Israeli director Joseph Cedar last night won the Silver Bear - best director award at the 57th international Berlin film festival for his film 'Beaufort '. Based on best-selling Israeli author Ron Leshem's book 'If There Is A Heaven', the setting for the film is a 12th century Crusader stronghold in southern Lebanon, just prior to Israel's withdrawal from that country in 2000. Israel's sudden withdrawal from Beaufort and Lebanon after 18 years of occupation is the backdrop for Cedar's film, which outlines the daily routine of a group of soldiers, their feelings and their fears, and explores their moral dilemmas in the days preceding the withdrawal.
Cedar, himself an IDF veteran who was stationed in Lebanon, uses the stone walls of Beaufort castle into a symbol of the futility and endlessness of war. The film was shot in northern Israel in the spring of 2006. Symbolically, filming was completed in June, just a month before Israel the second war in Lebanon broke out.
"This is a thrilling and blessed moment, proof of Israeli cinema's new position in the world," said Beaufort producers David Mendil and Dudi Zilber
This is the first time an Israeli director has won the prestigious prize. Cedar competed with 21 other directors, among them such well-known figures as Robert De Niro and Steven Soderbergh
Cedar joins two other big Israeli winners at the festival this year. Dror Shaul's 1970's-era kibbutz coming-of-age movie' Sweet Mud' was awarded the Crystal Bear award, first prize at the festival's Generation section for children and youth films. Eitan Fox's Tel-Aviv-West Bank gay love story 'The Bubble' was awarded second place at the Panorama awards.