Saturday 17 August saw the announcement on the Piazza Grande, to an audience of 5’700, of the winners of the 66th edition of the Festival del film Locarno. The 2013 edition, the first under Artistic Director Carlo Chatrian, was a resounding success and was crowned with the award of the Pardo d’oro to Historia de la meva mort by Albert Serra.
Festival President Marco Solari officially closed the 66th edition, saying that “on behalf of the Board of Directors I thank the two first-time directors Carlo Chatrian and Mario Timbal and the commitment of their respective teams for having strengthened the Locarno Festival, in operational and artistic terms, in the difficult and competitive film festival world”.
Carlo Chatrian commented that he was very satisfied with his first edition as Artistic Director, adding: “for eleven days Locarno has seen a celebration of cinema in which the films were center-stage. We are delighted that the Festival proved to be a meeting-place for and dialogue between master filmmakers from the past, present and future and enabled the audience to be part of this exchange”.
COO Mario Timbal announced initial figures for the event: “in terms of audience numbers we have seen a consolidation of what has been achieved in recent years with a slight increase:162.919 admissions (2012: 161.680) over the eleven days. The number of delegate accreditations also increased, to a total of 4.114 (2012: 3.950). A larger number of press attended the Festival, with 929 journalists and photographers (2012: 900). The increase in industry accreditations – to 1.013 (2012:970) – is largely due to a greater number of buyers attending”.
The list of Locarno 2013’s prize-winning films, as well as articles, photo gallery and recordings of various Festival guests’ open conversations with the audience, are available on www.pardo.ch.
The 67th Festival del film Locarno will take place 6-16 August 2014