Spain's Return to Hansala grabs Golden Pyramid at Cairo festival

Nov 28, 2008, 21:46 GMT

Cairo - The Spanish film Return to Hansala won the Golden Pyramid at the closing ceremony of the 32nd edition of Cairo International Film Festival (CIFF) late on Friday.

'The jury of the international competition chose this film, as it presented a story from two continents and depicted their different cultures and traditions,' said Egyptian director and jury member Mohamed Khan as he announced the winners.

Chus Guiterrez, the director, was also awarded the International Critics Prize, known as the Fipresci prize. Since Spain was the guest of honour at this year's edition of CIFF, Return to Hansala was screened at the opening ceremony of the festival on November 18.

Meanwhile, Jan Veheyen's Cut Loose, from Belgium, won the Silver Pyramid. Yolande Moreau was named best actress for her role in the French movie Seraphine, while Greek actor Juan Diego Botto was best actor for his role in El Greco.

Ezat Abi Ouf, CIFF director, described this year's edition as 'full of interesting and important activities.' Several international celebrities such as Goldie Hawn, Kurt Russel, Charlize Theron, Stuart Townsend and Susan Sarandon attended this year.

Abou Ouf along with Egyptian Minister of Culture Farouq Hosni presented both Oscar-winning actress Mira Sorvino and Mexican director and producer Arturo Ripstein with honorary awards.

The Algerian film Mascarades grabbed the 100,000-Egyptian-pound (around 18,000 dollars) prize for the best Arabic film in the Arabic films competition. The best screenwriter prize was shared by Ahmed Rachwan, for the Egyptian film 'Basra' and Rashid Masharawy, for the Palestinian film 'Laila's Birthday.'

'I spent about 10 days in severe conditions to be able to come here from Palestine and accept such a prize,' said Masharawy on stage, as he dedicated his prize to the Palestinians who are stranded in the Gaza Strip.

Masharawy was referring to those trapped in Gaza after Israel imposed a blockade on them. For more than a year now, Israel tightened the siege and Egypt maintained the closure of Rafah crossing in response to Hamas' violent takeover of the enclave in June 2007.

Egyptian director Khaled Youssef, actress Mena Shalaby and actor Khaled Saleh presented the winners with their trophies.

In the digital competition, Dervis Zaim's Turkish film 'Dot' won the first prize. The 10,000-dollar prize was given to both the director and the producer, while the Japanese film Goodbye won the 6,000-dollar second prize.

Around 46 films from 59 countries, including 22 movies from nine Arab states, were submitted to the competition.