Berlin 2012: 'The Parade' Wins Panorama Audience Award

BERLIN – The Parade, a comic farce from Serbian director Srdjan Dragojevic about the unusual friendship between a homophobic gangster and a gay veterinarian, has won the audience award for best film in the Panorama section of the 2012 Berlin International Film Festival.

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Parade, already a sleeper hit in Serbia and the ex-Yugoslavian territories, was a major buzz title in Berlin. The plot has Serbian macho Mafioso Limun, played by Nikola Kojo, bonding with the vet Radmilo (Milos Samolov) after Radmilo saves Limun’s prize pit bull.

In the documentary category, the Berlin audience cast its votes for Marina Abramovic The Artist is Present, Matthew Akers’ look at the controversial, and influential performance artist.

Runners up in the drama category were Daniele Vicari’s Diaz – Don’t Clean Up This Blood, a dramatization of the police crackdown against demonstrators at the G8 summit in Genoa in 2008; and the adventure drama Xingu from Brazilian director Cao Hamburger.

In the documentary category the runner-ups were Call Me Kuchu, the story of the life and death of Uganda’s first openly gay man; and The Virgin, The Copts And Me, Namir Abdel Messeeh’s look Coptic Christians in Egypt.

The winners will be honored at a ceremony in Berlin on Sunday.