On Sunday, January 19, UniFrance presented a French Cinema Award to the filmmaker Olivier Assayas. The award was given out by Daniela Elstner and Serge Toubiana, who paid tribute to Assayas as an outstanding ambassador of French cinema in the presence of many guests and friends of the director.
Olivier Assayas has made his mark as an important reference in contemporary cinema both in France and internationally since the second half of the 1980s. His films, which show a great openness to the world, are part of a long tradition of French auteur filmmaking that was inspired by the French New Wave but also influenced by major international movements, coming notably from Asia. Although Assayas regularly shoots his films abroad, his productions remain based in France, with production companies including Rectangle Productions, mk2, and CG Cinéma. As the filmmaker explains, "My films often get made due to their ability to be sold internationally, while in France it has always been more complicated."
Serge Toubiana, UniFrance president—who first met Olivier Assayas in the early 1980s when the director expressed a desire to write for Les Cahiers du Cinéma, of which Toubiana was chief editor at the time—stated: "People's connection with Olivier's films is strong, pure, driven by an indestructible faith. In 2019, Non-Fiction reached a wider audience abroad than in France, with around 600,000 spectators registered in international theaters. This is one of the reasons why UniFrance has chosen to honor Assayas with a French Cinema Award this year in recognition of his essential contribution to furthering the exposure of French cinema around the world."
Created in 2016 by UniFrance, the French Cinema Award (which was redesigned in 2018 by the Maison Daum*) honors an exceptional figure in the international movie industry who has contributed to raising the profile of French cinema internationally.
French Cinema Awards since 2016
2016
- Producers Aton Soumache and Dimitri Rassam (Le Petit Prince)
- Italian distributor Andrea Occhipinti (Lucky Red)
2017
- Chinese distributor La Peikang (China Film Group)
- German distributor Torsten Frehse (Neue Visionen)
- Actress Isabelle Huppert
2018
- Actress Juliette Binoche
- Director of the China Film Archive Sun Xianghui
- Spanish distributor Adolfo Blanco (A Contracorriente Films)
2019
- Directors Olivier Nakache and Éric Toledano
*Art is an expression of emotions, a universal language. It is, indeed, "meant to disturb," in the words of the artist Georges Braque. The vision of the Maison Daum is about awakening a reminiscence of ancestral art; it also expresses an abiding connection with the art scene, through over 400 collaborations with artists over the years (such as Armand, Braque, Dali, Mesnager, and Kongo, among others). To celebrate its 140th anniversary, the Maison Daum wished, through the French Cinema Award, to offer a magical work representing the wings of a white crystal angel created by Jean Lamore, which serves as a veritable symbol of the pure emotion of aesthetic pleasure.
