La Pivellina Wins Cannes Europa Cinemas Label

Tizza Covi and Rainer Frimmel's La Pivellina, an Australian/Italian co-production, has been awarded the Europa Cinemas Label as Best European Film in the Director's Fortnight section of the Cannes Film Festival, it has been announced by a jury of four Europa Cinemas exhibitors - the seventh year the Label has been awarded in the section.
La Pivellina will now receive the support of the Europa Cinemas exhibitors who commit themselves to extend the length of its run on screen and additional promotion across the network.
The Europa Cinemas jury for this year's Cannes Festival consisted of Nina Pece (Slovenia) - Head of Film Distribution and Director of Otok (Institute for the Development of Film Culture); Nicolas Bruyelle (Belgium) - Programmer at the Cinema Plaza Art a Mons; Richard Gramfors (Sweden) - Project Manager, Digital Houses, Folktets Hus och Parker and Jean-Marie Virginie (France) - Programmer at the Cinemas Jacques Tati a Orsay.
The jury issued the following statement: "Our decision was unanimous. La Pivellina is a film with a big heart - a generous, unpretentious and optimisitic look at society's outcasts and makes no moral judgements. The filmakers' background in documentaries gives the film a real naturalistic credibility, drawing the audience in and engaging them. The acting is superb.
"We feel the universal themes and the warmth of the cross-generational relationships in the film can have a real impact across Europe with audiences."
Sold internationally by Films Distribution, La Pivellina is directed by Tizza Covi and Rainer Frimmel with the screenplay by Covi and Frimmel as Producer. The cast is Patrizia Gerardi, Asia Crippa, Tairo Caroli and Walter Saabel. Vento Films is the production company.
Abandoned in a park, the two-year-old girl Asia is found by Patti, a circus woman living with her husband Walter in a trailer part in San Basilio on the outskirts of Rome. With the help of Tairo, a teenager who lives with his grandma in an adjacent container, Patti starts to search for the girls' mother and gives the girl a new home for an uncertain period of time.
This marks the seventh year that the Europa Cinemas Label has been awarded at Cannes and complements the Labels awarded at the Panorama section in Berlin, the Giornate degli Autori section in Venice and Karlovy Vary.
The success of recent winning films is eloquent testament to the impact that the Label has on a film's profile and its circulation around Europe. Last year's Berlin winner, Gotz Spielmann's Academy Award nominated Revanche has had successfully releases in ten territories.
The Cannes winner from 2008, Bouli Lanners' Eldorado enjoyed great success in Belgium, France and Italy with Germany and the Netherlands to follow this year.
Venice 2008 winner Uberto Pasolini's Machan had a solid opening in Italy, with releases set for France, Switzerland, Austria and Germany. Looking further back, Anton Corbjin's Control, the Cannes winner from 2007, has been released in 20 countries around Europe and Andrzej Jakimowski's Tricks (Venice 2007) has won prizes at 6 international festivals and has been sold in more than 20 countries.
Founded in 1992, the Europa Cinemas network now consists of a remarkable 1945 screens in 758 cinemas in 439 cities in 43 countries. Europa Cinemas' aim is to support the programming and visibility of European films outside their country of origin, and to foster initiatives aimed at encouraging younger audiences to develop their interest in European films and cultural diversity.
Since 2004, Europa Cinemas has been extending its film network outside Europe, particularly in Asia, South America and around the Mediterranean.
(KMcA/BMcc)