Best Feature
‘Scaffolding’ wins big at Jerusalem Film Festival
The 34th Jerusalem Film Festival held its awards ceremony Thursday night and Matan Yair’s Scaffolding, about a working-class high-school student who has a complex relationship with his teacher, won the Robert Nissim Haggiag award for Best Israeli Feature Film, which comes with a prize of NIS 100,000. Scaffolding also took the prize for Best Actor for Asher Lax and an honorable mention for Best Cinematography. The movie had its world premiere last spring at Cannes.
The similarly themed Doubtful, directed by Eliran Elya, won the Anat Pirchi Award for Best First Film. Adar Hazazi won an Honorary Mention for his performance and Shai Goldman won the Aaron Emanuel Award for Best Cinematography.
Samira Saraya won Best Actress for her performance in Dana Goldberg and Efrat Mishori’s Death of a Poetess.
Savi Gabizon’s Longing won the Audience Award and the Anat Pirchi Award for Best Script.
The FIPRESCI Award for Best Israeli First Feature went to Shady Srour’s Holy Air, about a Christian family in Nazareth.
The Van Leer Award for Best Documentary went to Conventional Sins by Anat Yuta Zuria and Shira Clara Winther, about pedophilia in the ultra-Orthodox community.
In the In the Spirit of Freedom Competition in Memory of Wim van Leer, the Cummings Award for Best Feature Film wen to Aki Kaurismaki’s The Other Side of Hope and the Ostrovsky Family Fund Award for Best Documentary went to City of Ghosts by Matthew Heineman.
For the second year, the Wilf Family Foundation gave a $20,000 prize for the Best International Feature. This year, the Wilf Award went to Korean director Hong Sang-soo’s On the Beach At Night Alone, about a young actress recovering from her breakup with a celebrated director.
The FIPRESCI Award for Best International First Feature went to Ali Soozandeh’s Tehran Taboo.
In the Jewish Experience Awards – courtesy of Michaela and Leon Constantiner, the Lia Award in honor of Lia van Leer for films dealing with Jewish heritage went to The Cakemaker by Ofir Raul Graizer. The Avner Shalev – Yad Vashem Chairman’s Award for Artistic Achievement in Holocaust-related Film went to 1945 by Ferenc Torok.