The Icelandic series Blackport, created by Gisli Örn Gardarsson, Björn Hlynur Haraldsson and Nina Dögg Filippusdottir, won the grand prize of the Séries Mania Festival, which ended on September 2 in Lille. The jury, chaired by the Israeli Hagai Levi, the creator of BeTipul (In therapy) and The Affair, has chosen to honor the social vein that permeated the event. Blackport chronicle, through the fate of a small fishing community, the eruption of liberalism in the 1980s, when fishing rights were privatized. The series will be broadcast in France on Arte.
The Best Actress Award went to young Danish actress Marie Reuther, who plays a grieving teenage influencer in Suicide bomber, while the prize for the best actor was made collective by rewarding the Israeli interpreters of The Echo of Your Voice, created and directed by filmmaker Tom Shoval. The Echo of Your Voice reflects on transmission and paternity by staging three generations of musicians.
“Germinal” wins the public prize
The OCS platform emerged as a winner in the French competition since it won two of the three prizes awarded. The one for the best series crowned the comedy Young and Golri, created by Agnès Hurstel (who is also the interpreter), Victor Saint Macary and Léa Domenach, while Ariane Labed was named best actress for The Opera. Daniel Njo Lobé won the Best Actor Award for The code, detective series which will soon be broadcast by France 2.
The International Panorama section, whose jury was chaired by our colleague Florence Aubenas, awarded the prize for the best series to The Last Socialist Artifact, bittersweet Croatian comedy about the endless aftermath of the socialist era. As Blackport, The Last Socialist Artifact took its first steps during the Co-Pro Pitching Sessions of Séries Mania, workshops during which the creators propose their projects to producers and broadcasters. In the same section, Colombian production Vida de colores, which sets in motion characters crossing the boundaries of gender and community identities, received the special jury prize.
Finally, and not surprisingly, it is Germinal which won the audience award. The adaptation of Emile Zola’s novel, created by Julien Lilti and directed by David Hourrègue. The imposing and dynamic proletarian fresco, already available on Salto, soon to be broadcast on France 2, had been presented on the site of the Arenberg pit, in the mining basin, in front of an audience of former miners or their descendants.