Young Norwegian filmmaker Halfdan Ullmann Tøndel has received a major award at this year’s Cannes Film Festival, following in the footsteps of his legendary Swedish grandfather, director Ingmar Bergman.
Halfdan’s ‘Armand’, about the toll on caretakers, was awarded the coveted Caméra d’Or prize on Saturday evening, 25 May 2024. The prize is given to the best first feature film presented in one of festival’s selections. ‘Armand’, was included in the festival’s Un Certain Regard section – a section in which both his famous grandfather as well as his grandmother, Norwegian actress Liv Ullman, have previously had films.
Halfdan says it was an incredible feeling to have won. “Five hours ago I was playing with my children in Oslo,” says the 34-year-old, “and now I’m here!” His trip to Cannes was so last-minute that he actually got waylaid in a taxi and didn’t make it in time to receive the award on stage. However, he did make it on time for the press conference afterwards.
There was a buzz around ‘Armand’ from its first screening in Cannes, something that Halfdan could not escape. “Suddenly I was getting crazy attention,” he admits. To prevent himself getting “too self-satisfied” he said he felt it important to get on with making his next film. “You’ve got to be careful to stay balanced,” he says.
Addressing the fact that he comes from a great cinema family, Halfdan smiles and says: “I can’t do anything about it. It just is. My grandmother and grandfather were great legends of cinema but I didn’t discuss Tchaikovsky with my grandfather when i was seven.”
He says other people can talk about his relatives, but for him, he has to just “focus on my films. He (Bergman) made 57 films, and we can make comparisons in the end.”
