German film wins European Film Award accolade

The German drama Head-On was the big winner at the 17th annual European Film Awards in Spain, picking up the prize for best European film, while the Spanish film The Sea Inside won for best director, Alejandro Almenabar, and best actor, Javier Bardem.

A sexually-explicit drama about second-generation Turkish immigrants in Germany, Head-On also received top honours earlier this year at the Berlin Film Festival, winning the Golden Bear.

The film’s director, Fatih Akin, himself a citizen of both Germany and Turkey, said it is one of the first films to tackle the problems of Muslim immigrants in Europe.

“Three different views are in this film: the Turkish-Turkish view, the Turkish-German view, and the German-German view. We’ve tried to bring those three views together, to find a middle ground,” Akin said after the awards ceremony at the new Barcelona International Convention Centre.

Almenabar’s “The Sea Inside”, a pre-show favourite for best European film, tells the story of a paraplegic man who fights for the right to end his own life.