The Golden Eye Awards

The Berlinale has its Golden Bears, the Venice Biennale its Golden Lions, Locarno its Leopards and Hollywood its Oscars. But, what about Zurich?

Zurich has its Golden Eyes.

The eyes are the symbol of the Zurich Film Festival. You can see them everywhere in town. They are like a piece of art.

Nadja Schildknecht, co-director of the ZFF, shared with me once during an interview at her office that the first thing people notice when holding their prize it is the eye is heavy.It weighs over 13 pounds! “We wanted something heavy, which would look good when displayed at home”, she explains.

The idea started when the directors were looking for a logo four months before the beginning of the first film festival. They checked hundreds of logos from various agencies until they picked the one with an eye. “I also like the fact that it looks like a lens”, continued Nadja.

Next, they searched for an artist, who could make the awards. They chose a local man from Dubendorf, Gérald Koller. Nadja described him as a sweet and nice man, who is now in his mid 70’s.

For the last 15 years since the beginning of the ZFF, people in the movie industry have been honored with Mr Koller’s beautiful trophies.

When the international film festival was created by Karl Spoerri and Nadja Schildknecht in 2005 it did not even have a handful of awards. Just one award was distributed the first year to the Russian film “The Italian” by Andrei Kravchuk. There was also a retrospective about the deceased German actor and director, Rainer Werner Fassbinder. Famous in the New German Cinema (1960-1980) he is above all remembered for his film “The Marriage of Maria Braun” (1978).

With the years going by, the ZFF has become more and more popular, recognized around the world and has brought more and more well-known directors, producers and actors to Zurich. Gradually more films were shown in the cinemas and new categories for new awards were created.

In 2006 the tribute award category came to life to honour a director. It was first given to the British director, Stephen Frears, known for his films “Dangerous Liaisons” (1988) and “The Queen” (2006). In 2008 the festival directors added the Golden Icon award to recognize an actor or actress’ lifework. The first one was given to Hollywood actor, Sylvester Stallone. In 2010 two new awards were created: a special achievement award for American actor, Laurence Fishburne, and a career achievement award for Mexican director Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu.

Three new awards were added in 2012: a Golden Eye award for the best International film composer, a Golden Eye award for actress Helen Hunt and a Lifetime Achievement award for American actor, John Travolta.

ZFF Kids started as well in 2012 with only two films. In 2019 it will present 10 films. In addition the festival added workshops for children. Those were in a one day completely sold out.

This year the Zurich Film Festival will distribute 9 awards. German director, Roland Emmerich will receive a Tribute award, Australian actress Cate Blanchett will receive the Golden Icon award and the most prestigious award, the Golden Eye Award will go US actress Kristen Steward.

The closing ceremony with the presentation of the Golden Eye awards will take place at the Zurich Opera House on Saturday October 5th, at 8:30 p.m.

• Cate Blanchett
• cinema
• film awards
• Gerald Koller
• Karl Spoerri
• Kristen Steward
• Nadja Schildknecht
• Roland Emmerich
• ZFF
• Zurich Film Festival