PARIS – Chinese filmmaker Wong Kar-wai will receive the Lumiere Award at the 9th edition of the heritage film festival set in Lyon, France, following in the footsteps of Martin Scorsese and Catherine Deneuve.
Run by French director Bertrand Tavernier and Cannes artistic chief Thierry Fremaux, the festival said it was paying tribute to Wong for “his unclassifiable films, each with countless flares of beauty, for the trace he is leaving upon cinema history, for all that is glorious and lingering in his work, for the neon lights of Hong Kong and the snows of Manchuria, and because, after all, dark glasses” – Wong’s trademark look – “are undeniably classy.”
The festival, organized by Lyon’s Institut Lumiere, added that Wong’s films, which include “Happy Together” and “Chungking Express,” have “reached beyond the circle of moviegoers and critics, attracting a public drawn to his search for the aesthetic and poetic.”
Wong said that receiving the award gave him “great pride to join those distinguished before me. To belong, in a way, to this Institut, inspired by the founders of cinema, makes me feel extremely humble.”
Previous Lumiere Award recipients include Clint Eastwood, Quentin Tarantino, Pedro Almodovar, Ken Loach, Gerard Depardieu, and Milos Forman, as well as Scorsese and Deneuve.
Wong has so far directed 10 feature films, four of which competed at Cannes: “Happy Together,” which earned him the best director prize in 1997; “In The Mood for Love” in 2000; “2046” in 2004; and “My Blueberry Nights” in 2007.
The Lumiere Award will be presented to Wong on Oct. 20 at the Lyon Convention Center in the presence of the French audience and a number of special guests from around the world.
The festival will take place Oct. 14-22.
