Sony Pictures Classics Soars on the Croisette
05/22/2016
NEW YORK (May 22, 2016) – Sony Pictures Classics has once again been a prevalent force in Cannes with their four highly critically acclaimed films, topped off by winning two awards last night. This kicks off what promises to be an exciting year ahead for the company, which is celebrating its 25th anniversary.
TONI ERDMANN won the Fipresci Competition Award, the International Critics’ Prize for Best Picture in Cannes Competition. Writer/director Maren Ade’s fresh and groundbreaking comedy drama, TONI ERDMANN tells the story of a practical joker Winfried who disguises himself to get busy daughter Ines’ attention and change her corporate lifestyle. The father-daughter challenge reaches absurd proportions until Ines begins to see that her eccentric father deserves a place in her life. SPC’s SON OF SAUL, winner of last year’s Academy Award for Best Foreign Film, won this award in 2015.
THE RED TURTLE, a major new animated feature, won the Un Certain Regard Special Prize & Commendations from the Ecumenical Jury. Directed by famed Studio Ghibli animator and Oscar winner Michael Dudok de Wit, THE RED TURTLE recounts the milestones in the life of a human being through the story of a man shipwrecked on a tropical island inhabited by turtles, crabs and birds.
In Competition film JULIETA marks writer/director Pedro Almodóvar’s 20th film. Based on short stories by Nobel laureate Alice Munro, JULIETA is about a mother’s struggle to survive uncertainty. It is also about fate, guilt complexes and that unfathomable mystery that leads us to abandon the people we love, erasing them from our lives as if they had never meant anything, as if they had never existed. JULIETA has received acclaim for its rich storytelling and supreme design as well as great performances led by Adriana Ugarte, Emma Suárez and Rossy de Palma.
Paul Verhoeven's In Competition film ELLE has already been named by many as the masterful filmmaker’s finest feature yet. Isabelle Huppert plays Michèle, who seems indestructible. Head of a leading video game company, she brings the same ruthless attitude to her love life as to business. Being attacked in her home by an unknown assailant changes Michèle's life forever. When she resolutely tracks the man down, they are both drawn into a curious and thrilling game that may, at any moment, spiral out of control. Many are calling Huppert’s performance in ELLE her finest one to date.
SPC plans to release all four films before the end of the year.
ABOUT SONY PICTURES CLASSICS
Michael Barker and Tom Bernard serve as co-presidents of Sony Pictures Classics—an autonomous division of Sony Pictures Entertainment they founded with Marcie Bloom in January 1992, which distributes, produces, and acquires independent films from around the world. Barker and Bernard have released prestigious films that have won 32 Academy Awards® (28 of those at Sony Pictures Classics) and have garnered 159 Academy Award® nominations (133 at Sony Pictures Classics) including Best Picture nominations for WHIPLASH, AMOUR, MIDNIGHT IN PARIS, AN EDUCATION, CAPOTE, HOWARDS END, AND CROUCHING TIGER, HIDDEN DRAGON.
ABOUT SONY PICTURES ENTERTAINMENT
Sony Pictures Entertainment (SPE) is a subsidiary of Sony Corporation of America, a subsidiary of Tokyo-based Sony Corporation. SPE's global operations encompass motion picture production and distribution; television production and distribution; home entertainment acquisition and distribution; a global channel network; digital content creation and distribution; operation of studio facilities; development of new entertainment products, services and technologies; and distribution of entertainment in more than 142 countries. For additional information, go to http://www.sonypictures.com/.