The Jury Prices for Best Competition Film and Best Competition Documentary were awarded in Convento dell’Annunziata.
Claudia Gerini was greatly welcomed as special guest of the 2020 edition.
The Audience Prices go to Supernova (film section) and The Need To Grow (documentary section.
SESTRI LEVANTE (GE) – Riviera International Film Festival 2020 edition issued its verdicts: the winners are “Relativity“, by the German director of Japanese origin Mariko Minoguchi, and Strike! – Fighting for the Future, by the Italians directors Francesca Floris, Pietro Jellinek and Davide Petrosino. These movies won the Jury Prize 2020, respectively as best competition film and best competition. The Audience Awards, for the most watched and voted movie online, go to “Supernova” by Bartosz Kruhlik (film section) and “The Need To Grow” by Rob Herring and Ryan Wirick (documentary section). The movies were awarded by Claudia Gerini, who presented the awards at the Sala Agave of Convento dell’Annunziata. In the same evening, the Roman actress, greeted by an authentic crowd of fans and onlookers, with whom she spent some time for a selfie or a picture, received the RIFF Icon Award, an award that the festival gives every year to important persons in the movie industry to crown their achievements in the artistic field.
Due to Covid-19 health emergency, this year’s edition was entirely digital. Thousands of users logged on to the website www.rivierafilm.org and watched and voted the competition films and documentary: all movies are still unpublished in Italy and – for the first time – were only available in streaming because of the social distancing rules still in force. “It was a new version of the RIFF but also a gamble won – explains Stefano Gallini Durante, Riviera International Film Festival President, after the event – Thanks to the work of a formidable team we were able to organize an original festival in compliance with all health regulations in force, involving in any case all film enthusiasts in a different and participatory way”.
Vito D’Onghia also applauds RIFF’s new formula. “We are a “rebel” and independent festival and we immediately aligned ourselves with the way film festivals are held worldwide – explains RIFF’s executive director – We had no idea that we could reach such a high number of views. This is a sign: even in a different formula, RIFF has the same success”.
The Riviera International Film Festival is realized with the support of the Municipality of Sestri Levante, with Mediaterraneo Servizi and with the patronage and support of Regione Liguria.
