Blancanieves, a silent
movie shot in black-
and-white, took Best Film honours at the Goya awards, Spain’s equivalent to the Oscars.
Pablo Berger’s version of the Snow White tale picked up 10 awards in all, including Best Original Screenplay and a Best Actress nod for Maribel Verdu as the evil stepmother. The Cuban entry, zombie pic Juan de los Muertos (Juan of the Dead) took the prize for Best Ibero-American Film. The Impossible, an English-language film, turned its box office record of more than 42 million euros ($56 million) into five prizes, including Best Director for Juan Antonio Bayona. Grupo 7 (Unit 7) came away with two acting awards: it opened the night with Best Newcomer, Male for Joaquin Nunez and then won Best Supporting Actor for Julian Villagran.
The Best Actor prize was almost as much a sure thing as the Goya of Honor for Concha Velasco – Jose Sacristan won it for El Muerto y Ser Feliz (The Dead Man and Being Happy).
But as always there had to be a loser, which in this case was “El Artista y la Modelo” (Artist and Model) by Fernando Trueba – 13 nominations and not a single prize.
France’s Les Intouchables won the Goya for best European film, with directors Olivier Kanache and Eric Toledano expressing their thanks in Spanish. (IANS)