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| Werner Herzog |
German filmmaker Werner Herzog was full of praise for the Basque country as he picked up his Donostia Award for lifetime achievement at San Sebastian Film Festival's opening ceremony, where politics was to the fore.
Herzog's Bucking Fastard, starring Rooney and Kate Mara as co-dependent sisters, alongside Orlando Bloom as a man they both fall for, is screening at the northern Spanish film festival after its premiere in Toronto.
Bloom presented the award to Herzog, who said: “What an honour to receive it from the very hands of Orlando Bloom. He’s a living legend at his young age already. He is a treasure of cinema.”
Herzog also noted that he follows Spain’s national poetry competition, adding: “I feel like as if I belong here. It is a country of poetry. It’s a country of poets, and I receive this here from the poets. Thank you very much.”
The film festival previously called for an "immediate ceasefire" in Gaza and the hosts of the evening Fariba Sheikhan and Mariona Terés said: “We join the myriad of voices calling for an end to genocide, like the one happening in Gaza,” adding: “And we stand in solidarity with the directors of the film Naza, Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor, who have been threatened by the Israeli government."
Naza, which will screen later in the week after showing in Toronto and Venice, sees Israeli military officers outline claims regarding protocol's used to target civilians in Gaza.
Israel’s culture minister Miki Zohar, has threatened to revoke the pair’s Israeli citizenship since the film won the Special Jury Prize in Venice.
