Italian filmmaker Paolo Sorrentino will be honored with the prestigious Honorary Heart of Sarajevo Award at this year’s Sarajevo Film Festival. The award recognizes his significant contribution to the art of cinema, and a retrospective of his work will be showcased as part of the festival’s “Tribute To” program.
Sorrentino will also participate in a Masterclass, engaging in a conversation with the audience about contemporary art and his creative process.
Jovan Marjanović, director of the festival, praised Sorrentino for his global impact through personal and local stories. “With visually stunning, emotionally powerful, and intellectually engaging work, Paolo has captured the hearts of audiences worldwide. His characters, though eccentric or isolated, serve as reflections of our world—sometimes absurd, often cruel, but always deeply human. The Honorary Heart of Sarajevo recognizes the beauty he has brought to cinema through his films,” Marjanović stated.
Sorrentino expressed his gratitude for the recognition, saying he was “deeply honored” and “thankful for the attention given to my filmography.”
Sorrentino’s career began with his debut feature One Man Up in 2001, which was selected for the Venice Film Festival. His film The Consequences of Love competed for the Palme d’Or in 2004, followed by The Family Friend in 2006 and Il Divo in 2008, which won the jury prize at Cannes.
He returned to Cannes in 2011 with This Must Be the Place and again in 2013 with The Great Beauty, which went on to win the Academy Award, Golden Globe, and BAFTA Award for Best Foreign-Language Film, as well as three European Film Academy awards.
In 2016, he competed at Cannes with Youth, which earned three EFA awards, an Academy Award nomination, and two Golden Globe nominations. That same year, Sorrentino created the acclaimed TV series The Young Pope, starring Jude Law and Diane Keaton, which earned Golden Globe and Emmy nominations.
Sorrentino’s later works include the 2018 film Loro, starring Toni Servillo, and the 2019 TV series The New Pope. In 2021, he wrote and directed The Hand of God, which was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Foreign Film, won the Leone d’Argento Grand Jury Prize, and received the Marcello Mastroianni Award at the Venice Film Festival.
In 2024, Sorrentino’s latest film Parthenope was presented in competition at Cannes and became one of the year’s most viewed films, winning the Biglietto D’oro.
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