&lt;p>Five films have been shortlisted for the 2023 LUX Audience Award. The rating closed on 12 June 2023. Almost 45 000 people rated the nominated films. The LUX Audience Award 2023 ceremony take place in the plenary room of the European Parliament in Brussels. Press conference by Evelyn REGNER (S&amp;D, AT), EP Vice-president and the LUX audience award winner Lukas DHONT, Director and Angelo THIJSSENS, co-writer for Close and by Michael DOWNEY: chair of EFA, Honorary Member of LUX, President of the Selection Panel. The transcription is the result of an automatic process. Please, check against delivery.&lt;/p>

Brussels

press conference

REGNER, Evelyn (S&D, AT)

DOWNEY, Mike (IE)

LUX European Audience Film Award 2023 (T)

Press conference by Evelyn REGNER (S&D, AT), EP Vice-president and the LUX audience award winner Lukas DHONT, Director and Angelo THIJSSENS, co-writer for "Close" and by Michael DOWNEY: chair of EFA, Honorary Member of LUX, President of the Selection

https://api.multimedia.europarl.europa.eu/documents/20125/71115332/1687791280240_I243043Chapters%5BSD-EN%5D.srt

SOUNDBITE (English), Evelyn REGNER (S&amp;D, AT), European Parliament Vice-president, Excellent. Good evening. Congratulation to the both of you. I mean, who has watched the movie? And I think everybody who has watched the movie, had tears in the eyes because "Close" is a film that touches our hearts.

SOUNDBITE (English), Evelyn REGNER (S&D, AT), European Parliament Vice-president, It's on friendship and it's going very much in depth. And I think when watching this movie, I mean, we really go so in-depth to the heart of Europe, European Union, our values. And that is what a film is about.

SOUNDBITE (English), Evelyn REGNER (S&D, AT), European Parliament Vice-president, So, we had our magic moment right now. When we're learning who is the winner of this year's LUX Audience Awards. And I think we are all touched also by the words you were addressing before and afterwards when receiving the prize. Because again, it's always about our values.

SOUNDBITE (English), Evelyn REGNER (S&D, AT), European Parliament Vice-president, When your film has difficulties to be shown just in a smooth way in a Member State of the European Union, in Bulgaria, that gives us a lot to think. And I was very much honoured by you, but also by the other five, by the other four, so all five all together, presenting their films.

SOUNDBITE (English), Evelyn REGNER (S&D, AT), European Parliament Vice-president, Because it's all going in-depth on what we are standing for in Europe and that just thought it, where the members of the European Parliament, doing the politics and you are holding your political speeches on the films. So films are really something that they go close to our hearts. So, really congratulation to you.

SOUNDBITE (English), Lukas Dhont, director of "Close", I mean, thank you. I we feel incredibly honoured. And to accept this award tonight, the five films that were selected for the LUX Audience Award are five films that each in their own very specific way do something spectacular to me. They show parts of human nature to us, they're paradoxes, they're consistencies, are paradoxes are consistencies, and our need for intimacy, our search for magic, our desire for a place where we can be ourselves.

SOUNDBITE (English), Lukas Dhont, director of "Close", So it's an incredible honour to be among those films, among those filmmakers, and maybe even a bigger honour that so many Europeans went to see these films. Of course, there were the beautiful screenings organised over 500th. And there were all the subtitles, even in sign language that were created. Thanks to the LUX Audience Award organisation.

SOUNDBITE (English), Lukas Dhont, director of "Close", But the fact that so many Europeans actually cared for our cinema and went to see it, I see as a great motivation to now go back to our desk and sit there for three years and just look at each other and write, I suppose, before we can again try to make a bridge with the audience and try to say something or show someone to all of you.

SOUNDBITE (English), Lukas Dhont, director of "Close", I must say that it's also really like you addressed a bit of a strange moment for us being here accepting this award, because very recently in Bulgaria, two of our screenings were cancelled because of protests of an anti LGBT propaganda group who entered the cinema hall and started to take pictures of this of the film goers and say and scream anti LGBT slurs.

SOUNDBITE (English), Lukas Dhont, director of "Close", So it really made us reflect on, I suppose, the radicalness of the film, which I never considered it to be. I always considered it to be a very tender and soft film. But apparently it's one that sparks anger, too. And. I think that's... Therefore, it feels incredibly healing, I think, to receive this award today from the part of so many European audience members, and I now want to thank them for that.

SOUNDBITE (English), Angelo THIJSSENS, co-writer for "Close", As always, I fully agree with Lucas. And again, I am very glad for plenty of journalists here, and I know you're all writing and making other stuff about cinema. And it's it's really cool to get so much attention from all of you.

SOUNDBITE (English), Angelo THIJSSENS, co-writer for "Close", But please fight or even sue your editors to have more space for films that aren't winning awards and for films that are in cinemas and for stories that are telling stories that need to be told but are very often overlooked because they don't have big names or they don't win big awards. I think they're even more necessary to focus on than us. But I'm still glad you're here tonight, though.

SOUNDBITE (English), Michael DOWNEY, chair of EFA, I think I've got very little to add to that because you're all so eloquent and fabulous and all of that. And the one thing I would say that, I think what this prize and what this evening's event tells us is that cinema is really alive and well, and living in Europe. And that Europe is a driver of global creativity and art and culture and even industry, to use that word in the context of art and culture.

SOUNDBITE (English), Michael DOWNEY, chair of EFA, I think the five films that we've had here, that we've chosen last year, that have been on the circuit now for, you know, the best part of eight months, have brought new ideas, have brought smart ideas, have brought progressive ideas, and it brought a sense of Europe into people's real lives.

SOUNDBITE (English), Michael DOWNEY, chair of EFA, Because we've reached out to so many people and so many individuals at the level of distribution and at the level of exhibition in a post-pandemic world. Because in the post-pandemic world, we have to rebuild our cinema going culture.

SOUNDBITE (English), Michael DOWNEY, chair of EFA, Now, that's all I want to say, apart from one other thing, and that is to refer back to what Lukas was saying earlier, that this vote is a vote for plurality, democracy and diversity in Europe. And this vote says to people who have been doing what they've been doing in Bulgaria and in Hungary and in Italy.

SOUNDBITE (English), Michael DOWNEY, chair of EFA, That this vote says, we say no to your hate. We do not need your hate. It is not part of the European idea. And how fabulous that's been expressed here tonight in the hemicycle. Thank you.

Q&A, Question regarding on how the filmmaker feels about the cancellation of the screening of his film in Bulgaria.

Q&A, Question regarding issues screening the LUX Audience Award finalists in the Member States and if the organisers are planning any more screenings of the winner.

Q&A, Question about the process of working with young people during the making of the movies and if the director thinks if the new generations will manage to stray away from patriarchy.

Intervention from the audience, Comment from a film critic about the tenderness portrayed in the film and how this might help parents of young children experiencing similar feelings and situations as the ones portrayed in the film.