VENICE (Reuters) – Hard-hitting Israeli war movie "Lebanon" won the Golden Lion for best picture at the Venice film festival on Saturday.
Director Samuel Maoz shot almost the entire drama, featuring graphic and disturbing scenes of violence, from inside a tank to communicate the claustrophobia and fear he experienced as a young Israeli conscript during the 1982 war.
He was so traumatized by his memories that it took him 25 years to gather the strength to make the movie, which the New York Times called "an astonishing piece of cinema."
"I dedicate this award to the thousands of people all over the world who, like me, come back from war safe and sound," the director told the closing ceremony in Venice. "Apparently they are fine, they work, get married, have children. But inside, the memory will remain stabbed in their soul."
