Times BFI 53rd London Film Festival Winners
Posted by editor@vimooz.com on October 29, 2009 under Times BFI London Film Festival | 
"A Prophet"
The Times BFI 53rd London Film Festival announced its winners and Jacques Audiard’s A Prophet picked up the Times BFI 53rd London Film Festival’s inaugural Star Of London award for best film.
Best Film - A Prophet
In this astounding prison drama, when Malik, a young French Arab, finds himself in prison with no friends or allies, he goes out of his way to be useful to the dominant Corsican gang and its leader Cesar Luciani. After a gruelling rites-of-passage murder of a new friend, he builds, by slow degrees, a power base of his own.
Grierson Award | Best Documentary - Defamation
Yoav Shamir’s latest documentary deals with anti-Semitism, which he claims never to have experienced personally, yet he hears the term used everyday, describing it as ‘a constant buzz, always in the background, always annoying’. His quest leads him to explore whether anti-Semitism has become an excusable prejudice in some civilised societies, or whether it is used as a spectre to drum up support for right wing Zionism.
Best British Newcomer - The Scouting Book for Boys
The debut feature from Tom Harper, the Scouting Book for Boys is a drama depicting the anxieties, awkwardness and fears of being a teenager. Having grown up together on a caravan park on the Norfolk coast where their respective parents work, young teenagers David (Thomas Turgoose) and Emily (Holly Grainger) have become close friends, deeply reliant on each other for distractions and mischief. It’s a shock to them both when it’s decided that Emily is to be sent away to live with her father, and there’s even greater alarm throughout the park community when Emily disappears. David struggles to cope as the situation grows ever more complex.
Sutherland Award | First Feature Award - Ajami
Ajami - a powerful crime drama set on the mean streets of Israel. Ajami is a tough Jaffa neighborhood, populated with Jews, Arabs and Christians, and rife with tension. Omar (Shahir Kabaha) and his younger brother Nasri (Fouad Habash) fear repercussions against their family when their uncle shoots a member of an influential criminal clan. They can end the vendetta by paying a substantial cash tribute to the offended family, and need to raise the money fast. Palestinian refugee Malek (Ibrahim Frege) is also desperate for money, for an operation his mother needs, and works illegally at a restaurant. Binj (Scandar Copti) has had enough of the place and his friends, and dreams of leaving so he might live openly with his Jewish girlfriend. Cop Dando (Eran Naim) is haunted by the disappearance of his brother, who went missing while on military service. As more is revealed about the characters’ lives, angers and frustrations, their fates become drawn together.
BFI Fellowships
The highest accolade that the British Film Institute bestows was awarded tonight to distinguished British actor John Hurt and renowned Malian filmmaker Souleymane Cissé for their significant achievements in the fields of acting and directing.
