The 29th edition of the Gran Paradiso Film Festival concluded on Sunday, August 9th, in the Aymavilles Castle Park. It attracted a total of 24,000 attendees and a 33% increase over the previous edition.
This result confirms the event’s growing appeal and rewards widespread programming in the Aosta Valley municipalities of Gran Paradiso, combining international nature cinema, cultural exploration, meetings with authors, and local development.
The evening saw the announcement of the winning films of the GPFF Online Award, awarded to “2000 jours au Paradis” by Véronique, Anne and Erik Lapied for feature films and to “Le bruit de l’aubépine” by Julien Deper for the short film category. Anne Lapied, a French director who for decades has sensitively and extraordinarily poetically depicted the mountains and the fauna that inhabit them, through a cinema deeply respectful of nature and its balance, accepted the award on stage in Aymavilles.
The jury of the online public awarded these latest prizes and, from August 2nd to 7th, viewed the films in competition through the Festival’s digital platform.
The Aymavilles evening concluded an edition that, from July 27 to August 9, brought great nature cinema to the municipalities of Cogne, Aymavilles, Introd, Rhêmes-Notre-Dame, Rhêmes-Saint-Georges, Valsavarenche and Villeneuve.
“The Gran Paradiso Film Festival is today a complex cultural machine: eighteen days of programming, seven municipalities involved, dozens of international guests, an online platform that takes films far beyond the valley’s borders”, declares Michel Martinet, President of Fondation Grand Paradis. “Behind these numbers is a collaborative effort, carried out by the artistic direction, staff, volunteers, municipal administrations, tourism operators, and partners who believe in the project and share its vision. The 24,000 visitors and 33% growth compared to last year demonstrate a real impact on the area, in terms of attractiveness, economic benefits for the Gran Paradiso communities, and international recognition. But the most significant growth isn’t just in numbers: it’s in the quality of the offering, in the ability to combine arthouse nature cinema, scientific dissemination, and the valorization of our valleys. It is a satisfaction we share with all those who made this edition possible”.
Commenting on the recently concluded edition and the chosen theme, Luisa Vuillermoz, Artistic Director of the Festival, states: «“Domain and coexistence” are two words that do not easily fit together, and we have chosen to stay within this tension, without consolatory syntheses. We did not want to represent nature only as an object of contemplation, nor to tell the story of society without its contradictions. Cinema, in this, does something that is particularly close to my heart: it changes the rhythm of the gaze. We are used to seeing a lot and watching very little, while a film asks us to stay, to follow a time that is not ours. The same happens in the De Rerum Natura talks, where one’s vision activates everyone’s thinking. This year I heard it with particular clarity: the questions, the meetings, the voting, the countless messages from those who participated brought back viewers who not only watch, but also appropriate the themes and bring them back into circulation. A festival really exists when it stops belonging only to those who organize it and those who lend their voice to it. This year it happened, and it is what we are most proud of together with the entire team: a satisfaction that gives us the responsibility of preparing the thirtieth edition as best we can».
The Gran Paradiso Film Festival is a project conceived by Fondation Grand Paradis in collaboration with the Department of Public Works, Territory, and Environment of the Autonomous Region of Valle d’Aosta; with the contribution of the Department of Tourism, Sport, and Commerce of the Autonomous Region of Valle d’Aosta, the Ministry of Culture, the Municipality of Cogne, the Gran Paradiso National Park, the Fondazione Cassa di Risparmio di Torino, and the Compagnia Valdostana delle Acque; with the support of the municipalities of Introd, Rhêmes-Notre-Dame, Rhêmes-Saint-Georges, and Villeneuve; with the patronage of the Aosta Valley Regional Council, the municipalities of Aymavilles and Valsavarenche, and the Nature Project Authority. Technical Partner Montura, Hospitality Partner Bellevue Hotel & Spa.
Fondation Grand Paradis Press Office
Tel. 0165-75301
info@grand-paradis.it – www.grand-paradis.it
