Ang Lee's second world war drama Lust, Caution won the Golden Lion Best Film Award at the 64th Venice Film Festival. Rodrigo Prieto also won the Osella Award for Best Cinematography.
Lust, Caution, starring Tony Leung Chiu-Wai and newcomer Tang Wei, tells the story of a young student (Tang Wei) who is asigned a mission to seduce and destroy a senior official (Tony Leung Chiu-Wai) who works for the pupet government under Japanese control. The script is based on an Eileen Chang's novel. The cinemetographer Rodrigo Prieto also worked with Ang Lee in Brokeback Mountain. At the award ceremony, Ang Lee dedicated the award to the late Swedish director Ingmar Bergman.
In the other awards, Taiwanese director Lin Jingjie's The Most Distant Course won the International Critics' Week Awards.
Full list of awards:
GOLDEN LION for Best Film:
SE, JIE (LUST, CAUTION) by Ang LEE (USA/China/China, Taiwan)
SILVER LION for Best Director to:
Brian DE PALMA for the film: REDACTED (USA)
SPECIAL JURY PRIZE to (ex aequo):
LA GRAINE ET LE MULET by Abdellatif KECHICHE (France)
I’M NOT THERE by Todd HAYNES (USA)
COPPA VOLPI
for Best Actor:
Brad PITT in the film THE ASSASSINATION OF JESSE JAMES
BY THE COWARD ROBERT FORD by Andrew DOMINIK (USA)
COPPA VOLPI
for Best Actress:
Cate BLANCHETT in the film: I’M NOT THERE by Todd HAYNES (USA)
MARCELLO MASTROIANNI AWARD
for Best Young Actor or Actress:
Hafsia HERZI in the film LA GRAINE ET LE MULET by Abdellatif KECHICHE (France)
OSELLA
for Best Cinematography to:
Rodrigo PRIETO director of photography for the SE, JIE (LUST, CAUTION) di Ang LEE (USA/China/China, Taiwan)
OSELLA
for Best Screenplay to:
Paul LAVERTY for the film IT’S A FREE WORLD… by Ken LOACH
(UK/Italy/Germany/Spain)
SPECIAL LION for Overall Work to:
NIKITA MIKHALKOV
The Jury is delighted to acknowledge the consistent brilliance of Nikita Mikhalkov’s body of work. His new film is once again a confirmation of his mastery in exploring and revealing to us, with great humanity and emotion, the complexity of existence.
