Of Horses and Men wins Nordic Council Film Prize

Filmmaker Benedikt Erlingsson has won Scandinavia’s most prestigious cinema honour with his directorial debut Of Horses And Men. The Icelandic film, a festival favourite, beat competition from Lars von Trier’s sex drama Nymphomaniac, Eskil Vogt’s Blind, Ruben Ostlund’s comedy Force Majeure and Concrete Night from Pirjo Honkasalo to claim the Nordic Council Film Prize on Wednesday night (29Oct14).
Erlingsson is the first Icelandic director to win the accolade, which comes with a gift of almost $60,000 (£37,500).
Announcing the win, the members of the Nordic Council jury called Of Horses and Men “a strikingly original film with its roots in the laconic humour of the Icelandic saga tradition”.
They paid tribute to Erlingsson, adding he “demonstrates a profound understanding of the primal side of both horses and humans, using the animal’s point of view to depict tragicomic human behaviour”.
Other honourees at the Nordic Council Prizes ceremony in Stockholm, Sweden included Danish composer Simon Steen-Andersen, who picked up the Music Prize for Black Box Music, and Finnish author Kjell Westo, who was named the winner of the Nordic Council Literature Prize for his novel Mirage 38.