It is the summer of 1990, the Berlin Wall has fallen and it is the last summer in the GDR before reunification. In Emily Atef´s emotionally and erotically intense perspective of female desire, Maria, a dreamy eighteen-year-old girl, lives with her boyfriend on his parents' farm. One day, she meets Henner, the farmer next door. One touch is all it takes to ignite an all-consuming passion between Maria and the headstrong, charismatic man twice her age. Based on Daniela Krien´s novel.
Director Emily Atef will receive the Jean-Marc Vallée Award, introduce her new film SOMEDAY WE’LL TELL EACH OTHER EVERYTHING at the Thursday Screening at 6pm, and participate in a post-screening Q&A session.
EMILY ATEF
2023 JEAN-MARC VALLÉE VANGUARD AWARD RECIPIENT
The Jean-Marc Vallée Vanguard Award was created in 2022 as a remembrance to director Jean-Marc Vallée to celebrate his impact on the festival and on the world with his unforgettable filmmaking accomplishments from his early film C.R.A.Z.Y. to his more recent films including Dallas Buyers Club, Demolition, Cafe de Flore and his perfectly realized limited tv-series Sharp Objects and Big Little Lies.
Prior to his unexpected passing, in December 2021, Jean-Marc came to almost every edition of the Orcas Island Film Festival. He was our annual guest director, presenting new works of his own along with bringing other filmmakers he supported in addition to DJ ́ing at our evening festivities and eagerly seeing as many films as he could during his time on Orcas Island. He was so enthusiastic to share his craft and to engage with audiences, filmmakers and future filmmakers alike.
This year's honoree is director Emily Atef. Emily has two strikingly different films in the festival, MORE THAN EVER and SOMEDAY WE´LL TELL EACH OTHER EVERYTHING, showcasing Emily´s incredible talent and astute directorial range. OIFF will present a $10,000 cash prize to rising filmmaking talent Emily Atef at the screening of her film SOMEDAY WE´LL TELL EACH OTHER EVERYTHING on Thursday, October 12 at 6:00 pm at the Sea View Theatre.
Emily Atef is a French-Iranian director born in Berlin. Her first feature film, “Molly’s Way,” won the Best Screenplay Award at the Munich Film Festival and the Grand Jury Prize at the Mar del Plata Film Festival, as well as several other awards. Her second feature film, “The Stranger in Me,” about a young mother suffering from postnatal depression, also received several awards and screened in the Critics’ Week section at Cannes. She received a grant from Cannes’ Cinéfondation, which she used to write her next film, “Kill Me.” Atef’s film “3 Days in Quiberon” made its world premiere in the competition section of the Berlin International Film Festival and won seven Lolas at the German Film Awards, including Best Film and Best Director.
̈I am so touched by this award, ̈ said Emily Atef, ̈I am extremely honored that you have chosen me, through my work, to receive the Jean-Marc Vallée Vanguard Award. Jean-Marc Vallée was an incredible filmmaker who left us much too soon, he would of had so many more cinematic stories to share with us! I feel truly privileged to receive an award holding his name! ̈
