Danish-Egyptian director May el-Toukhy wins Venice Golden Lion for Woman Unknown

Danish-Egyptian filmmaker May el-Toukhy claimed victory at the Venice Film Festival, receiving the prestigious Golden Lion award for her film Woman Unknown. The drama follows the story of a woman concealing her past, hiding a wartime romance with a German soldier in post-World War II Denmark. The film also earned Mathilde Arcel the Volpi Cup for Best Actress.

The jury for this year's awards was led by actress Maggie Gyllenhaal, alongside Tunisian filmmaker Kaouther Ben Hania and Afghan director Shahrbanoo Sadat. Upon accepting the Golden Lion, el-Toukhy expressed her motivation for crafting Woman Unknown: "What kept me going was the urgent need to illuminate the unknown women of our common history, to make them known."

Arcel portrayed Marie, a maid who plans to marry her employer while keeping her wartime relationship in secrecy. The film, a Danish-Swedish-Latvian production, portrays Marie's attempts to safeguard her future amid societal backlash against women linked to occupying soldiers. Born in Copenhagen to an Egyptian father and Danish mother, el-Toukhy previously directed Long Story Short and Queen of Hearts, the latter winning the Audience Award for World Cinema Dramatic Competition at the Sundance Film Festival in 2019.

Her triumph came amid concerns over the scarcity of women directors in the main competition, with Woman Unknown being the sole feature directed by a woman in this year's running. Israeli director Rachel Szor co-directed the late addition Naza with Yuval Abraham, which received the special jury prize at the festival. The short documentary follows a Lebanese filmmaker in Paris as she observes the ongoing conflict in Lebanon through her phone, blending screen recordings with family testimonies to depict the experience of witnessing events from afar.

In the main competition, Israeli director Naza won the special jury prize for its examination of Israeli military operations in Gaza through testimony from military and intelligence sources. South Korean director Lee Chang-dong secured the Silver Lion grand jury prize for Possible Love, while Russian filmmaker Ilya Khrzhanovsky took home the directing award for Dau.

Actor John Malkovich claimed the best actor award for Martin McDonagh's Wild Horse Nine, and Stephane Brize, Coralie Amedeo, and Olivier Gorce received the award for best screenplay for A Good Little Soldier.