The INTERFILM Jury at the International Film Festival Venice 2013 has chosen as winner of the 3rd INTERFILM Award for Promoting Interreligious Dialogue the film

Motivation:  Fifty years after the birth of her son, Philomena, a deeply Catholic Irish woman, finally decides to find him again. A convent of nuns, where Philomena was taken in as a teenage-mother, had given him away for adoption. Only with the help of an atheist journalist she succeeds in discovering the story of her lost son. The audience gets involved in an intense dialogue between a non-believer and a believer in which tolerance and respect are essential. The film may give us a model of how to deal in our secular societies with various religious and philosophical convictions. It also shows how forgiveness enables us to live in a reconciled and peaceful way.

Members of the Jury 2013:
Freek L. Bakker, Netherlands
Gaëlle Courtens, Italy
Werner Schneider-Quindeau, Germany - Jury President

Trailer "Philomena"

Synopsis: Falling pregnant as a teenager in Ireland in 1952, Philomena was sent to the convent of Roscrea to be looked after as a “fallen woman.” When her baby was only a toddler, he was taken away by the nuns for adoption in America. Philomena spent the next fifty years searching for him but with no success. Then she met Martin Sixsmith, a world-weary political journalist who happened to be intrigued by her story. Together they set off to America on a journey that would not only reveal the extraordinary story of Philomena’s son, but also create an unexpectedly close bond between Philomena and Martin. The film is a compelling narrative of human love and loss that ultimately celebrates life. (Festival information)

The Jury members (from left): Werner Schneider-Quindeau, Gaëlle Courtens, Freek L. Bakker