‘Empty Nets’ Catches Top Prize at Adelaide Film Festival

variety.com:

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Iranian drama film “Empty Nets” was Monday named winner of the AFF Feature Fiction Award at the Adelaide Film Festival.

Directed by Behrooz Karamizade, it collected an A$10,000 ($6,320) cash prize. The festival’s competition section is one of the oldest in Australia and seeks to reward bold filmmaking.

This year’s competition mostly comprised films by directors making their feature debuts. They included “Blaga’s Lessons,” from Bulgarian director Stephan Komandarev; “Embryo Larva Butterfly,” by Greek-Cypriot writer-director Kyros Papavassiliou; “On The Go,” from directors Julia de Castro and Mari?a Gise?le Royo; “Sahela,” directed by Australia’s Raghuvir Joshi; and “You’ll Never Find Me,” from Adelaide-based duo Josiah Allen and Indianna Bell. “’Empty Nets’ is a searing portrait of the bleak socioeconomic reality for young people without family money in contemporary Iran, distinguished by atmospheric visuals, an evocative sense of place, stirring lead performances and a powerful grasp of the sea as a metaphor for both freedom and menace,” said the jury which comprised Kitty Green (“The Royal Hotel”), Goran Stolevski (“Housekeeping for Beginners,” “Of an Age”), film journalist David Rooney, Indonesian film curator Alexander Matius and film executive Sally Riley.

The same jury awarded an equal cash prize to “Hollywoodgate,” as winner of the AFF Feature Documentary Award. It was directed by Egyptian journalist turned filmmaker Ibrahim Nash’at.“ ‘Hollywoodgate’ is a masterful critique of two diametrically opposed systems — the U.S.