The documentary
Adolescentes
by filmmaker Sébastien Lifshitz, who follows two young girls from the age of thirteen until they come of age, won the 2020 Louis-Delluc Prize, its president Gilles Jacob announced to AFP on Tuesday.
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Drunk
by Thomas Vinterberg
Released in early September,
Adolescentes
is a youth column that follows the daily lives of Emma and Anaïs, two friends from middle school and high school in Brive-la-Gaillarde for five years.
The film "
is a marvel of accuracy and sensitivity by one of the greatest contemporary documentarists,
" said Gilles Jacob, recalling that several documentaries had already been awarded since the creation of the prize in 1937.
The question of gender and margins
"
This shooting lasted several years,
explained Sébastien Lifshitz to AFP
," it's a piece of my life, a human adventure
", judging this prize"
very honorary
"for a documentary"
placed in the same way as a fiction in the Pantheon of cinema
”.
The 53-year-old director has been exploring the question of gender and margins for the past twenty years.
Les Invisibles
(2012), on the route of homosexuals, women and men born in the interwar period, was in official selection at Cannes.
To read also:
The Invisibles
... As they say
Five years later,
Les Vies de Thérèse
, which showed the last weeks of life of a figure of feminism, Thérèse Clerc, suffering from cancer, was selected for the Directors' Fortnight and then awarded the Queer Palm.
At the end of 2020, his documentary
Petite fille
broadcast on Arte, recounting the journey of a child born in a boy's body and expressing his transidentity, had been hailed by critics.
Composed of twenty critics and film personalities, chaired by the former president of the Cannes Film Festival, the jury also awarded, in the First Film category,
Josep.
Directed by the cartoonist Aurel, it features an anti-Franco fighter.
"
The strength of the subject and the qualities of the drawing and the sound, voice included, give it emotion and effectiveness to this animation with its refined graphics
", underlined the jury.
Despite the months of cinemas being closed in 2020, the Delluc Prize has decided to maintain its prize list, which traditionally only takes into account feature films released in theaters.
“
Anything that can serve the cinema is more than necessary,
” said Gilles Jacob.
The Louis-Delluc Prize, named after a director and critic from the beginning of the 20th century, rewards the best French film of the year.
Last year, it was attributed to
Jeanne
by Bruno Dumont, revisiting the figure of Joan of Arc, with Lise Leplat Prudhomme and Fabrice Luchini.
Read also: Louis-Delluc Prize: criticism declares its love for
Bruno Dumont's
Jeanne
