European Films

Two Italian films, Matteo Garrone's Gomorra (Gomorrah) and Paolo Sorrentino's Il Divo, lead the pack at this year's European Film Award (EFA) nominations. Both film have five nominations each and premiered earlier this year at the Cannes Film Festival before their releases at home. The festival seems to be this year's official supplies of nominees; the Best Director category is solely made up of titles that premiered there. The fact that two Italian titles are in the lead is also somewhat misleading, as this is not the sign of some kind of renaissance in Italian film. The Venice and Rome Film Festivals, both packed with local titles, programmed not one film that scored an EFA nomination this year. The winners will be announced at a ceremony held in Copenhagen on December. 6 The full list of 2008 EFA nominees follows.

 EUROPEAN FILM 2008

• IL DIVO, Italy
• ENTRE LES MURS (The Class), France
• GOMORRA (Gomorrah), Italy
• HAPPY-GO-LUCKY, UK
• ORFANATO (The Orphanage), Spain
• WALTZ WITH BASHIR, Israel/France/Germany

EUROPEAN DIRECTOR 2008

• Laurent Cantet for ENTRE LES MURS (The Class)
• Andreas Dresen for WOLKE 9 (Cloud 9)
• Ari Folman for WALTZ WITH BASHIR
• Matteo Garrone for GOMORRA (Gomorrah)
• Steve McQueen for HUNGER
• Paolo Sorrentino for IL DIVO

EUROPEAN ACTRESS 2008

• Hiam Abbass in LEMON TREE
• Arta Dobroshi in LE SILENCE DE LORNA (Lorna’s Silence)
• Sally Hawkins in HAPPY-GO-LUCKY
• Belen Rueda in EL ORFANATO (The Orphanage)
• Kristin Scott Thomas in IL Y A LONGTEMPS QUE JE T’AIME (I’ve Loved You So Long)
• Ursula Werner in WOLKE 9 (Cloud 9)

EUROPEAN ACTOR 2008

• Michael Fassbender in HUNGER
• Thure Lindhardt & Mads Mikkelsen in FLAMMEN & CITRONEN (Flame & Citron)
• James McAvoy in ATONEMENT
• Toni Servillo in GOMORRA (Gomorrah) and IL DIVO
• Jürgen Vogel in DIE WELLE (The Wave)
• Elmar Wepper in KIRSCHBLÜTEN - HANAMI (Cherry Blossoms)

EUROPEAN SCREENWRITER 2008

• Suha Arraf & Eran Riklis for LEMON TREE
• Maurizio Braucci, Ugo Chiti, Gianni di Gregorio, Matteo Garrone, Massimo Gaudioso & Roberto Saviano for GOMORRA (Gomorrah)
• Ari Folman for WALTZ WITH BASHIR
• Paolo Sorrentino for IL DIVO

• Luca Bigazzi for IL DIVO
• Oscar Faura for EL ORFANATO (The Orphanage)
• Marco Onorato for GOMORRA (Gomorrah)
• Sergey Trofimov & Rogier Stoffers for MONGOL

EUROPEAN FILM ACADEMY PRIX D’EXCELLENCE 2008

• Marton Agh for production design, DELTA
• Magdalena Biedrzycka for costume design, KATYN
• Laurence Briaud for editing, UN CONTE DE NOEL
• Petter Fladeby for sound design, O’HORTEN

EUROPEAN COMPOSER 2008

• Tuur Florizoone for AANRIJDING IN MOSCOU (Moscow, Belgium)
• Dario Marianelli for ATONEMENT
• Max Richter for WALTZ WITH BASHIR
• Fernando Velázquez for EL ORFANATO (The Orphanage)