‘Snow Leopard’ Wins Top Prize at Vesoul Asian Festival

Naman Ramachandran
·2 min read

The late Pema Tseden’s “Snow Leopard” (China) won the top prize, the Golden Cyclo, at the Vesoul International Film Festival of Asian Cinema on Tuesday.

The film, which previously won awards at the Tokyo and Hainan festivals, also won Vesoul’s National Institute of Oriental Languages ​​and Civilizations (INALCO) jury prize and actor Tseten Tashi scored a jury special mention. Pema Tseden (aka Wanmacaidan) died in May last year, age 53.

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The grand jury award went to Kenzhebek Shaikakov’s “Scream” (Kazakhstan), which also won the NETPAC award and the Mark Haaz award. “Scream” actors Orynbek Shaimaganbetov and Arnur Akram were accorded a jury prize special mention. The film shared the Mark Haaz award with Rajesh Jala’s “The Spark” (India), which also had a special mention at the film critics’ award.

“Solids by The Seashore” by Patiparn Boontarig (Thailand) won the jury prize and also the INALCO favorite award. The film critics’ award was won by Shokir Kholikov’s “Sunday” (Uzbekistan), which also won the audience award for a fiction film. The audience award for documentary film was won by Shuvangi Khadka’s “Age of Reason” (Nepal).

Prasanna Vithanage’s Busan winner “Paradise” (Sri Lanka) won the high school award, while the young award went to “Can I Hug You?” (Iran) by Elahe Esmaili.

The festival, founded by Martine and Jean-Marc Therouanne, unspooled its 30th edition Feb. 6 – 13.

The international jury was presided over by Mohsen Makhmalbaf (Iran) and other members included filmmaker Zero Chou (Taiwan) and actors Fatemeh Motamed-Arya (Iran) and Shogen (Japan).

Honorary Golden Cyclos were awarded to Chou and Taiwanese sound engineer Tu Du-chih. This year, the festival had a focus on Taiwanese cinema and also Malayalam-language cinema from the southern Indian state of Kerala.

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