Iranian Filmmaker Majid Majidi Wins Top Prize at Busan Film Festival for 'Lunch'

Veteran Iranian filmmaker Majid Majidi won the Best Film award at the 31st Busan International Film Festival for 'Lunch,' a simple yet powerful work in his contemporary style, about a rural schoolteacher who makes difficult moral choices to ensure his students receive free lunches amid government austerity measures. Majidi accepted the award from this […]

With the win, the socially conscious drama from the veteran writer and director is now eligible for this year's Best International Film Oscar.

Veteran Iranian filmmaker Majid Majidi has won Best Film at the 31st Busan International Film Festival for "Ghaza Zohr," his simple yet utterly powerful contemporary drama about a rural schoolteacher who makes difficult moral choices to ensure his students continue to receive free lunch.

Majidi received the award from the head of this year's competition jury, renowned Chinese director Zhang Yimou, and gave an impassioned speech protesting the war in Iran - specifically condemning the Minab school attack in February this year, which left 156 civilians (120 of them students) dead in a US military strike. In the end, Majidi said: They will stand firm until the end and fight to regain independence. Related Stories YouTube to tag AI-generated songs across its platforms: Listeners 'want transparency' YouTube virtues, industry consolidation, Christie Brinkley and 'Baywatch': Trends and themes from a busy Mipcom

"Midnight Food" with its humanistic approach to social realism and its special focus on the welfare of children is one of Majidi's works, which includes films such as "The Color of Heaven" and "Children of the Sun" in the Venice 2020 competition. He is known internationally with the film "Children of Paradise" produced in 1998, the first Iranian production that was nominated for the best international film today. In a complimentary review of his latest, Variety critic Kambol Campbell wrote, "Majidi's matter-of-fact cinematography underscores the cold reality that [the protagonist] is trying to navigate, removing any semblance of potential indoctrination." Popular in Variety

"Ghaza Zohr" could potentially put Majidi back in the Oscar race: Under new Academy rules enacted this year, Busan's winner automatically qualifies the film for the Best International Feature Oscar, without its country needing to officially submit it for consideration. (Iran has entered the "Land of Angels" this year.) Busan is the sixth and final festival on the calendar to be awarded this status. Other films guaranteed eligibility under the new rule include festival award winners "Shame and Money" and "To Hold the Mountain" (both Sundance), "The Yellow Letters" (Berlin), "The Fjord" (Cannes), "The Unknown Woman" (Cannes) and "Ang" (Toronto).

Other winners in Busan's main competition — slated entirely with films from Asian countries, most of which are world premieres — include Taiwanese family drama "Ordinariness," which won best director for Lee Yoon-chan, who Variety praised for its "elegant poise" and "subtle, empathetic touch." This is Lee's first film in more than 15 years, and he noted in his speech that he was wearing the same clothes he was wearing when he wore them. He made his debut in 2005's "Shoe Fairy" in Busan.

The Special Jury Prize went to Indonesian director Eddy Kahyuno for Ibuko, about a working-class Indonesian widow trying to keep her adult daughter alive in a Saudi Arabian prison, which Campbell praised as "most compelling when its spiritual qualities are felt rather than seen".

The neutral acting prize was shared by two actresses: Japanese newcomer Kashun Himeno, whose performance as a high school sweetheart in the charming "Satoko Always" was described by Variety critic James Marsh as "stunning [and] star-making." and Chinese star Zhu Jun as a single mother coping with the death of her father in director Gu You's tearjerker "The First Taste of Loneliness." Praised by Variety as "patient, restrained and delicately observed," Gu's film also won an artistic contribution award for sound designer Danfeng Li.

In a separate New Streams competition for first films, Indian filmmaker Shashank Walia won for "Birds in the Dark," about corruption and land disputes in rural Punjab. Korean director Lim Hyeon's Beach Fantasy, an enjoyable and fleeting romantic drama that also played in the main competition, won the Special Jury Prize.

Zhang was joined on the competition's grand jury by Chinese filmmaker Kay Ishikawa and Juli Yong, directors Samal Yesliamova and Choi. Hee Seo and producer Tran Thi Bich Nguk, who all hosted the glamorous closing ceremony at Busan's ultra-modern film center, with South Korean singer and actor Yim Si Wan ("Squid Game") as emcee.

A host of other awards were handed out at the Busan Vision Awards yesterday, where Mongolian-German 'Zogsool' took home a quadruple, while Spain's Oscar hopeful 'La Bola Negra' added another festival audience award to its tally. More about them here.