‘Vengeance is Mine, All Others Pay Cash’ Wins Locarno Film Festival
Indonesian director Edwin's homage to and deconstruction of Asian 1980s action movies wins the Golden Leopard at the 2021 Locarno Film Festival. Dario Argento takes the lifetime achievement award.
BY SCOTT ROXBOROUGH
AUGUST 14, 2021 8:26AM
'Vengeance is Mine, All Others Pay Cash' THE MATCH FACTORY
Vengeance is Mine, All Others Pay Cash, Indonesian director Edwin’s homage to and deconstruction of 1980s ultra-violent Asian action movies, has won the Golden Leopard for best film at the 2021 Locarno International Film Festival.
The feature, an adaptation of the novel by Indonesian writer Eka Kurniawan, is a revenge tale involving a hired killer who uses violence to compensate for his public shame in being impotent and a female fighter who takes over his burden of vengeance. It stars Ajo Kawir and Ladya Cheryl. The Match Factory is handling international sales.
In a surprise announcement at the Locarno award ceremony, held Saturday, the festival gave its lifetime achievement award to Italian director Dario Argento The famed filmmaker behind horror classics Suspiria (1977) and Tenebrae (1982), was also honored for his surprising lead performance as an aging father in Gaspar Noé’s Vortex, which premiered at the Cannes Film Festival.
The Leopard for best director went to New York veteran filmmaker Abel Ferrara for Zeros and Ones, a thriller starring Ethan Hawke as an American soldier assigned to a mysterious mission in Rome after the Vatican has been blown up.
The best actress honor went to Anastasiya Krasovskaya for her starring role in Natalya Kudryashova’s Russian drama Gerda. Mohamed Mellali and Valero Escolar took a joint best actor honor for The Odd-Job Men by Spanish filmmaker Neus Ballús. The surrealist comedy, which follows plumbers dealing with a series of eccentric clients, also won the European Cinemas Network honor for Best European film at Locarno. Beta Cinema is selling the movie worldwide.
In Locarno’s Concorso Cineasti del Presente sidebar of first and second films, Francesco Montagner’s documentary Brotherhood, which follows three Bosnian brothers, born into a family of shepherds, took the best film honor. The best emerging director award went to Hleb Papou for his drama The Legionnaire, about the only African-Italian officer in Rome’s riot police; Saskia Rosendahl won the best actress honor for her performance in Sabrina Sarabi’s No One’s With The Calves, with Gia Agumava taking the section’s best actor prize for his starring role in Elene Naveriani’s Wet Sand.
A special jury prize went to Émilie Aussel for the coming-of-age drama Our Eternal Summer. British director Charlotte Colbert took the best first feature honor for her debut, She Will, starring Malcolm McDowell, Alice Krige, and Rupert Everett.
The 74th Locarno International Film Festival wrapped up Aug. 14 with a gala screening of Liesl Tommy’s Aretha Franklin biopic Respect starring Jennifer Hudson.
The full list of 2021 Locarno Film Festival winners
Golden Leopard for Best Film
Vengeance is Mine, All Others Pay Cash, dir. Edwin
Special Jury Prize of the Cities of Ascona and Losone
A New Old Play, dir. Qui Jiongjiong
Leopard for Best Director
Abel Ferrara for Zeros and Ones
Leopard for Best Actress
Anastasiya Krasovskaya for Gerda, dir. Natalya Kudryashova
Leopard for Best Actor
Mohamed Mellali and Valero Escolar for The Odd-Job Men, dir. Neus Ballús
Special Mentions
Soul of a Beast, dir. Lorenz Merz
Espiritu Sagrado, dir. Chema García Ibarra
Concorso Cineasti del presente Awards
Leopard for Best Film
Brotherhood, dir. Francesco Montagner
Best Emerging Director
Hleb Papou for The Legionnaire
Special Jury Prize Ciné+
Our Eternal Summer, dir. Émilie Aussel
Leopard for Best Actress
Saskia Rosendahl for No One’s By The Calves, dir. Sabrina Sarabi
Leopard for Best Actor
Gia Agumava for Wet Sand, dir. Elene Naveriani
Best First Feature
She Will, dir. Charlotte Colbert
Special Mention
Holy Emy, dir. Araceli Lemos
Lifetime Achievement Award
Dario Argento
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