Successful closing of the 58^th Berlinale festival for Götz Spielmann’s Revanche. After the Europa Cinemas Label, the subtle drama on guilt and revenge which had premiered in the Panorama section was also awarded the Art-Cinéma-Award 2008 by the C.I.C.A.E. (International Confederation of Art House Cinemas) and the Femina Prize for Maria Gruber’s set design.

Label Europa Cinemas
Launched for the first time in 2003 within the Cannes Film Festival, the Europa Cinemas Label has been created in order to help European films increase their distribution and raise their profile with audiences and media. The Label is since then awarded by a jury of 5 member exhibitors to a European film selected in the Directors' Fortnight section in Cannes and since 2004 in the Venice Days. Since 2005, Europa Cinemas has been cooperating with the Berlinale to award the Label in the Panorama section. Revanche will now receive the invaluable support of extended theatrical exposure and additional promotion from the Europa Cinemas network.


The jury issued the following statement about the film
This is a very well made and dramatic film that we believe has the potential to grip audiences around Europe. The story is absorbing, the characters well drawn and the performances uniformly strong. This is true European cinema at its best – an authentic and uncompromised view of a corner of Europe.
 

C.I.C.A.E Prizes
The Confédération Internationale des Cinémas d’Art et d’Essai (C.I.C.A.E.), the International Confederation of Art House Cinemas, forms one jury for the Panorama and one for the Forum. Each jury awards one prize in its section.
 
The Panorama-Jury gives the Art-Cinéma-Award 2008 to Austrian director Götz Spielmanns Revanche, a very thoroughfully written and directed film about the struggle for a better, for a civil life. The director chooses the form of a calm and quiet drama to tell a very universal, emotional story about the loss of dreams, about moral values, love and forgiveness. What makes Revanche so much different of linear dramas or simple-crime-movies are it‘s very subtle interpreted, multi-dimensional characters and the writer-director is supported here by magnificent actors who are responsible for the film’s incredible richness.
 

Femina Film Prize Germany’s Association of Women Working in Film will award for the first time the annual Femina Film Prize at the Berlinale. The prize honours the “outstanding artistic contribution of a female technician” in a German-language feature film in the areas of set design, camera work, costumes, music or editing.
The jury awards the Femina Film Prize to Maria Gruber for set design in Revanche by Götz Spielmann

The precision of Maria Gruber’s production design has convinced the jury. Her rooms hint in a subtle way to the characters’ personality. They conduce to the story and blend beautifully with the costumes to form a whole. Her production design is special without trying too hard. It manages to be at the same time surprising and truthfull while renouncing the cliche. This way places paces come into being that will be remembered.