“The Crossroad” and “They Bloom at Dawn” top Thessaloniki awards

By Tom Whitfield

Mari Gulbiani’s “The Crossroad” and Angela Dimeska’s “They Bloom at Dawn” won the top prizes at the Thessaloniki Film Festival’s Agora industry awards on Wednesday night.

Gulbiani’s Georgian, politically charged road movie took the Two Thirty-Five Award, the leading honor in the Agora Works in Progress section. Produced by Kate Kalandarishvili for Georgia’s Midifilm, it marks the filmmaker’s fiction-feature debut.

Dimeska’s North Macedonian, female-centered drama took the Crossroads Co-Production Forum’s Frenel Post-Lab Post-Production Award. Ognen Anton produced her first feature for North Macedonia’s Dream Factory.

A missing husband and a threatened lake

The festival describes “The Crossroad” as the story of a young Muslim woman whose husband disappears shortly after their wedding. She travels with her mother-in-law and learns that he has gone to Syria to join ISIS.

The Agora Works in Progress jury praised the film:

“for its ambition to craft a road movie across arid lands marked by hostility; for its documentary-inspired perspective on the resilience of those women left behind by men, war and religion; and for its embrace of imagination as their most powerful weapon.”

The citation establishes the jury’s ambitions. It does not establish the film’s production status.

The festival describes “They Bloom at Dawn” as the story of a lost young woman who seeks refuge in her grandparents’ lakeside village. She must help her widowed grandmother save their threatened lake. The crisis forces three generations of women to heal fractured relationships and rediscover purpose.

The Crossroads Co-Production Forum jury said:

“Life is full of surprises. It’s sad, it’s traumatic, but it’s also beautiful. Like the nature it portrays, these characters will also renew themselves and find ways to support each other, even when they can’t find the words for it,”

“This is a project that has a strong visual potential and a story that will resonate across borders. In fact, it’s a project that wants to break walls both in front of and behind the cameras, led by a director and a producer in sync, who moved us with their perfect pitch.”

The citation makes a case for emotional renewal and visual force. It does not establish how the film will reach an audience. The announcement gives no release date or distribution plan.

“Mignon” takes €13,000

Sofia Georgovassili’s psychological thriller “Mignon” won two cash prizes: the Onassis Film Award, worth €10,000 ($11,100), and the €3,000 ($3,300) Agora Works in Progress Award from EKKOMED. The Onassis prize recognizes a Greek project in the Agora Works in Progress strand.

Set in the 1990s, “Mignon” follows two teenage girls on a visit to the titular Athens department store. The festival describes it as a story of moral decay. The jury praised “a compelling, sharp story about the end of innocence,” then wrote:

“A bold film with a suffocating atmosphere, exploring the limits of human endurance, the abuse that fuels closed social systems, the intensity of teenage friendship, the impulse to take risks and the inner strength of the powerless.”

The praise describes the proposed film; the announcement does not report a release.

The wider list of winners

Other Agora Works in Progress awards went to:

• “The Law of the Flies,” Tunahan Kurt — 119 Marvila Studios Award, which offers sound-mixing services. The festival describes the Turkish filmmaker’s film as a story of young love and new horizons.
• “Avanos,” Panagiotis Charamis — ERT Agora Works in Progress Award.
• “Río Masacre,” Sylvie Weber — Neaniko Plano Subtitling Award.
• “Mignon,” Sofia Georgovassili — Agora Works in Progress Award by EKKOMED and Onassis Film Award.

The festival’s Crossroads Co-Production Forum award list included:

• “A Pair of Shoes in the Dark Corner of the Moon,” Ayman El Amir — CNC award for script development from France’s CNC, worth €8,000 ($8,900). The Egyptian filmmaker’s project is a dark comedy.
• “In Those Darkest Nights,” Gözde Kural — ArteKino International Award, worth €6,000 ($6,700).
• “Koukitsa,” Christina Koutsospyrou and Aran Hughe — Finos Film Award, worth €3,000 ($3,300).
• “A Touch of Paradise,” Sarra Ben Hassen — Producers’ Network – Marché du Film Award.
• “The Arab of Your Dreams,” Patrick Tass — Midpoint Consulting Award.
• “This Is Not a Set,” Yumna Marwan’s feature — Greener Screen Consultancy Award and Sofia Meetings of the Sofia IFF Award. The festival identifies Marwan as a Lebanese actress and director.
• “In Those Darkest Nights,” Gözde Kural, and “Fuoristagione,” Isabella Rinaldi — Mediterranean Film Institute Award.
• “A Pair of Shoes in the Dark Corner of the Moon,” Nada Riyadh — EAVE Thessaloniki Marketing Scholarship Award.

The announcement gives different spellings for one of the directors of “Koukitsa”: Aran Hughe in its report on the Finos prize, and Aran Hughes in the complete list. No explanation accompanies the discrepancy.

Within the Agora Series Talents Award listing, Selini Papageorgiou received the Crew United Award and Matina Galatsianou received the Heart of the Project Mentoring Award.

What changes for audiences?

The prizes include script-development funding, post-production awards, cash grants and service awards. The announcement gives no release dates for the projects. For audiences, the practical change is a larger slate of works in development, not confirmed access to new films.

The next test is execution. “The Crossroad” must carry the political and visual ambition its jury praises, while “They Bloom at Dawn” must turn a “strong visual potential” into a film.

The awards mark first steps, not the final outcome.