German director and screenwriter Isabelle Stever’s film “I Rarely Wake Up Dreaming” won the Ethical Film Award of the Tokyo International Film Festival.
The award, organized in 2023 in partnership with the sponsor Sumitomo Corporation, highlights films that shed light on issues such as the environment, poverty and discrimination. The jury selects the winner from three candidates selected from the festival roster.
This year’s jury was chaired by two-time Japan Academy Film Award-winning actor Isomura Hayato, who helms the Shizuoka Film Festival in his hometown. He was joined by three members of the festival’s student public relations team. Other nominees included Brazil’s “Amadeo and the Hypothetical New World,” directed by Brenda Lígia and Edu Felistoque, and Australia’s “Time and Tide,” directed by Vee Shi.
Stever’s film, a German-Ukrainian co-production, opens in Kiev in late 2021, months before Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Oleh, a transgender man, tries to leave the country to escape the impending war but is not allowed to do so due to the gender stated in his documents. The couple, who stays behind with their partner Olya, struggles to keep their relationship and sense of self alive as the bombing approaches.
Stever’s previous films have premiered at the Berlinale and festivals in Toronto, Locarno and Busan. He worked on his last two feature films with his wife, Ukrainian novelist and screenwriter Anna Melikova.
Isomura said the jury rated the film highly because it tackled the issue of gender against the backdrop of the current war between Russia and Ukraine. The film follows a couple who are dragged into this war where their identity, sense of purpose and values are shaken and denied, and asks how people can continue to live under these conditions. He said the jurors chose it hoping that many people would see it and take some time to think about it.
Stever, who was unable to travel to Tokyo, accepted the award in a video message recorded during a break from teaching at a film school. “Queer doesn’t just refer to LGBTQ+, it also refers to something that hasn’t been normalized,” he said. “And we all know that if everything goes back to normal, we’ll stop breathing.”
He attributed this idea to autocratic regimes where people had to comply with set standards and had no choice, and Ukrainians fighting “so that people could still breathe in this country.”
The festival will send Stever a certificate and a cash prize of JPY 200,000 ($1,270) at a later date.