L'Alternativa 2016
Prizewinners
L’Alternativa Official Feature Film Prize
The judges for the Official Feature Film Section at the 23rd edition of the Barcelona Independent Film Festival, l’Alternativa, made up of Mar Coll, Andrés Duque and Mireia Iniesta, met on 18 November 2016 and agreed unanimously to award the Festival Feature Film Prize to the film Havarie, by Philip Scheffner (Germany). The still shot of a boat carrying immigrants sets the scene, and the sounds woven around this image create readings that enable us to establish our own point of view. A daring and effective effort which we believe worthy of this prize.
The judges also awarded a Special Mention to The Illinois Parables, by Deborah Stratman (United States).
L’Alternativa Official Short Film Prize
The judges for the Official Short Film Section at the 23rd edition of the Barcelona Independent Film Festival, l’Alternativa, made up of Federico Delpero Bejar, Luis Macías and Pilar Monsell, met on 18 November 2016 and agreed unanimously to award the Festival Short Film Award to the film Schicht, by Alex Gerbaulet (Germany), for its powerful message that there can be no future without the past and its original exploration of the nature of self-portraits in film.
The judges also awarded a Special Mention to Ondes et Silence, by David Bryant and Karl Lemieux (Canada), for exploring images as malleable materials and plunging us into its own powerful universe.
Critics Award for Best Feature Film in l’Alternativa Official
The judges for the Critics Award for Best Feature Film in l’Alternativa Official at the 23rd edition of the Barcelona Independent Film Festival, l’Alternativa, made up of Arantxa Acosta, Juan Manuel Linares and Albert Margalef, met on 18 November 2016 and agreed unanimously to award the Critics Award to the film Behemoth, by Zhao Liang (France, China). Liang’s poetic universe drags us, as if by the hand of Charon, into a brutal reality. This urgent discourse, with both local and universal themes, is conveyed by means of striking images that set purity against corruption, unspoilt nature against the insatiable ambition of man turned monster.
The judges also awarded a Special Mention to Paula, by Eugenio Canevari (Argentina, Spain). The judges praised Canevari for making his first film—full of silences, glances and still shots—with limited resources and nonprofessional actors. An excellent result that proves the potential of films made off the beaten track.
GAC Honorary Prize for Best Feature Film Screenplay in Panorama
The judges GAC Honorary Prize for Best Screenplay at the 23rd edition of the Barcelona Independent Film Festival, l’Alternativa, made up of Rodolf Giner and Daniel Resnich, met on 18 November 2016 and agreed unanimously to award the GAC Prize for Best Feature Film Screenplay to the film Thy Father’s Chair, by Alex Lora and Antonio Tibaldi (Spain, Italy, United States), for its powerful narrative-driven exploration of the conflictive relationship between two bothers in a claustrophobic setting.
GAC Honorary Prize for Best Short Film Screenplay in Panorama
The judges for the GAC Honorary Prize for Best Screenplay at the 23rd edition of the Barcelona Independent Film Festival, l’Alternativa, made up of Rodolf Giner and Daniel Resnich, met on 18 November 2016 and agreed unanimously to award the GAC Prize for Best Short Film Screenplay to the film Gure hormek, by Maider Fernández Iriarte and María Elorza (Spain), for its masterful transformation of walls into an effective narrative device for telling the story of the lives of the women who live within them.
Panorama l’Alternativa–Platja d’Aro–Costa Brava Award
The judges for the Panorama l’Alternativa–Platja d’Aro–Costa Brava Award at the 23rd edition of the Barcelona Independent Film Festival, l’Alternativa, made up of Sesi Bergeret, Pere Ginard and Tess Renaudo, met on 18 November 2016 and agreed unanimously to award the Panorama l’Alternativa–Platja d’Aro–Costa Brava Award to the film The monstruo en la piedra, by Ignasi Duarte (France).
Audience Award
The Audience Award at the 23rd edition of the Barcelona Independent Film Festival, l’Alternativa, goes to the film Notes from Sometime, Later, Maybe, by Roger Gómez and Dani Resines (Spain).
Filmic Crater-Lab Award in l'Alternativa Panorama
Bill Brand has awarded the Filmic Crater-Lab Award in l'Alternativa Panorama to Carla Andrade (Spain) for her film Listen to Me.
Carla Andrade’s beautiful poetic film evokes deep feelings of quiet resolve against winds of hope and despair. She accomplishes this through simple superimposition and juxtaposition. The film combines disparate materials and distant locations in a search for a complex truth by simple means. She elegantly contrasts gritty and unstable analogue film of a Chilean seascape with a formally framed video image of a Nepali meadow. Images of women, old and young—often in silhouette, so barely seen—draw us to a weave of visual threads. The threads are sometimes literal threads of hair, fur and rope, or they are the visually rhyming threads of branches, grasses and streams of light. Together they evoke the fabric of a fragile world, one not without hope but one too often unseen and unheard.