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Fantastico! Vassiliou congratulates Sorrentino after La grande bellezza scoops Oscar

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European Commissioner Androulla Vassiliou has congratulated Italian director-screenwriter Paolo Sorrentino whose MEDIA-backed epic La grande bellezza (The Great Beauty) won the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film at last night's 86th Academy Awards in Hollywood.

The movie, staring Toni Servillo as a 65-year-old socialite reflecting on his life in Rome, has received more than €300,000 to date from the European Union's MEDIA programme for film development and distribution. In total, seven MEDIA-backed titles were nominated for Oscars in six categories.

Writing on Twitter this morning, Commissioner Vassiliou commented: "It gave me great pleasure to hand over the best European Film Award to The Great Beauty by Sorrentino last December. Now I am thrilled that it received the Oscar as well for the best foreign film. Fantastico!"

La Grande Bellezza, which premiered at the 2013 Cannes Film Festival, is an Italian (Medusa Film, Indigo Film) and French (Babe Film) co-production. As well as winning four prizes at the European Film Awards in Berlin last December (best film, director, actor, editor), it has also won the best foreign film category at the Golden Globes and the British Academy Film Awards (BAFTAs).

European film-makers had a good night at the Oscars. The Best Picture award went to 12 Years a Slave by British director Steve McQueen, while space drama Gravity, filmed at the Pinewood and Shepperton Studios near London, won seven Oscars, including direction (Alfonso Cuarón) and technical awards for cinematography, film editing, visual effects, sound editing, sound mixing and score.

Mr Hublot by French directors Laurent Witz and Alexandre Espigares, won the Oscar for Animated Short. The animation features a character created by the Belgian sculptor Stéphane Halleu.

Background

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MEDIA-backed films nominated for the 86th Academy Awards

Best Picture

Philomena by Stephen Frears (United Kingdom, France, USA)

Awarded €402,000 from MEDIA distribution

Best Foreign Language Film

La Grande Bellezza (The Great Beauty) by Paolo Sorrentino (Italy, France)

Awarded €314,000 from MEDIA development and distribution

Jagten (The Hunt) by Thomas Vinterberg (Denmark)

Awarded €662,000 from MEDIA development, i2i and distribution

L'Image manquante (The Missing Picture) by Rithy Panh (Cambodia, France)

Awarded €54,000 from MEDIA distribution

The Broken Circle Breakdown by Felix Van Groeningen (Belgium)

Awarded €388,000 from MEDIA distribution

Best Animated Feature Film

Ernest and Celestine by Stéphane Aubier, Vincent Patar, Benjamin Renner (France, Belgium)

Awarded €184,000 from MEDIA development and distribution

Best Documentary Feature

The Act of Killing by Joshua Oppenheimer (Denmark, Norway, United Kingdom)

Awarded €172,000 from MEDIA distribution

Best Actress

Judi Dench for Philomena

Costume Design

Michael O'Connor for The Invisible Woman

More information

European Commission: Creative Europe
Androulla Vassiliou's website
Follow Androulla Vassiliou on Twitter @VassiliouEU

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