Francesco Sossai’s road movie about unlikely friendship dominated the 71st edition of Italy’s premier film prizes, leaving Oscar-winner Paolo Sorrentino’s much-anticipated entry without a single award. The David Awards are the Italian equivalent of the Oscars.

The 71st David di Donatello awards, Italy’s equivalent of the Academy Awards, produced a decisive and largely unexpected result on Wednesday night, with Francesco Sossai’s Le Città di Pianura claiming eight prizes to become the dominant film of the evening.

Known internationally as The Last One for the Road, the drama follows two older men who strike up an unlikely friendship with a shy architecture student on a journey across the flat, atmospheric landscapes of the Italian plain. The film swept the David Awards most prestigious categories. It claimed Best Film, Best Director, Best Actor for Sergio Romano, Best Original Screenplay, Best Song, Best Editing, Best Producer, and Best Casting — a haul that left little doubt about the industry’s verdict on the year’s outstanding work.

Sossai, a director who has built a reputation for quiet, character-driven cinema far from the mainstream, now finds himself at the centre of Italy’s cinematic conversation.

The evening’s most notable absence from the winners’ podium was Paolo Sorrentino. The Neapolitan director, who won the Academy Award for Best International Feature Film in 2022 with È stata la mano di Dio, had been considered a serious contender with his latest work, La Grazia. The film left the ceremony without a single award.

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