resonant ceremony while adding Marrakech\u2019s \u00c9toile d\u2019Or to a list of accolades that also includes best screenplay from Venice\u2019s Orizzonti and best in show from the Thessaloniki Film Festival.<\/p>\n
\tThe acclaimed title also claimed a shared best actress prize for leads Manar Shehab and Wafaa Aoun.<\/p>\n
\tSplit into four chapters, the Palestinian film follows an ensemble of characters \u2013 Arab and Jewish alike \u2013 living in contemporary Haifa. Family secrets and domestic tensions underscore scenes from everyday life as the film traces out an expansive social circle with a novelistic attention to cultural and interpersonal dynamics. \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \t<\/p>\n
\tThis year\u2019s jury \u2013 led by Luca Guadagnino alongside Andrew Garfield, Jacob Elordi, Virginie Efira, Patricia Arquette, Zoya Akhtar, Ali Abbasi, Nadia Kounda and Santiago Mitre \u2013 together awarded the winning title with a unanimous vote. <\/p>\n
\t\t\t \t\t\tPopular on Variety\t\t \t \t\t \t \t \t\t\t \t \t \t<\/p>\n
\t \t\t\t \t\t\t \t \t\t\t\t\tVirginie Efira, Manar Shehab, and Andrew Garfield \t\t\t\t \t \t\t\t \tAs she accepted the award on behalf of her filmmaking partner, screenwriter Mona Copti cast her joy for the accolades against the harsher reality of the ongoing war in Gaza. <\/p>\n
\t\u201cHow did we get here,\u201d she asked. \u201cHow did dehumanization become normalized? How have killing, destruction, and martyrdom become almost acceptable? How did we lose our moral compass and reach this point of ethical collapse?\u201d<\/p>\n
\t\u201cWe hope this film offers some answers to these questions by shedding light on the repercussions of indoctrination in societies and its impact on individual behavior\u2014particularly in communities where women remain constrained by customs and traditions that deny them personal freedom above all else. Our struggle is interconnected, and true liberation cannot be achieved in isolation. None of us is truly free until all of us are.\u201d<\/p>\n
\t \t\t\t \t\t\t \t \t\t\t\t\t\u2018The Cottage\u2019 producer Mercedes C\u00f3rdova and director Silvina Schnicer \t\t\t\t \t \t\t\t \tIndeed, nearly all the night\u2019s speeches carried a political charge. As director Silvina Schnicer accepted the jury prize for her film \u201cThe Cottage\u201d \u2013 an honor the film shared with Mo Harawe\u2019s \u201cThe Village Next to Paradise\u201d \u2013 the Argentine auteur decried the heavy hand of her country\u2019s Javier Milei government, specifically when it comes to cutting cinema funding. \t<\/p>\n
\tFinally, Polish drama \u201cUnder the Volcano\u201d was the night\u2019s other big winner, claiming the director prize for filmmaker Damian Kocur and the best actor trophy for star Roman Lutskyi. In another riveting speech, the actor dedicated his award to the armed forces of Ukraine.<\/p>\n
\tFor its 21st edition, the Marrakech Film Festival exceeded 40,000 attendees, marking a 5000-admission increase from the previous year\u2019s record, with young adults and students from Moroccan film schools in large parts accounting for the surge. Alongside its wider outreach programs, Marrakech also introduced an expanded festival hub that spread out over a half-mile, incorporating new venues while fostering a more vibrant and encompassing atmosphere.<\/p>\n
\t \t\t\t \t\t\t \t \t\t\t\t\t Mo Harawe \t\t\t\t \t \t\t\t \tAwards season hopefuls like Walter Salles\u2019 \u201cI\u2019m Still Here\u201d and Gints Zilbalodis\u2019 \u201cFlow\u201d screened for rapturous crowds, while Jean-Claude Barny\u2019s political biopic \u201cFanon\u201d made its world premiere \u2013 bolstering the festival\u2019s reputation as a continental showcase for African cinema.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\tPursuant to those goals, the festival will double down on its Atlas Distribution Award \u2013 a recent initiative meant to fuel wider domestic and international distribution for the Moroccan, Arab and Pan-African films presented in Marrakech.\u00a0 22 titles from this year\u2019s selection will be eligible for Atlas support, including the night\u2019s big winner.<\/p>\n
\t\u201cWe realized that these projects, outside of their time in festivals, were often not distributed in the Arab world or in Africa,\u201d says festival coordinator Ali Hajji. \u201cTo ensure the viability and longevity \u2014 both culturally and economically \u2014 we saw the need to create a distribution system to better reach those audiences. Quite simply, we want Arab and African audiences to see these films.\u201d<\/p>\n
\t \t\t\t \t\t\t \t \t\t\t\t\tSilvina Schnicer, Mo Harawe, Mona Copti, Manar Shehab, and Damian Kocur \t\t\t\t \t \t\t\t <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Scandar Copti\u2019s \u201cHappy Holidays\u201d won top honors at the Marrakech Film Festival on Saturday, capping an emotional and politically resonant ceremony while adding Marrakech\u2019s \u00c9toile d\u2019Or to a list of accolades that also includes best screenplay from Venice\u2019s Orizzonti and best in show from the Thessaloniki Film Festival. The acclaimed title also claimed a shared […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":20789,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-20787","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-movie"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieetv.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20787","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieetv.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieetv.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieetv.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieetv.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20787"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/movieetv.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20787\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieetv.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20789"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieetv.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20787"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieetv.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20787"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieetv.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20787"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}