Frances O’Connor’s ‘Emily’ and her actress Emma Mackey take home the main awards

The film Emily by director Frances O’Connor, has been awarded the Hitchcock d’Or at the 33rd edition of the Dinard British Film Festival, the organizers announced on Saturday evening October 1.

This is Australian actress Frances O’Connor’s directorial debut. Dedicated to the famous British novelist Emily Brontë who died at the age of 30, the film, which also won the audience award, focuses on the journey of a tormented and rebellious young woman. Emily is played by Franco-British actress Emma Mackey, who also won the Hitchcock for Best Performance for this role.

The special prize of the Barrière jury is awarded to The Almond and the Seahorse by Celyn Jones and Tom Stern. “These are people trapped in their lives and moving forward”, summarized Celyn Jones. The co-director also plays Joe, a victim of amnesia after a head trauma, one of the main protagonists of this feature film which intertwines the lives of two couples.

A collective interpretation prize was awarded to All my Friends Hate Me by Andrew Gaynord, recounting a strange party between friends which, in the end, turns sour. With in particular Joshua McGuire, Christopher Fairbank and Georgina Campbell.

The 33rd British film festival opened on September 28 and notably offered around thirty feature films screened as well as six films in competition. This edition, which ends this Sunday, October 2, also presented around twenty European previews, according to the organizers. During her opening speech, the artistic director of the festival, Dominique Green, defended “a selection of films that allow us to question ourselves: who do we think we are?”.

The Franco-British jury was chaired by French actor José Garcia. The latter had launched this festival with a thunderous “brilliant”. “It’s my favorite word in the English language.“because it emphasizes in particular”audacity”, “smart” of the one who is qualified by this term, he had explained. The festival also intended to pay tribute to the director and legend of British theater Peter Brook, who died on July 2 at the age of 97, with the screening of his adaptation of the novel by William Golding His Majesty of the Flies (1963). In 2021, this festival, intended to promote British cinema to French audiences and distributors, rewarded in particular Limbo by Ben Sharrock and Sweetheart by Marley Morrison.