Six Césars for 120 BPM

120 BPM took home Best Film at the Cesars along with a clutch of other awards

With only a couple of days to go before the Oscars (look out for our live blog on Sunday) France’s César ceremony at the Salle Pleyel in Paris last night (March 2) gave the ultimate accolade of best film (as expected) to Robin Campillo’s 120 BPM (Beats Per Minute), which also nabbed five other awards including best male newcomer for Argentinian actor Nahuel Pérez Biscayart and another acting prize for best supporting actor for Antoine Reinartz.

Campillo took the opportunity to underline the the themes of the film about Aids activists in Paris in the early 1990s by suggesting that people need to remain vigilant and vocal in the face of repressive laws and legislation.

The other big winner of the evening, presided over by Vanessa Paradis and comedian Manu Payet, was Albert Dupontel’s See You Up There (Au Revoir Là-Haut), which scooped five awards including best director for Albert Dupontel. An adaptation of Pierre Lemaitre's Goncourt-winning novel that follows three surviving soldiers from the First World War who scheme their way to oblivion. 120 BPM’s Biscayart plays alongside Laurent Lafitte and Niels Arestrup.

An unlikely winner with three Césars was Hubert Charuel’s debut feature Bloody Milk (Petit Paysan), which sees the filmmaker channel his own childhood in France’s rural northeast – even shooting the film at his parent’s working dairy farm – and using it as the backdrop for a captivating psychological thriller in which a desperate farmer takes desperate measures to protect his livelihood. It was named best first film while Swann Arlaud received a best actor gong.

Over the course of a glamorous soirée in which most of the assembled throng, including Juliette Binoche and Isabelle Huppert, wore a white ribbon as part of a campaign launched by the Academie des Césars to combat violence against women (hashtag #NowWeAct) in the style of the #MeToo movement, Penelope Cruz received a career tribute accolade from her mentor Pedro Almodovar. The director compared her to such icons as Sophia Loren and Anna Magnani while Marion Cotillard said she had been an inspiration. Cruz who sat beside her husband Xavier Bardem, paid special tribute to her mother who sat glowingly in the audience.

There were a few surprises in the ceremony - Agnès Varda and JR’s documentary Faces Places (in the running for an Oscar) lost out to Raoul Peck’s I Am Not Your Negro (named best documentary) while best foreign film was awarded to Andrey Zvyagintsev’s Loveless, rather than Christopher Nolan’s Dunkirk or Ruben Ostlund’s The Square.

For the first time the Césars introduced an audience award which was bestowed on Danny Boon’s Raid Dingue, a comedy about a special police unit which drew over a million spectators in its first week.

Best Film

• WINNER: 120 BPM / 120 Battements Par Minute, dir: Robin Campillo
• See You Up There / Au Revoir Là-Haut , dir: Albert Dupontel
• C’est La Vie! / Le sens de la fête Eric Toledano and Olivier Nakache
• Barbara, dir: Mathieu Amalric
• Le Brio, dir: Yvan Attal
• Bloody Milk / Petit paysan, dir: Hubert Charuel
• Patients, dir: Grands Corps Malade and Mehdi Idir

Best Director

• Robin Campillo, 120 BPM (Beats Per Minute) / 120 Battements Par Minute
• WINNER: Albert Dupontel, See You Up There / Au Revoir Là-Haut
• Mathieu Amalric, Barbara
• Éric Toledano and Olivier Nakache, C’est La Vie! / Le sens de la fête
• Michel Hazanavicius, Redoutable
• Julia Ducournau, Raw / Grave
• Hubert Charuel, Bloody Milk / Petit Paysan

Best First Film

• Raw / Grave directed by Julia Ducornau
• Montparnasse Bienvenue / Jeune Femme directed by Leonor Serraille
• Mr & Mrs Adelman directed by Nicolas Bedos
• Patients directed by Grand Corps Malade, Mehdi Idir
• WINNER: Petit Paysan / Bloody Milk directed by Hubert Charuel

Best Original Screenplay

• WINNER: Robin Campillo, 120 BPM (Beats Per Minute) / 120 Battements Par Minute
• Mathieu Amalric, Philippe Di Folco, Barbara
• Julia Ducournau, Raw / Grave
• Claude Le Pape, Hubert Charuel, Bloody Milk / Petit Paysan
• Eric Tolédano, Olivier Nakache, C’est La Vie! Le Sens De La Fête

Best actor at the Césars: Swann Arlaud in Bloody Milk / Petit Paysan Photo: Unifrance

Best Adapted Screenplay

• WINNER: Albert Dupontel, Pierre Lemaitre, See You Up There / Au Revoir Là-Haut
• Xavier Beauvois, Drédérique Moreau, Marie-Julie Maille, Les Gardiennes
• Grand Corps Malade, Fadette Drouard, Patients
• Eric Barbier, Marie Eynard, Promise At Dawn / La Promesse De l’Aube
• Michel Hazanavicius, Redoubtable

Best Actress

• Juliette Binoche, Let The Sunshine In / Un Beau Soleil Intérieur
• WINNER: Jeanne Balibar, Barbara
• Emmanuelle Devos, Numéro Une
• Marina Foïs, The Workshop / L'atelier
• Charlotte Gainsbourg, Promise At Dawn / La Promesse De L'Aube
• Karine Viard, Jealousy / Jalousie
• Doria Tillier, Mr And Mrs Adelman / Monsieur Et Madame Adelman

Best Actor

• WINNER: Swann Arlaud, Bloody Milk / Petit Paysan
• Daniel Auteuil, Le Brio
• Jean-Pierre Bacri, C’est La Vie! / Le Sens De La Fête
• Guillaume Canet, Rock’n Roll
• Albert Dupontel, See You Up There / Au Revoir Là-Haut
• Louis Garrel, Redoutable
• Reda Kateb, Django

Best Newcomer (Female)

• Iris Bry, The Guardians / Les Gardiennes
• Laetitia Dosch, Montparnasse Bienvenue / Jeune Femme
• Eye Haïdara, C'est La Vie! Le Sens De La Fête
• WINNER: Camélia Jordana, Le Brio
• Garance Marillier, Grave / Raw

Best Newcomer (Male)

• Benjamin Lavernhe, C'est La Vie! Le Sens De La Fête
• Finnegan Oldfield, Reinventing Marvin / Marvin Ou La Belle Education
• Pablo Pauly, Patients
• WINNER: Nahuel Pérez Biscayart, 120 BPM (Beats Per Minute) / 120 Battements Par Minute
• Arnaud Valois, 120 BPM (Beats Per Minute) / 120 Battements Par Minute

Best Actress at the Césars - Jeanne Balibar as legendary singer Barbara

Best Supporting Actor

• Niels Arestrup, See You Up There / Au Revoir Là-Haut
• Laurent Lafitte, See You Up There / Au Revoir Là-Haut
• Gilles Lellouche, C’est La Vie! / Le Sens De La Fête
• Vincent Macaigne, C’est La Vie! / Le Sens De La Fête
• WINNER: Antoine Reinartz, 120 BPM (Beats Per Minute) / 120 Battements Par Minute

Best Supporting Actress

• Laure Calamy, Ava
• Anaïs Demoustier, The House By The Sea / La Villa
• WINNER: Sara Giraudeau, Bloody Milk / Petit Paysan
• Adèle Haenel, 120 BPM (Beats Per Minute) / 120 Battements Par Minute
• Mélanie Thierry, See You Up There / Au Revoir Là-Haut

Best Set Decoration

• Emmanuelle Duplay, 120 BPM (Beats Per Minute) / 120 Battements Par Minute
• WINNER: Pierre Quefféléan, See You Up There / Au Revoir Là-Haut
• Laurent Baude, Barbara
• Pierre Renson, Promise At Dawn / La Promesse De l’Aube
• Christian Marti, Redoubtable

Best Animated Short Film

• Le Future Sera Chauve, Dir: Paul Cabon
• I Want Pluto To Be A Planet Again, Dirs: Marie Amachoukeli, Vladimir Mavounia-Kouka
• Le Jardin De Minuit, Dir: Benoît Chieux
• WINNER: Pépé Le Morse, Dir: Lucrèce Andreae

Best Animated Film

• WINNER: The Big Bad Fox And Other Tales / Le Grand Méchant Renard Et Autres Contes, Dirs: Benjamin Renner, Patrick Imbert
• Sahara, Dir: Pierre Coré
• Zombillénium, Dirs: Arthur De Pins, Alexis Ducord

Best Cinematography

• Jeanne Lapoirie, BPM (Beats Per Minute) / 120 Battements Par Minute
• WINNER: Vincent Mathias, See You Up There / Au Revoir Là-Haut
• Christophe Beaucarne, Barbara
• Caroline Champetier, The Guardians Les Gardiennes
• Guillaume Schiffman, Redoubtable

Niels Arestrup and Émilie Dequenne in See You Up There Photo: Jerome Prebois/Unifrance

Best Editing

• WINNER: Robin Campillo, BPM (Beats Per Minute) / 120 Battements Par Minute
• Christophe Pinel, See You Up There / Au Revoir Là-Haut
• Francois Gedigier, Barbara
• Julie Lena, Lilian Corbeille, Grégoire Pontecaille, Bloody Milk / Petit Paysan
• Dorian Rigal Ansous, C’est La Vie! / Le Sens De La Fête

Best Sound

• Julien Sicart, Valérie De Loof, Jean-Pierre Laforce, BPM (Beats Per Minute) / 120 Battements Par Minute
• Jean Minodo, Gurwal Coïc-Gallas, Cyril Holtz, Damien Lazzerini, See You Up There / Au Revoir Là-Haut
• WINNER: Olivier Mauvezin, Nicolas Moreau, Stéphane Thiébaut, Barbara
• Mathieu Descamps, Séverin Favriau, Stéphane Thiébaut, Raw / Grave
• Pascal Armant, Sélim Azzazi, Jean-Paul Hurier, C’est La Vie! / Le Sens De La Fête

Best Costumes

• Isabelle Pannetier for BPM (Beats Per Minute) / 120 Battements Par Minute
• WINNER: Mimi Lempicka for See You Up There / Au Revoir Là-Haut
• Pascaline Chavanne for Barbara
• Anais Romand for The Guardians / Les Gardiennes
• Catherine Bouchard for Promise At Dawn / La Promesse De l’Aube

Best Short Film

• WINNER: Les Bigorneaux
• Le Bleu Blanc Rouge De Mes Cheveux
• Debout Kinshasa!
• Marlon
• Les Misérables

Best Foreign Film

• The Nile Hilton Incident, dir: Tarik Saleh
• Dunkirk, dir: Christopher Nolan
• The Royal Exchange, dir: Marc Dugain
• WINNER: Loveless, dir: Andrey Zvyagintsev
• La La Land, dir: Damien Chazelle
• A Wedding /Noces dir: Stephan Streker
• The Square, dir: Ruben Ostlund

Best Documentary

• 12 Days / 12 Jours, dir: Raymond Depardon
• WINNER: I Am Not Your Negro, dir: Raoul Peck
• À Voix Haute La Force De La Parole, dirs: Stéphane de Freitas and Ladj Ly
• Carré 35, dir: Éric Caravaca
• Faces Places / Visages, Villages, dir: Agnès Varda and JR

Best Original Score

• WINNER: Arnaud Rebotini, BPM (Beats Per Minute) / 120 Battements Par Minute
• Christophe Julien, See You Up There / Au Revoir Là-Haut
• Jim Williams, Raw / Grave
• Myd, Bloody Milk / Petit Paysan
• Mathieu Chedid, Faces Places / Visages Villages

Audience Award (given to the French film that sold the most tickets in 2017)

• WINNER: Raid Dingue, dir: Dany Boon
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