Ildiko Enyedi's offbeat abattoir romance won the Golden Bear at this year's Berlin International Film Festival.


Ildiko Enyedi's On Body and Soul, a deadpan romance set in an abattoir, is Hungary's entry for the 2018 Oscars' best foreign-language film category.

The feature won the Golden Bear for best film at this year's Berlin Festival and also scooped the international film critics honor, the Fipresci.

On Body and Soul follows the slow-burning romance between the stoical financial director of a meat processing plant (Geza Morcsanyi) and a beautiful but socially challenged quality control inspector (Alexandra Borbely). Oh, and there's a subplot involving a stolen vial of bovine aphrodisiac. That strange and potent mix was enough to convince the Berlin jury, headed by director Paul Verhoeven, as well as that of the Sydney Film Festival in June, where On Body and Soul also took the top prize, making Enyedi the first female director to win in the 10-year history of the Sydney fest.

On Body and Soul will have its North American premiere in Toronto. Films Boutique is handling world sales.

Hungary has been nominated nine times for the foreign-language Oscar and has won twice: for Istvan Szabo's Mephisto in 1981 and in 2015 for Laszlo Nemes' Son of Saul.


Source