"Quo Vadis, Aida?" and "Flee" win big at the European Film Awards

by Nathaniel R

The years bleed together in the world of movie awards. Quo Vadis Aida?, the Bosnian drama, premiered at the Venice Film Festival in 2020 before receiving an Oscar nomination for Best International Feature Film that same season. It lost the Oscar to 2020's European Film Awards champ, Denmark's Another Round. Now, a full movie awards season later, it has succeeded its once-vanquisher to also take the top prize at the European Film Awards. What's more two British Oscar winners last year, Promising Young Woman and The Father also picked up key prizes. The only Oscar hopeful this season that arguably got a boost from the European Awards was the animated documentary Flee, which triumphed in both of its categories, Animated Feature & Documentary Feature, a double-whammy it surely hopes to achieve again at the Oscars. You can watch the ceremony here if you're so inclined.

This has no bearing on the Oscars of course, since none of those films are eligible but it is a mild eyebrower raiser that France's Titane, Finland's Compartment No 6, Italy's The Hand of God, and Norway's Worst Person in the World, all of which are award-winning presumed threats to Oscar nominations this season, could beat the year-old Bosnian film in any of their categories. Complete list of winners after the jump...

EUROPEAN FILM 2021
COMPARTMENT NO. 6, dir: Juho Kuosmanen (Finland)
★ QUO VADIS, AIDA?, dir: Jasmila Žbanić (Bosnia and Herzegovina)
THE FATHER, dir: Florian Zeller (UK)
THE HAND OF GOD, dir: Paolo Sorrentino (Italy)
TITANE, dir: Julia Ducournau (France)

EUROPEAN DIRECTOR 2021
Julia Ducornau for TITANE (France)
Radu Jude for BAD LUCK BANGING OR LOONY PORN (Romania)
Paolo Sorrentino for THE HAND OF GOD (Italy)
★  Jasmila Žbanić for QUO VADIS, AIDA? (Bosnia and Herzegovina)
Florian Zeller for THE FATHER (UK)

EUROPEAN COMEDY 2021
★  NINJABABY, dir: Yngvild Sve Flikke (Norway)
THE MORNING AFTER, dir: Méliane Marcaggi (France)
THE PEOPLE UPSTAIRS, dir: Cesc Gay (Spain)

EUROPEAN DOCUMENTARY 2021

BABI YAR. CONTEXT, dir: Sergei Loznitsa (Ukraine)
★  FLEE, dir: Jonas Poher Rasmussen (Denmark)
MR BACHMANN AND HIS CLASS, dir: Maria Speth (Germany)
TAMING THE GARDEN, dir: Salomé Jashi (Switzerland/Germany/Georgia)
THE MOST BEAUTIFUL BOY IN THE WORLD, dirs: Kristina Lindström & Kristian Petri (Sweden)

EUROPEAN ANIMATED FEATURE FILM 2021
EVEN MICE BELONG IN HEAVEN, dirs: Denisa Grimmová & Jan Bubeníček (Czech Republic)
★  FLEE, dir: Jonas Poher Rasmussen (Denmark)
THE APE STAR, dir: Linda Hambäck (Sweden/Norway/Denmark)
WHERE IS ANNE FRANK, dir: Ari Folman (Israel)
WOLFWALKERS, dirs: Tomm Moore & Ross Stewart (Ireland)

EUROPEAN ACTRESS 2021
★  Jasna Đuričić in QUO VADIS, AIDA? (Bosnia and Herzegovina)
Seidi Haarla in COMPARTMENT NO. 6 (Finland)
Carey Mulligan in PROMISING YOUNG WOMAN (UK)
Renate Reinsve in THE WORST PERSON IN THE WORLD (Norway)
Agathe Rousselle in TITANE (France)

EUROPEAN ACTOR 2021

I'm not Anthony Hopkins as you can see...

-Florian Zeller accepting "Best Actor"  for his star

Yuriy Borisov in COMPARTMENT NO. 6 (Finland)
★  Anthony Hopkins in THE FATHER (UK)
Vincent Lindon in TITANE (France)
Tahar Rahim in THE MAURITANIAN (France)
Franz Rogowski in GREAT FREEDOM (Austria/Germany)

EUROPEAN SCREENWRITER 2021
Radu Jude for BAD LUCK BANGING OR LOONY PORN (Romania)
Paolo Sorrentino for THE HAND OF GOD (Italy)
Joachim Trier & Eskil Vogt for THE WORST PERSON IN THE WORLD (Norway)
Jasmila Žbanić for QUO VADIS, AIDA? (Bosnia and Herzegovina)
★  Florian Zeller & Christopher Hampton for THE FATHER (UK)

Despite no film or director nomination, Joachim Trier does land here for the excellent Worst Person in the World. Yes we mention this movie a lot but we love it so...

EUROPEAN SHORT FILM 2021
BELLA, (hybrid) Greece
DISPLACED, (documentary) Kosovo
EASTER EGGS, (animated) Belgium/France/Netherlands
IN FLOW OF WORDS, (documentary) Netherlands
★  MY UNCLE TUDOR, (documentary) Belgium/Portugal/Hungary/Moldova

EUROPEAN DISCOVERY AWARDS 2021
BEGINNING (Georgia)
LAMB (Iceland)
PLAYGROUND (Belgium)
PLEASURE (Sweden/Netherlands/France)
★  PROMISING YOUNG WOMAN (UK)
THE WHALER BOY (Russia/Poland/Belgium)

PREVIOUSLY ANNOUNCED AWARDS

Austria's Great Freedom, France's Titane, and Iceland's Lamb, all hoping for Best International Feature Oscar nominations this season, picked up at least one craft honor.

European Cinematography Crystel Fournier – Great Freedom (Austria's Oscar submission)

European Editing Mukharam Kabulova – Unclenching The Fists (Russia's Oscar submission)

European Production Design Marton Agh – Natural Light

European Costume Design Michael O’Connor – Ammonite

European Make-Up & Hair Flore Masson, Olivier Alfonso, Antoine Mancini – Titane

European Original Score Nils Petter Molvaer, Peter Brotz-Mann – Great Freedom

European Sound Gisle Tveito, Gustaf Berger – The Innocents

European Visual Effects Peter Hjorth, Fredrik Nord – Lamb

European Lifetime Achievement Marta Meszaros

European Achievement in World Cinema Susanne Bier

European University Film Award Flee, dir: Jonas Poher Rasmussen

Steve McQueen showed up to accept in person.

EFA For Innovative Storytelling Steve McQueen – Small Axe

Young Audience Award The Crossing (Norway)

Comments

[Edwin]

I think Flee is in a good position to win Best Animated Feature this year, but Disney favoritism might let Encanto triumph (which I know is also a well liked movie, but it doesn’t seem to have anywhere near the level of passion going for it that Flee’s biggest supporters have shown). My worry is that if it does get nominated for both Documentary and Animated Feature, voters will split the votes and it’ll end up winning neither since I don’t know how strong the incentive to give it both awards will be. But we’ll see, I suppose.

[Gallavich]

Love that three horror movies have been awarded. Learn Oscars, learn