“Modern gay classic” French Armenian Serge Avedikian won Palme d'Or 2010 at Cannes

Simply amazing news. French Armenian director, actor, writer and producer Serge Avedikian received the highest award at Cannes - Palme d'Or - Short Film, 2010, for Chienne d’Histoire (Barking Island). [Another director of Armenian origin, Lebanese Armenian video artist and filmmaker Vatche Boulghourjian was awarded 3rd prize Cinéfondation Ex-aequo, 2010, for Hinkerord Zorasune (The Fifth Column). Congrats, Vatche!!]

Congrats, dear Serge!!

Serge Avedikian made an unforgettable mark on the history of world gay cinema by playing in a very different wartime love story - Nous étions un seul homme (We Were One Man), film by renown French director Philippe Vallois in 1979.



Critiques call it the “most unusual wartime love story”, “a modern gay classic”.

“We Were One Man' had its U.S. premiere at the Chicago International Film Festival in 1980, where it was awarded the prestigious Silver Hugo. Written, produced, edited, and directed by France's premiere gay director, Philippe Vallois [...]

Serge Avedikian who plays the French simple minded country asylum runaway Guy and Piotr Stanislas who plays the German soldier Rolf both deliver performances which are truly extraordinary.”

“In rural France, a male farmer comes across a wounded German officer. Allowing his pacifist nature to supersede his patriotism, the farmer hides the German in his barn. The two men become friends....and then, lovers. Handled with taste (if not always discretion), We Were One Man offers a fascinating variation on the standard "opposites attract" theme.”

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Brief biography (based on Wikipedia): Avedikian’s parents were born in France, children of survivors of the 1915 Armenian Genocide. In 1947, influenced by Stalin's and Maurice Thorez' propaganda, they left to rejoin the motherland, where Avedikian, born in Yerevan in 1955, attended the French school. At the age of fifteen along with his family, he returned to France. He got his stage debut in college, in his professor's amateur theater company. After studies at the Conservatory of Dramatic Arts in Meudon (France), he arrived in Paris in 1971 where he worked with the students of the Paris Conservatory. In 1976, he created a theater company and produced several plays. At the same time, he pursued a career as a theater, movie and television actor. In 1988, he founded his own production company but continues to direct films. Currently, he is working on his first feature film The Last Round.

(pictures - via Filmes de Interes Gay)