Critically acclaimed prison drama A Prophet (Un Prophète) by French filmmaker Jacques Audiard swept the 35th annual César awards, France’s equivalent to the Academy Awards, this Saturday by taking home nine awards. Awards received included all the major categories including French film of the year, best director and best actor. Winning nine awards puts Prophet in position as the second most winning film in the history of The César awards behind tied for first place The Last Metro (1980) and Cyrano de Bergerac (1990) with 10 wins each.
Prophet was nominated in 13 categories in The Césars and has won in addition to the nine César awards, the 2009 BAFTA award for foreign film, the Grand Prix at the 2009 Cannes Film Festival as well as many other smaller film and critic association awards worldwide. Prophet is nominated for The Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film as well. However, along side Prophet is Michael Haneke’s The White Ribbon which beat out Prophet at The Cannes Film Festival for the Palme d’Or and won the 2010 Golden Globe Award for Best Foreign Language Film.
While by the sheer number of awards Prophet has accumulated worldwide it may seem natural that it is a solid choice for the Best Foreign Language Film Academy Award, traditionally The Academy does not strictly follow trends of the festival circuits and other national awards around the world in their decision on a winner for this category.
Prophet leading star and winner of Best Actor César and Best Newcomer César, Tahir Rahim said, “Long live French cinema,” during his acceptance speech for his second award. It is clear with truly great films like A Prophet that French cinema is alive and well and we can only hope that The Academy recognizes A Prophet as the incredible filmmaking achievement that it is as well as take note of the global recognition it has received when making their decision for a winner.
Source: THR