Who Gets to Take Home That Shiny Symbol of Prestige at the International Film Festival

Audiences are important in the success of films, they can make or break a film. However, audiences differ in their levels of cultural capital, and consequentially in their position within the fields of cultural production, tastes, habitus, judgements standards and legitimacy. They assign different kinds of recognition (popular, professional, and critical) and add different kinds of value (economic or symbolic capital) to filmmakers and their films. The interest of this thesis is the assigning of professional recognition through prestigious prizes at international film festivals, and researching what attributes these award winning films possess. This research then contributes to filling up a gap left in previous studies, and gaining a better understanding of professional recognition, international film festivals and prestige. The aim of this research resulted in the following research question: Looking at several international film festivals—their award winners and nominees—from 1996 to 2016, how do cast and content related attributes influence or contribute to the chances of winning the award for best film at these prestigious cultural events? A quantitative approach was used to study the award winners and nominees over a period of twenty years at the three most prestigious international film festivals: Berlin, Cannes and Venice. The theoretical background already provided some research expectations, based on (logics of) the field of films and the position film festivals take therein. Film festivals position themselves as (crucial) authoritative institution within the field of films as art, which assigns (symbolic) value to films and filmmakers. Therefore, the award winning attributes should match with the characteristics that make an art film. The data was gathered using online databases, and analysed in SPSS. The results showed that juries of professional recognition indeed use aesthetic judgements standards that fit with the logics of the field of art films. Directors who (co)wrote the script and the artistic reputations of the directors and writers had a positive effect on the odds of winning. Only actors seemed excluded from these logics, where their star power and name recognition through economic reputations have more effect on the odds of winning. Experience also had either no effect or a negative effect on the odds of winning, reflecting that status does take precedence. In relation to content, dramas, R-ratings, and true stories had a positive effect on the odds of winning. Whereas adaptations, runtime, and budget had no effect on the odds of winning. Overall, attributes that fit with the concept of the auteur, artistic reputations, and attributes that signal artistic, unique, novel, innovative, meaningful and significant content have a positive effect on the odds of winning. These finding then implicate that film festivals are indeed positioned in the (autonomous) field of restricted production, focussing on films as art, symbolic capital and recognizing artistic achievements. Consequently, they are crucial institutions, contributing to maintaining the cultural position of art films, and the valorisation and consecration of films and filmmakers. They are a gateway to cultural legitimization.