“Dao” Wins Golden Spike at Valladolid’s 71st Festival — SkimNews
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- Alain Gomis received the Golden Spike for “Dao,” a three-hour hybrid of fiction and documentary that moves between a wedding in France and an ancestral memorial in Guinea-Bissau; praise converged around its rhythm, duration and movement, with the international jury highlighting the form and Variety’s Guy Lodge calling it Gomis’s “most vibrantly expansive and accessible” work.
- La Gradiva took the Silver Spike, the José Salcedo editing prize for Guillaume Lillo and the Rainbow Spike for LGBTQ-related cinema; after winning Cannes Critics’ Week’s Grand Prix, it collected Melbourne International Film Festival’s Bright Horizons Award in August, and MK2 Films represents international sales.
- Lisandro Alonso won the Ribera del Duero best-director award for “Double Freedom,” the well-received sequel to his 2001 debut “Freedom”; Luxbox sells the film.
- Alba Rohrwacher won best actress for playing a corporate executive in Stéphane Brizé’s “A Good Little Soldier”; Swann Arlaud won best actor for Emmanuel Marre’s “A Man of His Time,” which also took Olivier Boonjing’s cinematography award.
- “Salen las lobas” took both the Meeting Point Audience Award and Seminci Youth Prize as a double audience favorite; its story follows girls in a juvenile justice facility bonding over music and dreams of a Barcelona trap competition, with a Dec. 11 Spanish theatrical release through Silencio Cinema.
- Hassen Ferhani won the Time of History Grand Prize for the Algeria-France production “Alea Jacarandas,” while Mariano Llinás received the section’s special award for “Life of Jorge Luis Borges.”
- Seminci canceled its traditional closing gala after a deadly train accident in Toledo province; organizers separately reported a provisional audience tally of 100,000, more than 120 film discussions and participation by over 90% of directors in its official sections.
Why it matters: For “Salen las lobas,” Valladolid delivered two audience honors and a dated theatrical rollout: a Dec. 11 Spanish release through Silencio Cinema. For Gomis and Atlan, “Dao” and “La Gradiva” earned top prizes while Party Film Sales, Janus Films and MK2 Films handle sales or distribution, giving the festival a concrete role in film circulation.
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