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Film und Medien Stiftung NRWNewsPressAwards ceremony at Cannes Film Festival: Diane Kruger named Best Actress in „In The Fade"

Awards ceremony at Cannes Film Festival: Diane Kruger named Best Actress in „In The Fade"

Diane Kruger, the lead actress in Fatih Akin’s Filmstiftung-backed thriller „In The Fade", has just been named Best Actress at the 70th Festival de Cannes. The gala awards ceremony, which was presided over by the jury under the chairmanship of Pedro Almodovar including the director Maren Ade („Toni Erdmann"), was held in the Grand Théatre Lumière on Sunday evening. The Golden Palm was won by Ruben Östlund for „The Square".

Director Fatih Akin and lead actress Diane Kruger © Kurt Krieger / Film- und Medienstiftung NRW
Director Fatih Akin and lead actress Diane Kruger © Kurt Krieger / Film- und Medienstiftung NRW

„Congratulations to all of the prize-winners and, above all, to Diane Kruger! Everybody had been crossing their fingers after the enthusiastic reception for ,In The Fade' in the Competition on Friday. The jury has now given its Best Actress Prize to Diane Kruger. It’s also a great success for her director Fatih Akin who enriched the festival with his politically charged film from Germany. We are very pleased for Bombero and the whole team!", says Petra Müller, CEO of the Film- und Medienstiftung NRW.

„In The Fade" von Fatih Akin (Wettbewerb)
Fatih Akin’s thriller centres on a woman’s love for her family beyond the grave. Her life suddenly implodes when her husband and son die in a bomb attack. The police arrests two suspects: a young couple from the Neo-Nazi scene. The young woman wants justice – there isn’t any alternative for her. Diane Kruger, Denis Moschitto and Ulrich Tukur are cast in the leads. „In The Fade“ is a production by bombero international in co-production with Warner Bros. Film Productions Germany, Macassar Productions (F), Pathé (F) and corazón international. The Filmstiftung NRW backed the film with 250,000 Euros, the main funder was Filmförderung Hamburg Schleswig-Holstein, with other funding coming from FFA, BKM and DFFF. Warner will be releasing the film theatrically.

NRW with five supported films in Cannes
A total of five Filmstiftung-backed productions had been invited to the anniversary edition of the festival on the Croisette: „In The Fade" by Fatih Akin was joined in the Competition by „Jupiter’s Moon" by Kornél Mundruczó, the socio-political dramas „Tehran Taboo" by Ali Soozandeh and „Los Perros" by Marcela Said were invited to the Semaine de la Critique, while the documentary „The Prince Of Nothingwood" by Sonia Kronlund screened in the Quinzaine des Réalisateurs sidebar. Another Filmstiftung-backed production – the winner of the 2016 Student Oscar, „My Second Eye" („Ayny") by the KHM graduate Ahmad Saleh – screened in German Films and the FFA’s Next Generation Short Tiger showcase of shorts.

During the press lunch hosted by the Filmstiftung NRW, the "Toni Erdmann" producers Janine Jackowski and Jonas Dornbach of Komplizenfilm had handed over a cheque for 400,000 Euros to the Filmstiftung’s CEO Petra Müller exactly a year after the film’s premiere, having now paid back a large part of the funding to the Filmstiftung NRW.

The Film- und Medienstiftung NRW presented the film region of NRW during the festival at the German Pavilion, the joint stand of Focus Germany and German Films