Romanian director Cristi Puiu’s 2016 drama Sieranevada, which was in the competition for a Palme d’Or at last year’s Cannes film festival, gathered a total of 16 nominations at this year’s edition of the Gopo Awards, an event awarding the local film industry.

A total of 21 Romanian feature films launched in local cinemas in 2016 were considered for the various categories of the Gopo Awards, which take place March 21 at the National Theater in Bucharest.    

Five movies were nominated in The Best Film category, all of them having received a host of international recognition before. They are Graduation by Cristian Mungiu, Dogs by Bogdan Mirica, Two Lottery Tickets by Paul Negoescu, Scarred Hearts by Radu Jude, and Sieranevada by Cristi Puiu.

The nominees in the Best Director category are Cristian Mungiu, Adrian Sitaru (for Illegitimate), Cristi Puiu, Bogdan Mirica and Radu Jude. Director Cristian Mungiu, a 2007 Palme d’Or winner, received in 2016 the Best Director award at the Cannes film festival, a distinction he shared with French director Olivier Assayas.

Mimi Branescu (Sieranevada), Adrian Titieni (Graduation), Bogdan Dumitrache (Double), Gheorghe Visu (Dogs), and András Hatházi (Horizon) are nominated in the Best Actor category.

The contenders for the Best Actress award are Medeea Marinescu (03.ByPass), Dana Dogaru (Sieranevada), Maria Dragus (Graduation), Rodica Lazar (Horizon), and Alina Grigore (Illegitimate).

The Best Supporting Actor category has as nominees Adrian Titieni (Graduation), Vlad Ivanov (Dogs), Serban Pavlu (Scarred Hearts), Petre Ciubotaru (Graduation), and Sorin Medeleni (Sieranevada), an actor who passed away at the end of 2015.

The Best Supporting Actress category has this year four nominations of actresses with roles in Sieranevada. They are Tatiana Iekel, Catalina Moga, Ana Ciontea, and Judith State. The fifth nominee is Viorica Geanta Chelbea, for her role in The Miracle of Tekir.

Besides Sieranevada, Dogs has also landed more than 10 nominations, including in categories such as Best Script or Best Image.

Son of Saul, Toni Erdmann, La Isla Minima, Rams, and A Pigeon Sat on a Branch Reflecting on Existence are the films nominated in the Best European Film category.

The nominations were made by a jury made up of director Gabriel Achim, producer Oana Iancu, actor Doru Ana, script writer Raluca Manescu, operator Tudor Mircea, montage specialist Nita Chivulescu, and film critics Dana Duma, Ileana Birsan, Andrei Sendrea, Dragos Marin and Doru Pop.

In the coming period 500 active members of the local cinema industry will be invited to vote for the winners. The votes are audited by PwC Romania.

The Gopo Awards are the national Romanian film awards, modeled after the Academy Awards (U.S.A.), the Goya Awards (Spain), or the César Award (France). They were established in 2007 and were named in honor of Romanian film director Ion Popescu-Gopo. The trophy is a sculpture by Romanian artist Adrian Ilfoveanu representing Gopo’s Little Man, the main character of Gopo’s animation films.

The full list of nominees is available in Romanian here.

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editor@romania-insider.com