'Fjord' and 'La perra' win parallel awards at Cannes

Cristian Mungiu's Romanian drama 'Fjord' has garnered significant recognition at the Cannes Film Festival, securing the Fipresci Prize awarded by international critics, the Ecumenical Prize, and the 2026 Citizenship Award. The film, starring Renate Reinsve and Sebastian Stan, was lauded for its moving, tense, and deeply emotional portrayal of a legal battle.

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a moving, tense, and deeply emotional drama that invites the public to reflect on the arguments of both sides.

International critics highlighted 'Fjord' for prompting reflection on the arguments of both sides in the legal dispute, while also mirroring the extreme environment of contemporary life. The Citizenship Award jury praised the film for immersing the audience in the certainties and doubts of a family navigating a society where convictions clash, doing so without stigmatizing any party. They emphasized the importance of recognizing a filmmaker who captures such ambiguities and nuances in an era that often demands black-and-white thinking.

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makes us participants, from within, of the certainties and doubts of a family facing a society in which everyone has their reasons and convictions.

Further accolades included the Ecumenical Prize, whose judges described Mungiu's film, centered on an ultra-conservative Romanian religious family settling in Norway, as a potent warning against ideological extremism. They noted that faith and the protection of the vulnerable can become corrupted when reduced to mere rules, hindering empathy.

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without ever stigmatizing one or the other.

In other parallel awards, the Chilean film 'La perra,' directed by Dominga Sotomayor and based on Pilar Quintana's novel, won the 26th Dog Palm for best canine performance, awarded to the dog Yuri. The Queer Palm, celebrating films with LGBTQ+ representation, went to the American production 'Adolescence, Sex, and Death in Camp Miasma' by Jane Schoenbrun.

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a powerful warning against the risks of ideological drifts.